Mel Blanc

**Melvin Jerome Blanc**, widely known as **Mel Blanc**, was an influential American voice actor and radio personality whose illustrious career spanned over six decades. Known globally for his significant contribution during the Golden Age of American Animation, Blanc lent his voice to several world-renowned characters like Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Tweety, Sylvester the Cat, among others. His iconic voice also gave life to characters from the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies theatrical cartoons. He replaced Joe Dougherty and Arthur Q. Bryan as the voice of characters like Porky Pig and Elmer Fudd. His voice work doesn't stop at animation; Blanc also worked extensively in radio programs, including his own short-lived sitcom. Mel Blanc is heralded as 'The Man of a Thousand Voices' and is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential personalities in the voice acting industry. Blanc was born in San Francisco, California, and attended Lincoln High School in Portland, Oregon. He had an early penchant for imitating various voices since he was 10 and turned this talent into a remarkable career. Throughout his career, Blanc was admired for his vocal versatility. His work ranged to Hanna-Barbera's television cartoons like Barney Rubble and Dino on The Flintstones, Mr. Spacely on The Jetsons, Secret Squirrel on The Atom Ant/Secret Squirrel Show, and many others. He also worked with Warner Bros, voicing numerous characters in their cartoon shorts and was one of the few voice actors at the time to receive on-screen credit. Towards his later years, Blanc voiced Heathcliff from 1980 to 1988. He continued to be active in denoting voice to characters even after a severe car accident in 1961 that left him in a coma for some time. That said, the allure of Mel Blanc's voice acting was so robust that even after his death, several of his characters' voices were used in subsequent productions.