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Mannie Davis & John Foster (1947)

The fox convinces the duck that the sky is falling, and the duck tells the hen, and both of them tell the pig, and the three of them tell the King and, the next thing anyone knows is that the whole kingdom is twatting and twittering over the upcoming catastrophe, with the exception of the one who started the rumor. But Mighty Mouse flies in, with a song on his lips, and sets matters straight.

The character was created by story man Izzy Klein as a super-powered housefly named Superfly. Studio head Paul Terry changed the character into a cartoon mouse instead (click here for the Terrytoon theatrical shorts).

Originally created as a parody of Superman, he first appeared in 1942 in a theatrical animated short titled The Mouse of Tomorrow. The original name of the character was Super Mouse, but after 7 cartoons produced in 1942-1943, it was changed in the 1944 cartoon ‘The Wreck of the Hesperus‘ to Mighty Mouse when Paul Terry learned that another character with the same name was being published in comic books. Super Mouse appeared briefly in the Marvel Comics interpretation of the character and was nicknamed Terry the First, as he was the first version of the character.

Mighty Mouse originally had a blue costume with red trunks and a red cape, like Superman, but over time this outfit changed to a yellow costume with red trunks and a red cape, his most popular colors. As with other imitations of Superman, Mighty Mouse’s super powers include flight, super strength, and invulnerability. He has demonstrated the use of X-ray vision in at least one episode, while during several cartoons he used a form of telekinesis that allowed him to command inanimate objects and turn back time. Other cartoons have him leaving a red contrail during flight which he can manipulate at will like a band of solid flexible matter.

The initial formula of each story consisted of an extended setup of a crisis which needs extraordinary help to resolve, after which Mighty Mouse appears to save the day.

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Mannie Davis (1950)

Heckle and Jeckle the Talking Magpies in King Tut’s Tomb finds our beloved hecklers in Egypt, inside King Tut’s tomb, where they encounter all sorts of mysterious marvels.

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.

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Mannie Davis (1944)

While sleeping with Sourpuss, Gandy dreams about Sourpuss’s girlfriend, so Sourpuss keeps waking him and beating him up. Later, Sourpuss figures out how he can get into the dreams, too.

Terrytoons was an animation studio in New Rochelle, New York, that produced animated cartoons for theatrical release from 1929 to 1972. Terrytoons was founded by Paul Terry, Frank Moser, and Joseph Coffman, and operated out of the “K” Building in downtown New Rochelle.

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John Foster and Mannie Davis (1930)

Good Old Schooldays is a 1930 American film produced by The Van Beuren Corporation and released by Pathe. The film, which features Milton and Rita Mouse, was directed by John Foster and Mannie Davis. Synchronization by Gene Rodemich. The film takes place inside of a schoolhouse, and is part of the series entitled Aesop’s Sound Fables, though its plot has no relation to the actual Aesop’s Fables of 600 BCE.

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Mannie Davis (1945)

Ants in Your Pants is a 1945 animated cartoon from Terrytoons featuring what they are most notorious for: cycles! And cycles of the commonest kind: ants harvesting and a baby factory! It also has a voluptuous Queen Ant and a sweetly delivered punchline which may make it worth your trouble. Withheld from television release; presumably because it leaves too many “birds-and-bees” questions unanswered for tiny tots (and their beleaguered parents).