The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Illinois, and within Whiteside County, and especially in the city of Erie people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, is an animation studio which creates animated short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Erie. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Erie is known for cartoons such as Toy Story 3, Ratatouilli and Knick Knack.
As of 2013, the studio has produced 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 Doc and Bashful and its most recent release in Erie 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 Erie 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 cartoon Disney produced a sound track. In the end the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with synchronized sound.
The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Erie and the United States. A second Disney series of sound animated films, the Silly Symphonies, released 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 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 Fiddler 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 Erie residents.
The 1st Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st animated feature in English and color.
A lot of 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 Erie - but we're not sure.
What Erie parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful was the highest grossing production of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a few 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 including 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 Monstro. 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 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 Erie viewers.
Dumbo premiered 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 Sleepy and Dopey and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Erie and we met new friends including Thumper, Flower the Skunk 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 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.
Disney also began reissuing the previous features beginning with re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Prince and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Chernabog, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Erie movie-goers , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Cheshire Cat and The King of Hearts. Parents in Erie also took their boys and girls to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy Darling, Mary Darling and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Erie could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Tramp and Jim Dear.
