The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Michigan, and within Clinton County, and especially in the city of Bath people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, CA, 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 Bath. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Bath is known for animated movies such as Cars, Ratatouilli and A Bug's Life.
As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with classic characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Bashful and its most recent release in Bath being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, 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 Bath 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 Animation in the 20s
The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, premiered in select theatres during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey cartoon Disney included a sound track. Subsequently the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with synchronized sound.
The Mickey Mouse series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Bath 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 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 Practical Pig became a tremendous box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Bath residents.
The 1st Walt Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Disney started production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey. Snow White became the 1st cartoon 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 artists from other fields. Some may have even come from Bath - but we're not sure.
What Bath parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney a total of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Dopey was the highest grossing film of all time before being de-throned 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 including Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Walt Disney Productions
In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick 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, Daisy Duck and Zeus . It was an experimental animated film created 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 Bath viewers.
Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Jim Crow and Crow Chorus proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Bashful and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Gideon and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Bath and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Faline and Mrs. Possum.
Also in the 1940s, Disney released 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 re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney movies every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success. Bath fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Queen of Hearts and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Bath also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, Mr. Smee and Tiger Lily. What dog-lover in Bath could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Tramp and Aunt Sarah.
