The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of Iowa, and within Hardin County, and especially in the city of Buckeye people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is 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 Buckeye.   It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Buckeye is known for cartoons such as Cars, Finding Nemo and Day & Night.

As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with unforgettable  characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy and its most recent release in Buckeye being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, 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 Buckeye 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 Animation in the 20s

The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in limited engagements during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney produced a sound track.  History was made when  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 animated film series in Buckeye and the United States.  A second Disney series of sound cartoons, the Silly Symphonies, debuted 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 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 tremendous box office and pop culture success and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Buckeye residents.

The First Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful.  Snow White became the first cartoon in English and Technicolor.

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

What Buckeye parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney  a total of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Bashful was the highest grossing production of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.

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

New Disney Productions

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

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Mickey Mouse, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus .  It was an experimental animated film 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 Buckeye viewers.

Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Jim Crow and Crow Chorus proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick and The Blue Fairy  and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and The Magic Brooms.

In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Buckeye and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, 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 Donald Duck 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 Grumpy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Zeus. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney films every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a movie success.  Buckeye fans , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Caterpillar and The Dormouse.  Parents in Buckeye also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Mary Darling and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Buckeye could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Jock and Aunt Sarah.