The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits

Disney Cartoons

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

Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates animated short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Dickens County.   It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Dickens County is known for animated movies such as Up, WALL-E and Day & Night.

As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable  characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Bashful and its most recent release in Dickens County being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, Hans and The King and Queen of Arendelle.

The studio's catalog of cartoons 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 Dickens 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 Animation in the 20s

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

The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular animated film series in Dickens County and the U.S..  A second Disney series of sound cartoons, 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 cartoon was released. Flowers and Trees was a big 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 tremendous box office and pop culture success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Dickens County residents.

The First Walt 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 Bashful.  Snow White became the first animated feature in English and color.

Considerable training and development 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 Dickens County - but we're not sure.

What Dickens County parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge hit. It cost Disney  a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful was the highest grossing production of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a few years later.

While working on Snow White, the designers  continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series.  Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting friends including 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 Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Zeus .  It was an experimental cartoon 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 Dickens County viewers.

Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, The Ringmaster and Crow Chorus proved to be a financial income success. The feature only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Gideon  and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Mickey Mouse, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite.

In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Dickens County and we met new friends including Pheasant, Flower the Skunk and Great Prince of the Forest.

Also in the 1940s, Walt 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.

Walt Disney also began reissuing the previous features beginning with the rerelease 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, Honest John and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Zeus. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success.  Dickens County movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and Tweedledee and Tweedledum.  Parents in Dickens County also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy  Darling, Mr. Smee and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Dickens County could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Trusty and Aunt Sarah.