The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Iowa, and within Howard County, and especially in the city of Riceville people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, headquartered in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates animated feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Riceville. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Riceville is known for cartoons such as Toy Story 3, Finding Nemo and Luxo Jr..
As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful and its most recent release in Riceville being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Olaf and The Duke of Weselton.
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 Riceville 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 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney produced a sound track. History was made when the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with synchronized sound.
The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Riceville and the United States. 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 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 major box office and pop culture hit and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Riceville residents.
The 1st Walt Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Disney began production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey. Snow White became the 1st animated feature in English and Technicolor.
A lot of training and development went into the production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The studio expanded with the addition of established animators and artists from other fields. Some may have even come from Riceville - but we're not sure.
What Riceville parent would have guessed that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big hit. It cost Walt Disney a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful was the highest grossing movie of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.
During the production of Snow White, the artists continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey Mouse 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 Disney Productions
In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, Stromboli and Monstro. Pinocchio won ”Gold Statue” for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Yen Sid and Zeus . 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 Riceville viewers.
Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Jim Crow and Mr. Stork proved to be a monetary success. The film 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 Geppetto, Lampwick and Monstro and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Daisy Duck and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Riceville and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Flower the Skunk and Mrs. Rabbit.
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 dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald Duck, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Disney features every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success. Riceville movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Caterpillar and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Riceville also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Peter Pan, Mr. Smee and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Riceville could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Trusty and Tony.
