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Actor · Director

1894-09-23 · Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA · Male

10 series in the catalog

William "Billy" Bletcher (September 24, 1894 – January 5, 1979) was an American actor. He was known for his prolific voice acting career for cartoons during the golden age of American animation, most notably Pete in Walt Disney Productions' Mickey Mouse short films and the Big Bad Wolf in Three Little Pigs. He also voiced various miscellaneous characters in cartoons from other studios, as well as Spike in various Tom and Jerry shorts.

Early life

William Bletcher was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, on September 24, 1894, to Huber and Dora Bletcher.

Career

Bletcher appeared on-screen in films and later television from the 1910s to the 1970s, including appearances in several Our Gang and The Three Stooges comedies.

He was most active as a voice actor. His voice was a deep, strong and booming baritone. Bletcher provided the voices of various characters for Walt Disney Productions (including his recurring roles as Black Pete and the Big Bad Wolf). He auditioned to play one of the dwarfs in Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937). However, Walt Disney disapproved for fear that people would recognize Bletcher from the studio's Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck short subjects.

His booming voice can also be heard as "Don Del Oro" the Yacqi Indian god in the 1939 Republic serial, Zorro's Fighting Legion. He also provided voice work for Ub Iwerks as the Pincushion man in the 1935 animated short Balloon Land, Owl Jolson's disciplinarian violinist father in the 1936 Warner Bros. short subject based on the song I Love to Singa, a wolf character almost identical to Walt Disney's incarnation in the Ub Iwerks cartoon "Little Boy Blue" released in 1936 and the menacing spider in Bingo Crosbyana.

In 1939, Billy Bletcher and Pinto Colvig were hired to perform ADR work for the Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz.

In MGM films, he voiced Spike the Bulldog and on some occasions even Tom Cat, in Tom and Jerry, and in Warner Bros. many characters, most notably Henry "Papa" Bear of Chuck Jones' The Three Bears. He voiced the villainous wolf in Little Red Riding Rabbit (1944).

Bletcher did voice acting for the 1944 Private Snafu World War II training film "Gas", where Bletcher voices the villainous Gas Cloud. Bletcher also portrayed The Captain in The Captain and the Kids with MGM cartoons.

In 1950, he portrayed several characters on The Lone Ranger radio program as well as the TV series.

In 1971, he portrayed one of his final roles, Pappy Yokum in a television adaptation of Lil Abner. In 1978, he was originally hired to voice the Weed on The Plastic Man Comedy/Adventure Show, but had to drop out due to illness.

Personal life

Bletcher married actress Arlyn H. Roberts in 1915 and had a daughter, Barbara.

Death

Bletcher died at the age of 84 on January 5, 1979, in Los Angeles, California.