The Royal Guardsmen

Hailing from Ocala, Florida, the Royal Guardsmen featured Bill Balough on bass, John Burdette on drums, Chris Nunley handling vocals, Tom Richards on guitar, Billy Taylor on organ, and Barry Winslow sharing vocals and guitar duties. Between 1966 and 1968 the six-piece act achieved a short stretch of chart success through a string of novelty tracks built around the Peanuts cartoon figure Snoopy and his imagined World War I dogfights against German flying ace Baron Von Richthofen. Their first such effort, the million-selling “Snoopy Vs. the Red Baron,” appeared in fall 1966 and proved the strongest performer, while the immediate follow-up “The Return of the Red Baron” also climbed into the Top 40.

“Snoopy’s Christmas” reached the top of the seasonal listings at the close of 1967. Several singles outside the Snoopy series met with weaker results, leading the band to issue “Snoopy for President” in summer 1968 once the craze had already waned. Their final Top 40 entry came when the two-year-old debut single “Baby Let’s Wait” was reissued during the winter of 1968–1969. The original lineup disbanded in 1969, though a revised version with substitute members carried on for one additional year.