The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of Michigan, and within Berrien County, and especially in the city of Shorewood Hills people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates cartoon feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Shorewood Hills.   It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Shorewood Hills is known for animated movies such as Toy Story, The Incredibles and Knick Knack.

As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with unforgettable  characters such as Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy and its most recent release in Shorewood Hills being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Hans and The Duke of Weselton.

The studio's catalog of animated features are among Disney's most notable assets and the stars of its animated shorts—Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, and Pluto—have gone on to become recognizable figures in Shorewood Hills popular culture.

Walt Disney Animation Studios continues to produce animated features using both hand-drawn and computer generated imagery techniques. Their 54th feature, Big Hero 6, is currently in production and set for release on November 7, 2014.

Vintage Disney Animation in the 20s

The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in select theatres during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey cartoon Disney included a sound track.  In the end  the 3rd Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first animated film with synchronized sound.

The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Shorewood Hills and the U.S..  A second Disney series of sound animated films, the Silly Symphonies, premiered in 1929 with The Skeleton Dance. Each Silly Symphony was a one-shot cartoon centered around music or a particular theme.

Silly Symphonies

In 1932 the Silly Symphony Flowers and Trees, the first full-color animated film was released. Flowers and Trees was a huge success so all the Silly Symphonies were subsequently produced in Technicolor. The 1933 Three Little Pigs with character of The Big Bad Wolf and Practical Pig became a big box office and pop culture hit and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Shorewood Hills residents.

The First Disney Cartoon Feature

In 1934, Walt Disney began production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Happy.  Snow White became the first animated feature in English and color.

A lot of development and training went into the production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.  The studio expanded with the addition of animators and artists from other fields.  Some may have even come from Shorewood Hills - but we're not sure.

What Shorewood Hills parent would have guessed that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney  a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Bashful was the highest grossing production of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind two years later.

While working on Snow White, the designers  continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series.  Mickey switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters among them Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.

New Walt Disney Productions

In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Stromboli and Monstro. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Mickey Mouse, Daisy Duck and Zeus .  It was an experimental cartoon produced to accompanying an orchestral arrangement.  Fantasia also brought about the development of the Fantasound system which was used to create the film's stereoscopic soundtrack to the delight of Shorewood Hills viewers.

Dumbo premiered in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Casey Junior and Elephant Catty proved to be a monetary success. The film only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Happy and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Gideon  and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Jack-in-the-Box.

In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Shorewood Hills and we met new friends including Pheasant, Friend Owl and Mrs. Rabbit.

Also in the 1940s, Disney  premiered shorts which included Saludos Amigos (1942), The Three Caballeros (1944), Make Mine Music (1946), Fun and Fancy Free (1947), Melody Time (1948), and The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949). The studio also produced two features, Song of the South (1946) and So Dear to My Heart (1948), which were a combination of animated and live-action footage. Shorts production continued during this period as well, with Goofy and Pluto cartoons being the main output accompanied by cartoons starring Mickey Mouse, Figaro and in the 1950s, Chip 'n Dale and Humphrey the Bear.

Disney also began re-releasing the previous features beginning with re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald, Daisy Duck and Zeus. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Disney movies every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success.  Shorewood Hills fans , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Caterpillar and Tweedledee and Tweedledum.  Parents in Shorewood Hills also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Captain Hook and Tiger Lily. What dog-lover in Shorewood Hills could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Jock and Boris.