Heckle and Jeckle

Heckle and Jeckle are postwar animated cartoon characters created by Paul Terry, originally produced at his own Terrytoons animation studio and released through 20th Century Fox. The characters are a pair of identical anthropomorphic yellow-billed magpies who usually cause problems to others and on themselves with their bizarre antics. Heckle speaks in a tough New York style manner, while Jeckle has a more polite British accent. They were voiced at different times by Sid Raymond (1947), Ned Sparks (1947–51), Roy Halee (1951–61), Dayton Allen (1956–66) and Frank Welker (1979). Production history The Talking Magpies, released January 4, 1946, was the first Terrytoons cartoon to feature a pair of wisecracking magpies. This was a husband-and-wife pair, not the pair of identical birds that they would become. Terry was taken with the idea of a pair of identical characters, and followed up with The Uninvited Pests (November 29, 1946), which established the pair as new characters. Terrytoons made 52 Heckle and Jeckle theatrical cartoons between 1946 and 1966. The early cartoons paired the duo with the popular song of the time, "Listen to the Mocking Bird", as their theme. Television shows After Paul Terry sold the Terrytoons studio to CBS in 1955, the studio's cartoons were repackaged in different timeslots. In summer 1956, the premiere episode of the primetime CBS Cartoon Theater included the 1947 magpie short Flying South.