The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of Arizona, and within Pinal County, and especially in the city of Casa Blanca people have enjoyed Disney animation with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, California, formerly known as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, is an animation studio which creates animated feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Casa Blanca.   It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Casa Blanca is known for animated movies such as Up, Ratatouilli 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 classic  characters such as Snow White and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy and its most recent release in Casa Blanca being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Kristoff 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 Casa Blanca 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 1920s

The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, 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 cartoon Disney included a sound track.  In the end  the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with matched sound.

The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular animated film series in Casa Blanca 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 tremendous 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 huge box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Casa Blanca residents.

The First Walt Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Walt Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Dopey.  Snow White became the first cartoon in English and Technicolor.

Considerable development and training went into the creation of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.  The studio expanded with the addition of animators and recent college graduate artists.  Some may have even come from Casa Blanca - but we're not sure.

What Casa Blanca parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big success. It cost Walt Disney  a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to complete but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful was the highest grossing movie of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.

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

New Disney Productions

In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, Lampwick and Gideon. Pinocchio won ”Gold Statue” for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Mickey Mouse, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box .  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 Casa Blanca viewers.

Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Casey Junior and Elephant Catty proved to be a financial income success. The feature only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Happy and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy  and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite.

In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Casa Blanca and we met new friends including Pheasant, Friend Owl and Mrs. Possum.

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 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 The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey Mouse with Donald, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Walt Disney films every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a movie success.  Casa Blanca fans , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and The King of Hearts.  Parents in Casa Blanca also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy  Darling, Captain Hook and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Casa Blanca could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Tramp and Boris.