{"id":12286,"date":"2013-01-25T10:30:08","date_gmt":"2013-01-25T14:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/devwp.davison.com\/blog\/?p=12286"},"modified":"2019-10-14T10:57:26","modified_gmt":"2019-10-14T14:57:26","slug":"paul-winchell-an-amazing-inventor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.davison.com\/blog\/paul-winchell-an-amazing-inventor\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Winchell: An Amazing Inventor"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"DavisonWhat if we told you that there once was this amazing man who had many talents: comedian, ventriloquist, voice actor, inventor, and humanitarian \u2013 would you believe us? OK, you\u2019d say \u2013 that could happen. But what if we said that he was also the host of a prime-time television show, the host of a children\u2019s show, and has a star on Hollywood\u2019s Walk of Fame? Would you believe us then? Maybe, you\u2019d say \u2013 but that is pretty cool if it\u2019s all true. Then what if we said that this guy also invented the first mechanical artificial heart that could be implanted in a person\u2019s chest cavity? Would you still believe us? No way, you\u2019d say \u2013 that\u2019s just over the top.<\/p>\n

Well, meet Paul Winchell; actor and inventor extraordinaire. Some may remember Paul Winchell from when they were small children, watching his children\u2019s show on Saturday morning. It was fascinating. What made it so cool was that he was a ventriloquist and had two ventriloquist dummies named Jerry Mahoney and Knucklehead Smiff. Throughout time, many people have been fascinated by ventriloquists and their ability to make their voice seem to come from another place.<\/p>\n

Ventriloquists have been dazzling audiences for thousands of years, but just in the time we have had radio and television, we have had such artists as Edgar Bergan, Paul Winchell, Shari Lewis and even today we laugh at Jeff Dunham and his curmudgeonly old dummy named Walter. So it\u2019s no surprise that little kids would be fascinated by Paul Winchell and his alter egos, Jerry and Knucklehead, back in the 60\u2032s and 70\u2032s.<\/p>\n

\"DavisonYou may recognize his distinctive voice in numerous animated roles for film and television cartoons. Turns out, he was a very successful voice actor and did a lot of work for Disney and Hanna-Barbera cartoons. Perhaps his best remembered role was as the voice of \u2018Tigger\u2019 in the Walt Disney movie \u201cWinnie-the-Pooh and the Blustery Day,\u201d which earned an Academy Award for best animated short film. He won a Grammy for the best children\u2019s recording of the year for \u201cWinnie-the-Pooh and Tigger Too.\u201d<\/p>\n

His voice gave life to many other characters, including Boomer in \u201cThe Fox and the Hound,\u201d the Siamese cat in Disney\u2019s \u201cAristocats,\u201d and many Hanna-Barbera characters, including the evil Gargamel of \u201cThe Smurfs.\u201d Winchell provided the voices of Sam-I-Am and his friend in \u201cGreen Eggs and Ham\u201d from the animated television special \u201cDr. Seuss on the Loose\u201d in 1973. In commercials, he voiced the Scrubbing Bubbles for Dow Chemicals and Mr. Owl for Tootsie Roll Pops.<\/p>\n

But what was probably most fascinating about Winchell was the fact that he was a very successful inventor. Over the course of his life, he held patents on over 30 devices, including a disposable razor, a flameless cigarette lighter, an illuminated ballpoint pen, a retractable fountain pen, an inverted novelty mask, battery-operated heated gloves, an indicator to show when frozen food had gone bad after a power outage, and the first artificial human heart. That\u2019s right, the artificial heart.<\/p>\n

This invention was developed through collaboration with Dr. Henry Heimlich, inventor of the Heimlich Maneuver, and held the first patent for such a device. Though Dr. Robert Jarvik has been referred to as \u201cthe inventor of the artificial heart,\u201d documents from the United States Patent Office show that on February 6, 1961, Paul Winchell filed for a patent on his artificial heart. He was granted a patent (3097366) on\u00a0 July 16, 1963, well before the Jarvik-7 was ever invented.<\/p>\n

\"DavisonWinchell established more medical patents while working on projects for the Leukemia Society and the American Red Cross. Some of his other medical inventions were a portable blood plasma defroster, a piezo-electric diaphragm, and a sectional garment for hypothermia. And there\u2019s more. He was also an entrepreneur who owned a shirt factory; and a humanitarian who proposed an idea he called \u201cThe Tilapia Project,\u201d which would have used the production of rapidly reproducing tilapia fish as a source of protein for undernourished people in sub-Saharan Africa.<\/p>\n

We grew up thinking Tigger was all bounce and no brains; so if we told you the man who is the voice of Tigger is really a creative genius who has accomplished so many amazing things in his life, would you believe me?<\/p>\n

We bet you would now…<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

SOURCES<\/strong>
\nhttp:\/\/paulwinchell.net\/bio.html
\nhttp:\/\/web.mit.edu\/invent\/iow\/winchell.html
\nhttp:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2005\/06\/27\/movies\/27winc.html?_r=0<\/p>\n