The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Minnesota, and within Isanti County, and especially in the city of Keewatin people have enjoyed Disney animation 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 Keewatin. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Keewatin is known for animated movies such as Toy Story, The Incredibles and Day & Night.
As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with notable characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Happy and its most recent release in Keewatin being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, Kristoff 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 Keewatin 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 Animation in the 1920s
The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, 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 produced a sound track. History was made when 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 animated film series in Keewatin and the U.S.. A second Disney series of sound cartoons, the Silly Symphonies, debuted 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 cartoon 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 Fifer Pig became a big box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Keewatin residents.
The 1st Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Bashful. Snow White became the first animated feature in English and color.
Tremendous development and training went into the creation 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 Keewatin - but we're not sure.
What Keewatin parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big success. It cost Disney a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey 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 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 Disney Productions
In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Jiminy Cricket, Honest John 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 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 Keewatin viewers.
Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Jim Crow 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 Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and The Blue Fairy and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Keewatin and we met new friends including Thumper, Friend Owl and Great Prince of the Forest.
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 Donald 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 the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney features every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Keewatin movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Queen of Hearts and The Dormouse. Parents in Keewatin also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy Darling, Mr. Smee and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Keewatin could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Jock and Tony.
