Beany and Cecil was created by animator Bob Clampett[3] after he quit Warner Bros., where he had been directing short cartoon movies.

Clampett is said to have originated the idea for Cecil when he was a boy after seeing the top half of the dinosaur swimming from the water at the end of the 1925 movie The Lost World.

The cartoon featured characters Beany, a boy, and Cecil the Sea-Sick Sea Serpent embarking on a series of adventures, often to discover ancient civilizations and artifacts.

Many other well-known classical music pieces were featured in the show as well, including The William Tell Overture (in the episodes "Beanyland" and "The Phantom of the Horse Opera"), Ride of the Valkyries and Flight of the Bumblebee.

The puppet origins and the form of Cecil inspired the famous science fiction author Larry Niven to invent an important extraterrestrial race called Pierson's Puppeteer as part of his Known Space series of novels and short stories (as originally stated in the story "The Soft Weapon".

Clampett also made sure to include his name in the lyrics of the often-repeated B&C theme song to gain more recognition with viewers and from the animation industry.

Image Entertainment released "Bob Clampett's Beany and Cecil the Special Edition" DVD in 2000, with 12 cartoon shorts and various show bumpers remastered from their original 35mm camera negatives.

Bonus features included four complete episodes of Time for Beany, audio tracks of original story sessions, backstage footage, lost animated works from Bob Clampett's studio, and a still gallery.

After a considerable delay, Volume 2 was released by Hen's Tooth Entertainment during 2009, containing 11 cartoon shorts, plus two more Time for Beany episodes, archival audio interviews with Bob Clampett, video interviews with celebrity fans of the series as well as animator Bill Melendez, original bumpers from Matty's Funday Funnies and other special features.