[7][8][9] When he was three months old, he was adopted by real estate appraiser Howard Dunham and his homemaker wife Joyce, who raised him in a devoutly Presbyterian household[9] in an affluent Dallas neighborhood, as an only child.

[9] When Dunham was in the sixth grade, he began attending the Vent Haven ConVENTion in Fort Mitchell, Kentucky, an annual international meeting of ventriloquists that includes competitions, where he met Jimmy Nelson in person.

The organizers of the ConVENTion eventually declared Dunham a "retired champion", ineligible from entering any more competitions, because other attendees were too intimidated to compete against him.

[12] He was voted Most Likely to Succeed, and in 1980, after he graduated from high school, Dunham gave himself a career goal of obtaining, within ten years, an appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, which was seen as the "holy grail" for comedians.

[9] That year Dunham began attending Baylor University, hoping to graduate with a degree in communications, while performing around campus.

[9] He would also fly around the country on weekends,[1] doing up to 100 private shows a year,[9] entertaining corporate customers such as General Electric, whose CEO, Jack Welch, he mocked during his routine.

[9] He caught a break in 1985 when he was asked to join the Broadway show Sugar Babies with Mickey Rooney and Ann Miller, replacing an outgoing variety act.

His experience at Catch a Rising Star in New York City served as a bitter confirmation of where ventriloquists stood in the comedic food chain, as the emcee at that club gave Dunham little respect.

Dunham attributes this initial reaction to his underdeveloped comedy, explaining that while the characters' personalities were developed at that point, his jokes were not.

[9] At the end of 1988, Jim McCawley, a talent booker for The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, told Dunham that he would be given a spot on the coveted program.

Dunham continued to tighten his act in Los Angeles clubs, performing the same 6-minute segment with Peanut a total of nine times for McCawley over the next few months.

Dunham and Peanut appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson on April 6, 1990, alongside guests Bob Hope and B.B.

To maintain a connection with his fan base, he would use question cards that he had audiences fill out for his performances to build a database, which was tailor-made for the burgeoning World Wide Web.

Though he was voted Funniest Male Standup at the American Comedy Awards in 1998, his club work kept him away from his wife and daughters between two and three weeks each month, which put a strain on his marriage, and made paying bills for his expanded family difficult.

During his half hour piece, he showcased José Jalapeño on a Stick, Walter, an early version of Melvin the Superhero Guy and Peanut, whom Dunham had begun to merchandise into a line of dolls.

Surprised by the high ratings of the first Blue Collar Comics concert movie that same year, the network began to reconsider its brand.

[9] In 2007, Dunham appeared as The Amazing Ken with José Jalapeño on a Stick in the Larry the Cable Guy feature film Delta Farce.

It served not only to cement Dunham's stardom, but to introduce his most controversial character, Achmed the Dead Terrorist, which became a viral Internet sensation.

All the songs, with the exception of "Jingle Bombs", were written and accompanied by Brian Haner, who joined Dunham's act as "Guitar Guy".

It included a fourth stand-up special to air in 2010, DVDs, a consumer products partnership, a 60-city tour beginning in September 2010, and an order for a television series called The Jeff Dunham Show that premiered on October 22, 2009.

[21][22] Dunham appeared in a guest role with Bubba J on NBC's sitcom 30 Rock, playing a ventriloquist named Rick Wayne and his dummy Pumpkin from Stone Mountain, Georgia.

Dunham responded, "I've skewered Whites, Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Christians, Jews, Muslims, gays, straights, rednecks, addicts, the elderly, and my wife.

As a standup comic, it is my job to make the majority of people laugh, and I believe that comedy is the last true form of free speech ...

[46][47] Dunham has conceded that he does exhibit particular sensitivity to the "conservative country crowd" or those characterized by "basic Christian values", as they are one of his largest audiences and a part of his upbringing.

[50][51][52][53] J. P. Williams, the producer of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour, has opined that Dunham's act is not funny on its own merits, and that his material gets a greater reaction because of the puppet characters than it would otherwise garner by itself.

[58] In the 2020 United States presidential election, Dunham adapted the Walter puppet into "Wonald Grump" and "Ben Hiden," caricatures of Donald Trump and Joe Biden, respectively, for a mock debate moderated by Achmed.

[59] Peanut is a hyperactive,[1] purple-skinned "woozle"[60] with white fur covering most of his body, a tuft of green hair on the top of his head, and one sneaker on his left foot.

Touching upon such stereotypes, Bubba mentions in Arguing with Myself that he met his wife at a family reunion, and remembers seeing her with a corn dog in one hand, a beer in another, and leaning against a ferris wheel, "making it tilt".

Dunham portrays Melvin as unimpressed with other superheroes: When told Superman can leap tall buildings in a single bound, Melvin dismisses him as a "showoff," arguing that he can simply walk around them, observes that Aquaman has the same powers as SpongeBob SquarePants, asserts that the Flash's super speed is derived from methamphetamine, that the Hulk's vaunted ability to get stronger as he gets angrier merely mirrors "every white trash guy on COPS," and makes innuendo about the questionable relationship between Batman and the underage Robin.

Melvin's first onscreen appearance was in the July 2003 Comedy Central Presents episode, in which he had small, black, beady eyes.