John McLeish - The Narrator of the Goofy "How To" Cartoons

Q: Who does the voice of the sportscaster in the Goofy cartoons on football and basketball? I believe he also does the same thing in this short called Football Now and Then as well as in Moochie of Pop Warner Football. Do you know who the actor is?
Michael, Granite Bay, California 

A [Dave Smith]: The narrator of the Goofy "how to" cartoons was John McLeish, who was an animator and story man at Disney in the 1940s.

[Marcio Disney]

Here is a photo during the production of Disney’s The Reluctant Dragon on November 7, 1940. Actress Frances Gifford, who played a studio artist in the film, is the woman in the photo. Clockwise from Gifford: John McLeish, T. Hee, Ward Kimball, Fred Moore (back), Norm Ferguson (back) and Erdman Penner.

Dumbo was also narrated by John McLeish.

Goofy - How to Play Football (1944)

Goofy - How to Play Baseball (1944)

Goofy - How to Play Golf (1944)

Mickey, Goofy and Donald's Siblings

Q: I know that Mickey has two nephews: Morty and Ferdie, Donald has three nephews: Huey, Dewey and Louie, and Goofy has a son, Max, yet I don't ever recall hearing about Mickey or Donald's siblings or Max's mother. Can you tell me more about this younger generation of Disney characters and how they came to be?

Rachael, Littleton, Colorado 

A [Dave Smith]: Disney artists only created characters when they were needed for a story; in the theatrical cartoons no sibling was ever created for Mickey Mouse, and only in some early cartoons did Goofy have a wife. We are told in Donald's Nephews that Donald's sister was named Dumbella, but she was never used in a cartoon. A multitude of relatives for the characters were created for comic books and comic strips.