The Mel Blanc Project was a series of public history/art education events made possible in part by a grant from the Kinsman Foundation and by a grant from the James F. and Marion L. Miller Foundation.
The Mel Blanc Lecture Series examined Mel Blanc’s Portland years through the lens of vaudeville he saw, the music he heard, the radio he made, and the South Portland neighborhood in which he grew up. Guest speakers shared their expertise via onstage conversations that audiences were invited to join. The lectures took place June 8 – June 29, 2011.
The Mel Blanc Walking Tours introduced Mel Blanc’s Portland by matching key events of Mel Blanc’s childhood and early adulthood with the exact sites in Portland where those events took place. The walking tours took place July 23 and July 30, 2011.
Oregon Cartoon Institute’s Beginner’s Guide to Mel Blanc was compiled to provide basic information. Think of it as a first aid kit to fight complete ignorance. It is available to all, just return the kit back to the wall when you are through using it.
Q: Who was Mel Blanc?
A: Mel Blanc ( 1908 – 1989) was the premier voice artist of Hollywood’s Golden Age of Animation. The first voice artist to receive screen credit, he is widely viewed as the first truly professional voice artist.
Q: What did he do?
A: He provided voices for hundreds of cartoon characters. The majority of Warner Brothers’ Merrie Melodies and Looney Tunes characters were voiced by this one man. Bugs Bunny, Porky Pig and Daffy Duck are three of his most famous characterizations.
Q: Is that his real name?
A: No. His birth name was Melvyn Jerome Blank. He was born May 30, 1908 in San Francisco to Frederick and Eva (Katz) Blank.
Q: How did he come to be a voice artist?
A: He began imitating voices at an early age. He made his radio debut in 1927, at age nineteen, when he was recruited by an early Portland radio show, the KGW Hoot Owls, to sing a novelty song.
Q: The voice of Bugs Bunny came from Portland, Oregon?!
A: Correct. The Blank family moved to Portland in 1915, when Mel was five and a half.
Q: When did Mel Blanc go Hollywood?
A: He moved to Los Angeles in 1935, and was hired by Leon Schlessinger to provide the voice of a drunk in Picador Porky in 1937, his first Warner Brothers cartoon.
Q: Why are you celebrating his life and career with the Mel Blanc Project?
A: You are showing signs of advancing to the next level of Mel Blanc scholarship.
For more information about Mel Blanc, see the Archives.
