The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of Colorado, and within Cheyenne County, and especially in the city of Cheyenne Wells people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, California, formerly known as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, is an animation studio which creates cartoon short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Cheyenne Wells. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Cheyenne Wells is known for animated movies such as Toy Story, 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 notable characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy and its most recent release in Cheyenne Wells being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, 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 Cheyenne Wells 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.
Older Cartoons 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. In the end the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with synchronized sound.
The Mickey Mouse series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Cheyenne Wells 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 1st full-color animated film 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 Practical Pig became a major box office and pop culture hit and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Cheyenne Wells residents.
The First Walt Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Disney started production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st cartoon in English and Technicolor.
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 recent college graduate artists. Some may have even come from Cheyenne Wells - but we're not sure.
What Cheyenne Wells parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big hit. It cost Disney a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to complete but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy was the highest grossing movie of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind two years later.
During the production of 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 Mouse’s dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Disney Productions
In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli 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 Mickey Mouse, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box . It was an experimental cartoon designed 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 Cheyenne Wells viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Jim Crow and Crow Chorus proved to be a monetary success. The film only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and The Blue Fairy and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Mickey Mouse, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Cheyenne Wells and we met new friends including Thumper, Friend Owl and Mrs. Possum.
Also in the 1940s, Walt 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.
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 dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and The Magic Brooms. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Walt Disney features every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success. Cheyenne Wells fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Cheshire Cat and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Cheyenne Wells also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Peter Pan, Mary Darling and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Cheyenne Wells could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Tramp and Jim Dear.
