Paul Ford Weaver (November 2, 1901 – April 12, 1976) was an American character actor and comedic actor who came to specialize in portraying authority figures whose ineptitude and pompous demeanor were played for comic effect, notably as Mayor George Shinn in the 1957 Broadway musical comedy play, followed five years later by repeating in the feature film version The Music Man (1962), (starring Robert Preston and Shirley Jones), and on television as U.S. Army Colonel John T. Hall on several seasons of the military comedy The Phil Silvers Show (1955–1959).

Because of this positive influential contact, to the day he died, Ford was a devoted political / social Liberal and Progressive, becoming a staunch "FDR Democrat" for the rest of his life.

[6] Years later in 1958 after he became nationally known on TV, he said of that opportunity: "I got on the puppet project of the WPA and helped write and put on shows for the Federal Theater.

[4] In 1955, Ford played the bank president in the National Broadcasting Company ( NBC) television comedy series Norby.

The other role he is most identified with is that of "Horace Vandergelder" opposite Shirley Booth in the 1958 screen version of The Matchmaker, plus as "Kendall Hawkins", in the Cold War-era comedy The Russians Are Coming!

(1966), as an old Army officer with delusions of grandeur (who still carries his sword) leading his New England Gloucester island rural militia and a mob of panicked villagers against a possible Russian invasion when a Soviet Red Navy submarine accidentally runs aground offshore.

The film also starred Brian Keith, Carl Reiner, Eva Marie Saint, Jonathan Winters, Alan Arkin, and Theodore Bikel.

His earlier stage credits include Another Part of the Forest (1946), Command Decision (1947), The Teahouse of the August Moon (1953), Whoop-Up (1958), replacing David Burns as Mayor George Shinn of River City, Iowa in The Music Man (1957) and repeated the role five years later in the 1962 musical film, A Thurber Carnival (1960), Never Too Late (1962), 3 Bags Full (1966), and What Did We Do Wrong?

He was known for his descriptive quotes about life in the Great Depression in later years, including, "My kids used to think everyone lived on peanut butter sandwiches!!"