The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of Kentucky, and within Mason County, and especially in the city of Maysville people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, headquartered in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates animated feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Maysville. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Maysville is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 3, Ratatouilli and A Bug's Life.
As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with classic characters such as Snow White and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy and its most recent release in Maysville being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Hans and The Duke of Weselton.
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 Maysville 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, premiered in limited engagements during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey cartoon Disney produced a sound track. Subsequently the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with matched sound.
The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular animated film series in Maysville and the United States. A second Disney series of sound animated films, 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 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 Fifer Pig became a tremendous box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Maysville residents.
The 1st Walt Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney started development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy. Snow White became the 1st cartoon in English and color.
Considerable 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 Maysville - but we're not sure.
What Maysville parent would have guessed that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big success. It cost Disney a total of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Doc and Happy was the highest grossing production of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.
During the production of Snow White, the animators continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters among them Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Disney Productions
In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Lampwick and Gideon. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and The Magic Brooms . It was an experimental cartoon produced 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 Maysville viewers.
Dumbo premiered in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, The Ringmaster and Crow Chorus proved to be a monetary success. The movie only cost half 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 Monstro and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Mickey Mouse, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Maysville and we met new friends including Pheasant, Flower the Skunk and Great Prince of the Forest.
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 re-releasing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey Mouse with Donald, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Spring Sprite. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Walt Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Maysville movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Queen of Hearts and Mathilda. Parents in Maysville also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Peter Pan, Mary Darling and Tiger Lily. What dog-lover in Maysville could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Tramp and Aunt Sarah.
