The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of Kansas, and within Osage County, and especially in the city of Burlingame people have enjoyed Disney animation 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 feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Burlingame. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Burlingame is known for animated movies such as Up, The Incredibles 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 Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful and its most recent release in Burlingame being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Hans 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 Burlingame 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.
Vintage Disney Cartoons in the 1920s
The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, 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 Mouse cartoon Disney included a sound track. History was made when the third Mickey Mouse 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 Burlingame 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 Fifer Pig became a big box office and pop culture success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Burlingame residents.
The First Walt Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney started production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy. Snow White became the 1st animated feature in English and Technicolor.
Considerable 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 Burlingame - but we're not sure.
What Burlingame parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge hit. It cost Walt 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 Sleepy and Bashful was the highest grossing movie of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.
During the production of 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 premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, 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, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box . It was an experimental animated film created to accompanying an orchestral arrangement. Fantasia also caused the development of the Fantasound system which was used to create the film's stereoscopic soundtrack to the delight of Burlingame viewers.
Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Jim Crow 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 dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Burlingame and we met new friends including Thumper, Friend Owl 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 re-releasing the previous features beginning with re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Zeus. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney movies every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success. Burlingame fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and Mathilda. Parents in Burlingame also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy Darling, George Darling and Tiger Lily. What dog-lover in Burlingame could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Jock and Tony.
