Tony the Tiger & 6 More Gr-r-r-eat Cereal Mascots

After hearing that the man responsible for the voice of Tony the Tiger, Lee Marshall passed away, you may have started to wonder about the people behind some of the other beloved cereal cartoon characters of your youth. As was reported Friday morning, Marshall died at age 64 of esophageal cancer on April 26. Marshall began contributing to the voice of Frosted Flakes' Tony the Tiger in 1999 when he started working with the original Tony, Thurl Ravenscroft who was having voice issues due to old age. In 2005, Marshall took over for Ravenscroft full-time after he passed away. During his life Marshall also worked in sports broadcasting, as a wrestling announcer, voice actor for cartoons, and radio DJ.

Now that we know a bit about the man behind Tony the Tiger, let's take a look at some other old favorites. "Cereal cartoon characters" sounds like a very specific thing, but there are a ton of them and if you ever watched Saturday morning TV as a kid, you're probably familiar with them all. There are some pretty interesting facts behind the figures that convinced you to eat sugary cereal.

Trix Rabbit

The Trix Rabbit was created in 1959 and, as you know, he rarely gets to eat Trix cereal: "Trix is for kids!" But on a couple instances, notably in 1976, 1980, and 1991, children were able to vote on whether or not the rabbit should be allowed to eat Trix and then special commercials were created. The video above from 1991 shows the results of voters choosing "Yes!"

Toucan Sam

Froot Loops' Toucan Sam is currently voiced by Maurice LaMarche who has a very long resume and who you might be familiar with if you're a Futurama fan. LaMarche voices Zapp nassitant Kif Kroper (the green alien that dates Amy) among other characters. He also voiced The Brain on Pinky in the Brain.

Crazy Craving

Did you know the super annoying "Me want Honeycomb" character was named Crazy Craving? Me neither.

Lucky the Leprechaun

The Lucky Charms mascot was voiced by the same actor, Arthur Anderson, for 29 years between its creation in 1963 until 1992. In 2005, Anderson, who is not actually Irish said of the part, "People have expectations. I just have an Irish-sounding name." He continued, "I had the luck of the Irish to get that part... I never got free cereal, but they gave me lots of green money. And it was a fun character to play. Hardly a day goes by when somebody doesn't ask me to sing the Lucky Charms jingle, and I'm proud of that."

The Flintstones

Of course you know who the Flintstones are, but did you know that Fruity Pebbles and Cocoa Pebbles cereal was created around the Flintstones? The Flintstones weren't added as mascots later, the cereal was created in 1970 with the Flintstones in order to boost Post's children's cereal sales.

Cap'n Crunch

Cap'n Crunch has an official biography which says that his full name is Horatio Magellan Crunch and that he was born on Crunch Island in the Sea of Milk, "a magical place with talking trees, crazy creatures and a whole mountain (Mt. Crunchmore) made out of Cap’n Crunch cereal." He also was once involved in a scandal involving claims that he is not actually a captain.