When it came to marketing ventriloquism Fred Maher was a true genius. He created an empire, so to speak, for his ventriloquism course back in the 1930’s through the 1960’s.

Fred Maher & Skinny Dugan

He advertised his ventriloquism course in just about every publication you would pick up and read. I myself remember seeing his ads in the Johnson Smith catalogue, Popular Mechanics and Boy’s Life. If you ever wanted to be a ventriloquist, he certainly made it available to everyone and everyone at the time knew the ad.

In the same vein of thought Edgar Bergen, or his handlers, also saw the genius of marketing his popularity in the 1930’s and beyond by having Charlie and Edgar endorse products such as Coca Cola, GE Light Bulbs, etc.

Edgar Bergen, Charlie McCarthy, &
Mortimer Snerd

And then they marketed so many items with Charlie on them it is almost to hard to do a complete listing but I can give some great examples.

Effanbee Charlie Dolls of course come first, Charlie jewelry clips done in both metal and plastic also either moving or non moving mouths, Whitman Big Little books, Comic books, pencil boxes, Majestic radios, plastic walking Charlie, carnival plaster Charlie statues, Charlie McCarthy tin wind up toys, Charlie McCarthy silver ware …..well you get the idea. The list of items is endless.

Just the products that were available with Charlie McCarthy’s name made Edgar Bergen a very wealthy man and just think all this took place because of the Chase and Sandborn Radio show in which the duo appeared in voice only. I have to say they sure knew how to market.

Today Jeff Dunham is following suit with his array of toys depicting his characters.

Dan
www.ventriloquistcentral.com

***************************************************

Dan Willinger is a ventriloquism enthusiast and ventriloquist figure collector. He has been collecting for over 25 years. He created the Ventriloquist Central Collection. It now has over 100 ventriloquist figures and over 50 of them are Frank Marshall figures. Because of his love for the art of ventriloquism, Mr. Willinger created the website Ventriloquist Central. For more information about the website, go to: http://www.ventriloquistcentral.com

Copyright 2010 by Dan Willinger

NOTE: You may use this blog article provided you run it with the bio box intact. Please email a copy of your publication with the blog article in it to: webmaster@ventriloquistcentral.com

I happened to see that Clinton had asked on his blog about identifying a few small vent figures (here’s Clinton’s blog) and I had done a blog on the Davy Crockett figure made by the Grand Toy Co of New York. I sent him this link in case you missed it.

He had stated that he was cleaning out some storage so I asked him if he had any figures that he may be getting ready to sell and he let me know that in fact he was not a collector of vent figures and did not want to burden Adleia (his wife) with having to sell off or find where to put a collection once he may be gone. Therefore he never really collected figures he just built and sold them. Clinton told me that more than once he had been asked by widows of ventriloquists what they should do with their figures now that their spouses had passed.

I was motivated to tell this story because it is in fact true. You really should have a plan for the possessions if and when a spouse passes. The names and addresses of who to contact should be placed in your important papers so the information is available to the surviving spouse. I myself have made sure that I have this type of information available for my family just in case.

This is just a smart and easy thing to do and even though this is not what any of us like to think about it is a part of life and if you have a collection it must be done.

Dan
www.ventriloquistcentral.com

***************************************************

Dan Willinger is a ventriloquism enthusiast and ventriloquist figure collector. He has been collecting for over 25 years. He created the Ventriloquist Central Collection. It now has over 100 ventriloquist figures and over 50 of them are Frank Marshall figures. Because of his love for the art of ventriloquism, Mr. Willinger created the website Ventriloquist Central. For more information about the website, go to: http://www.ventriloquistcentral.com

Copyright 2009 by Dan Willinger

NOTE: You may use this blog article provided you run it with the bio box intact. Please email a copy of your publication with the blog article in it to: webmaster@ventriloquistcentral.com

Over the past few days I saw these articles and in case you missed them, thought I would share them with the Ventriloquist Central readers.

This is a nice article about Dave Parker of Marquette, MI.

Ventriloquist, dummies entertain at Arenac Eastern

Next up is a wonderful article about Edgar Bergen and Charile McCarthy and their radio days:

Contemporary Collectibles: Charlie McCarthy was no dummy

Last, but certainly not least is an article and video about a regular contributor to Ventriloquist Central, Val Hilliker and her work with the Virtues Project:

Character Education through ventriloquism

I hope you enjoy these articles.

Dan
www.ventriloquistcentral.com

***************************************************

Dan Willinger is a ventriloquism enthusiast and ventriloquist figure collector. He has been collecting for over 25 years. His collection of ventriloquist figures now numbers over 100 figures of which there are over 50 Frank Marshall figures. Because of his love for the art of ventriloquism, Mr. Willinger created the website Ventriloquist Central. For more information about the website, go to: http://www.ventriloquistcentral.com

Copyright 2009 by Dan Willinger

NOTE: You may use this blog article provided you run it with the bio box intact. Please email a copy of your publication with the blog article in it to: webmaster@ventriloquistcentral.com

Back in the early days you could look in any periodical from Boy’s Life to Look to Popular Mechanics and you would always find Fred Maher’s ad promoting his ventriloquism course. And he always had his side kick Skinny Dugan by his side to help with the promotion.

His course was so successful that his wife Madeleine Maher continued to sell it after Fred passed away and then Madeleine sold it to Clinton and Adelia Detweiler and he is still selling it today.

If you want this course I am sure Clinton would be happy to oblige. For more about the Maher Course, click here.

Fred Maher took many promotional shots of Skinny and these pictures were always retouched to eliminate the lines showing the mouth movement, the upper lip movement, the wiggling nose movement and the eyebrow movement.

I was fortunate to find an original sepia 8 x 10 photo of Fred and Skinny and these lines in this photo are not removed. It is a wonderful shot of one of the most famous McElroy figures and certainly one of the most favorite of all the McElroy fans. I hope you enjoy seeing this rare photo.

If you have any pictures of Skinny that you think the readers here at Ventriloquist Central would enjoy seeing please send them in to us to webmaster@ventriloquistcentral.com and we will post them right away.

Dan
www.ventriloquistcentral.com

***************************************************

Dan Willinger is a ventriloquism enthusiast and ventriloquist figure collector. He has been collecting for over 25 years. His collection of ventriloquist figures now numbers over 100 figures of which there are over 50 Frank Marshall figures. Because of his love for the art of ventriloquism, Mr. Willinger created the website Ventriloquist Central. For more information about the website, go to: http://www.ventriloquistcentral.com

Copyright 2009 by Dan Willinger

NOTE: You may use this blog article provided you run it with the bio box intact. Please email a copy of your publication with the blog article in it to:
webmaster@ventriloquistcentral.com