A Lantz Inside Gag

A couple of familiar names to staff at the Walter Lantz studio found their way into the 1956 cartoon Pigeon Holed.



Two of them are Lantz directors.



The third name belongs to writer Homer Brightman. Lantz had a Homer Pigeon before this cartoon, but he disappeared in 1943. It is possible Brightman’s name inspired a revival, though this version of H. Pigeon sounds and behaves differently than the one on screens in World War Two. He did not star in a cartoon after this one, though he made an appearance in a lame Hallowe’en TV special that Lantz produced in 1964, so it is possible the two Homers were just a coincidence.