Paul Winchell

Paul Winchell (né Wilchinsky) was an American actor, voice actor, comedian, humanitarian, inventor, and talented ventriloquist. He was best known for voicing Tigger in the Winnie the Pooh franchise, Shun Gon the Chinese cat in The Aristocats, Boomer in The Fox and the Hound, and Zummi Gummi in the first five seasons of Adventures of the Gummi Bears.
Outside of Disney, Winchell was well-known for voicing Sam-I-Am, Guy-Am-I, and some of the Sneetches in the television special , Dick Dastardly in the shows , , , and (from ), and Gargamel in .
In Winchell's earlier years, he worked as a hypnotist by helping people undergo surgery. He had also been an inventor, with some of his ideas being an artificial heart and a flameless cigar lighter. A patent for one of his ideas, a disposable razor, was disapproved on the basis of it being considered ridiculous for people to buy razors to throw them away after a single use. Ironically, that concept had soon become hugely popular.
Winchell got into show business as a ventriloquist and had his own show called The Paul Winchell Show. He operated multiple puppets; two of his best-known ventriloquist dummies were named Jerry Mahoney and . The Jerry Mahoney puppet now resides in the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C..
During Winchell's time on Winnie the Pooh and Gummi Bears in the latter part of the 1980s, he had taken an interest in famine and malnutrition. With actor Ed Asner, Winchell lobbied Congress to appropriate foreign aid for landlocked nations to encourage the breeding of the tilapia fish, which was a source of protein and could survive in different types of waters. Although it had been well researched, their idea was ultimately disapproved as aquaculture in Third World nations that lacked access to the ocean was inadvisable.
Winchell was married three times, fathering five children. Through his second marriage to British actress Nina Russel, he had a daughter, April Winchell, who later became a voice actress herself.
==Roles==
Tigpic.png|Tigger(Winnie the Pooh franchise)
Shun Gon.jpg|Shun Gon(The Aristocats)
Boomer2.jpg|Boomer(The Fox and the Hound)
AdventuresOfTheGummiBears-DayOfTheBeevilweevils-ZummiGummi.png|Zummi Gummi(Adventures of the Gummi Bears; seasons 1–5)
AdventuresOfTheGummiBears-AGummiByAnyOtherName-SirTuxfordAndAmbassadorDribbly.png|Ambassador Dribbly (right)(Adventures of the Gummi Bears)
AdventuresOfTheGummiBears-GummiInAStrangeLand-SlumberSprite.png|Slumber Sprite(Adventures of the Gummi Bears)
Trolls-gummibears.png|Nip (right)(Adventures of the Gummi Bears; seasons 2–5)
Screen Shot 2014-10-21 at 6.41.45 pm.png|Shepherd(Adventures of the Gummi Bears)
==Gallery==
Winch1.jpg|Paul Winchell autograph photo with Tigger.
Manyadventures-10.jpg|Winchell in The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh: The Story Behind the Masterpiece.
==Trivia==
*Paul Winchell's co-star John Fiedler (voice of Piglet) passed away at the age of 80 on June 25, 2005, one day after Winchell's death.
*Winchell and his puppet, Jerry Mahoney, masqueraded as and in the short-lived game show .
*Winchell was considered to voice Luke in The Rescuers.
*Winchell was originally cast as Tigger in The Tigger Movie, but was dropped from the project due to his old voice which resulted to Jim Cummings replacing him.
==External links==
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fr:Paul Winchell
pl:Paul Winchell
pt-br:Paul Winchell
Category:Voice actors
Category:The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
Category:Winnie the Pooh
Category:The Fox and the Hound
Category:The Aristocats
Category:Deceased
Category:Ventriloquists
Category:Comedians
Category:Actors
Category:Annie Award Winner
Category:Annie Award Nominated
Category:1920s births
Category:2000s deaths
Category:Adventures of the Gummi Bears
Category:People from New York
Category:American people
Category:Males
Category:Television hosts
Category:The Disney Afternoon
Category:Radio actors