The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of Massachusettes, and within Worcester County, and especially in the city of Cordaville people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, California, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates cartoon feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Cordaville.   It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Cordaville is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 2, WALL-E and Partly Cloudy.

As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with unforgettable  characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey and its most recent release in Cordaville being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, Kristoff and The King and Queen of Arendelle.

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 Cordaville 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 20s

The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in limited engagements during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney added a sound track.  History was made when  the 3rd Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with synchronized sound.

The Mickey Mouse series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Cordaville 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 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 Fiddler Pig became a big box office and pop culture success and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Cordaville residents.

The First Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Disney began production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful.  Snow White became the first cartoon in English and Technicolor.

Tremendous 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 Cordaville - but we're not sure.

What Cordaville parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Walt Disney  a total of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey 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 Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters among them Mickey Mouse’s dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.

New Disney Productions

In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy. Pinocchio won ”Gold Statue” for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Mickey Mouse, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite .  It was an experimental cartoon produced 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 Cordaville viewers.

Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Jim Crow and Mr. Stork proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, 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 Cordaville and we met new friends including Thumper, Faline and Mrs. Rabbit.

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 reissuing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Walt Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success.  Cordaville fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Caterpillar and The King of Hearts.  Parents in Cordaville also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Captain Hook and Tiger Lily. What dog-lover in Cordaville could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Trusty and Aunt Sarah.