Warners' One-Shot Crow

Just because the voice credit on screen reads “Mel Blanc” doesn’t mean Blanc is the only person heard in that particular Warner Bros. cartoon. Yes, June Foray and Daws Butler were heard somewhat regularly in the 1950s, but there were others who are far lesser known—unless you’re really familiar with old radio comedy/variety shows.

Director Bob McKimson seems to have gone out of his way to not cast Blanc on occasion. A good example is Sheldon Leonard, who appeared in two cartoons as Dodsworth the cat. Jim Backus shows up in his pre-Magoo days as a miffed genie in a Bugs Bunny cartoon. Musician Lloyd Perryman and veteran actor Herb Vigran, who had worked for John Sutherland Productions, are each in one McKimson short.

But there’s an obscure voice, one that appeared in one really odd cartoon that seems like a misfire by McKimson in creating a new character. That’s the unnamed crow in Corn Plastered, released in 1950.

McKimson dipped into network radio to cast the voice in this one, too. The actor appeared on the Edgar Bergen/Charlie McCarthy show for a number of years. Everyone thinks of Bergen as having dummies as foils (including Mortimer Snerd, the origin of Beaky Buzzard’s voice). But there was a strange human character with twists of the English language on the show. He was named Ercil Twing and played by Pat Patrick. His voice (sped-up) is the one you hear as the crow, who behaves pretty much like Twing does.

Just who was Pat Patrick?

Let’s find out from the “Radio Sidelights” column of the Kansas City Star, March 14, 1948.

Pat Patrick’s Star Rises in The Role of Ercil Twing
Character Actor on Edgar Bergen Show Gets More Laughs Than Charlie McCarthy or Mortimer Snerd — Milque-Toast Part Developed by Accident
THE supporting players on several of the top-rated comedy shows have much to do with the success of the programs. On some shows such personalities seem to get more and louder laughs than the stars.
That Is especially true on the Edgar Bergen-Charlie McCarthy show. The supporting player in that case is Pat Patrick in the role of Ercil Twing. Patrick has caught on in a big way this season, and seems to be gaining in popularity each week.

The studio audiences virtually go into hysterics when he appears on the broadcast even before he says a word. What is so funny? the listeners wonder. Does he fall down on the way to the microphone? Does he cut his suspenders or make faces? We decided to try to find out.
As far as we could learn, Patrick has done nothing more than to accent the character part his appearance. Those who saw him here last year will remember that he swings onto the stage in a prissy manner, with his hair pasted across his forehead. He wears nose gold-rimmed glasses and portrays a fussy, Casper Milquetoast role.
Patrick is a Mid-Westerner who has been in the show business some time, although his radio career didn’t start until 1942. He was scheduled to start on the air in Los Angeles as a disc jockey on KMPC on December 7, 1941. That was the day the United States entered the war and the program was nipped in the bud.
He stayed on the West coast and was doing the apologetic “Ercil” role in a Hollywood nightclub when Edgar Bergen saw him and six months later Patrick was on the radio program. He has been on it since, except for a stretch in the army.
Bom Ersel Kirkpatrick in Strawberry Point, Ia., he ran away from home at the age of 16 to join a circus. He spent two years as a clown with the Al G. Barnes circus. Then he played stock and tent shows and appeared on the Chautauqua circuit.
At the age of 22 Patrick struck out on his own — as a producer and actor in an original stage production in Los Angeles. It was there that ’’Ercil,’’ the radio character was developed.
"As part of the after-show I did a travel lecture," Pat explains. “One day by accident I used a hesitant, high voice. The audience liked it and Twing was born.”
Many persons have asked Pat if the character he played is based on a real person. Pat’s answer is that “He’s a little like my father and a great deal like my brother who teaches school in a small New York town.”
Some Kansas City ex-GIs will remember Patrick in the army by his real name of Kirkpatrick. He was stationed for a while at Hammer Field, Fresno, Calif. Carl Cooper of The Star’s staff says Patrick was attached to special services as an entertainer. “Patrick did a ventriloquist act and used a dummy part of the time,” Cooper said.
Patrick is married and the father of a 5-year-old son, Jeffrey.

Corn Plastered has a copyright date on screen of 1950. It was released March 3, 1951, though we’ve found it playing on February 24th at the Granada Theatre in Streator, Ill.

Patrick was on Bergen’s TV debut in a special on Thanksgiving 1950 (doing very little, according to Variety). He apparently left Bergen’s radio show soon after that and concentrated on nightclub appearances as Twing and other characters.

The same fate befell Patrick as radio and cartoon actor Frank Graham. The Hollywood Citizen-News of August 20, 1954 reported:

Pat Patrick Rites Planned
Funeral services today are pending for Pat Patrick, 40, comedian of stage and radio, well known for his role of Ercil Twing on the Edgar Bergen radio series.
North Hollywood police listed the death a suicide yesterday after carbon monoxide gas was piped into his station wagon with a vacuum cleaner hose.
He was discovered in the 2000 block on Ventura Blvd., across the street from property which he purchased to open a bar.
Police reported no suicide notes were found in the car and his widow, Dani Patrick, said she knew of no reason why her husband would kill himself. Mr. Patrick left Wednesday night to get his business ready for opening, and did not return home.

Corn Plastered was Patrick’s only cartoon. Nowhere have we found Patrick mentioned in newspapers of the day in connection with it, nor does it seem anyone asked McKimson how Patrick came to be in it.

Late Additional Note: Patrick was originally identified by Keith Scott. His book on cartoon actors of the Golden Age is on sale. Buy it.