William Arnold Costello (February 2, 1898 – October 9, 1971), commonly known as "Red Pepper Sam", was an American actor and the original voice of ''

Popeye the Sailor Popeye the Sailor Man is a fictional cartoon character created by Elzie Crisler Segar.Fleischer Studios Fleischer Studios () is an American animation studio founded in 1929 by brothers Max and Dave Fleischer, who ran the pioneering company from its inception until its acquisition by Paramount Pictures, the parent company and the distributor of i ...

as the voice of Gus the Gorilla on the Betty Boop radio show, and they felt that the raspy voice he had used for that character would work for a series of cartoons based on Popeye (created by

E.C. Segar Elzie Crisler Segar (; December 8, 1894 – October 13, 1938), known by the pen name E. C. Segar, was an American cartoonist best known as the creator of Popeye, a pop culture character who first appeared in 1929 in Segar's comic strip ''Thimble ...

) they were planning. He was cast to provide the voice for the first Popeye cartoon, 1933's ''

Popeye Popeye the Sailor Man is a fictional cartoon character created by E. C. Segar, Elzie Crisler Segar.Jack Mercer Winfield B. Mercer (January 31, 1910 – December 7, 1984), professionally known as Jack Mercer, was a prolific American voice actor, animator and TV screenwriter. He is best known as the voice of cartoon characters Popeye the Sailor Man and ...

, who was working in the studio. Costello's final appearance as Popeye was in ''

You Gotta Be a Football Hero "You Gotta Be a Football Hero" is a song written by Al Sherman, Buddy Fields and Al Lewis in 1933. It is one of the most widely recorded and performed American football anthems of all time. Recording artists *Fred Waring and his Pennsylvanian ...

'' (1935). However, Costello wasn't prepared to give up the fame associated with voicing Popeye and, billed as "The Original Voice of Popeye", he voiced the character on a European stage tour and made several recordings for the Columbia, Decca, and Rex labels, including "Popeye the Sailor Man" (1935), "Blow the Man Down" (1935), "Tiger Rag" (1936), and "The Merry Go Round Broke Down" (1937), which, to avoid copyright problems in the USA, were only marketed overseas. For nearly a decade he was based in London.

Later life and death

With the start of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, Costello returned to the United States, where for a short period he toured the dinner theatre circuit before becoming largely forgotten. From 1959 until his death, he managed a trailer park in

San Jose, California San Jose, officially San José (; ; ), is a major city in the U.S. state of California that is the cultural, financial, and political center of Silicon Valley and largest city in Northern California by both population and area. With a 2020 popul ...

, and there he died on October 9, 1971. He was buried in the Mariposa District Cemetery in

Mariposa, California Mariposa (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Butterfly") is an unincorporated community and census-designated place (CDP) in and the county seat of Mariposa County, California, Mariposa County, California, United States. The population was 1,526 at ...

.''The Union Democrat''
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References

External links

* * American male stage actors American male voice actors 20th-century American male actors Male actors from Rhode Island 1898 births 1971 deaths Vaudeville performers {{US-voice-actor-stub