The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Animation

Throughout the state of Minnesota, and within Cass County people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, California, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates animated short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Cass County.   It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Cass County is known for cartoons such as Cars 2, The Incredibles and Lifted.

As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable  characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful and its most recent release in Cass County being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, 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 Cass County 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 Cartoons in the 20s

The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney produced a sound track.  History was made when  the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with matched sound.

The Mickey Mouse series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Cass County 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 major success so all the Silly Symphonies were subsequently produced in Technicolor. The 1933 Three Little Pigs with character of The Big Bad Wolf and Fifer Pig became a huge box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Cass County residents.

The 1^st Walt Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Disney started development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey.  Snow White became the first animated feature in English and color.

Tremendous training and development went into the creation 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 Cass County - but we're not sure.

What Cass County parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big success. It cost Disney  a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful was the highest grossing film of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind a few years later.

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

New Walt Disney Productions

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

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus .  It was an experimental animated film created to accompanying an orchestral arrangement.  Fantasia also caused the development of the Fantasound system which was used to create the film's stereoscopic soundtrack to the delight of Cass County viewers.

Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, The Ringmaster and Elephant Catty proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro  and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms.

In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Cass County and we met new friends including Thumper, Friend Owl and Mrs. Rabbit.

Also in the 1940s, Disney  released 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 Donald 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 reissuing 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 Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Donald, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney films every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success.  Cass County fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and The King of Hearts.  Parents in Cass County also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Mr. Smee and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Cass County could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Jock and Aunt Sarah.