The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Iowa, and within Hardin County, and especially in the city of Hubbard people have enjoyed Disney animation 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 feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Hubbard. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Hubbard is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 2, Finding Nemo and Partly Cloudy.
As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films starting with 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 Hubbard being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Olaf and Grand Pabbie the Troll King.
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 Hubbard 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 select theatres during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey cartoon Disney produced a sound track. History was made when the third Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first cartoon with synchronized sound.
The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Hubbard 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 first full-color animated film was released. Flowers and Trees was a huge 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 Hubbard residents.
The 1st Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st cartoon 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 established animators and recent college graduate artists. Some may have even come from Hubbard - but we're not sure.
What Hubbard parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Doc and Happy was the highest grossing film of all time before being surpassed 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 characters 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 Jiminy Cricket, 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, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Spring Sprite . 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 Hubbard viewers.
Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Casey Junior and Elephant Catty 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 seven drawfs including Grumpy and Happy and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Monstro and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Hubbard and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Friend Owl and Mrs. Possum.
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 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 re-releasing the previous features beginning with re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey Mouse with Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success. Hubbard movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and The King of Hearts. Parents in Hubbard also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Captain Hook and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Hubbard could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Trusty and Aunt Sarah.
