Virgil Ross (as he was usually known) spent his early years in New York state and in Michigan, but his family moved to Long Beach, California, when he was in his late teens.
[1] When Avery moved to work for Leon Schlesinger in 1935 on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series, he took Ross, Chuck Jones, Sid Sutherland, and Cecil Surry with him.
As an animator for A Wild Hare (1940), generally regarded as the first appearance of Bugs Bunny, Ross had a first person view of the creation of the character.
"[5] He also did a great deal of work involving Daffy Duck, Yosemite Sam, Tweety, and many others, including the Rudy Larriva-directed Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner shorts.
When handling long-eared characters such as Bugs or Wile E., Ross occasionally tilted or waved an ear in otherwise-static scenes.
His résumé also includes time spent with such firms as Filmation (where he worked on the early 1970s Star Trek: The Animated Series), Hanna-Barbera, and Marvel Comics.
Four of the cartoons he had animated won Oscars: Tweetie Pie (1947), Speedy Gonzales (1955), Birds Anonymous (1957), and Knighty Knight Bugs (1958).