The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits

Disney Animation

Throughout the state of Minnesota, and within Marshall County, and especially in the city of Truman people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates animated short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Truman.   It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Truman is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 2, Finding Nemo and Partly Cloudy.

As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable  characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful and its most recent release in Truman being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Hans 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 Truman 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 cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey cartoon Disney included a sound track.  Subsequently  the third Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first animated film with synchronized sound.

The Mickey Mouse series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Truman and the U.S..  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 first full-color cartoon was released. Flowers and Trees was a major 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 major box office and pop culture success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Truman residents.

The First Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Walt Disney began production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Bashful.  Snow White became the first cartoon in English and color.

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 Truman - but we're not sure.

What Truman parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge hit. It cost Disney  a total of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey was the highest grossing movie of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.

While working on Snow White, the animators  continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series.  Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting friends including 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, Lampwick and The Blue Fairy. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Yen Sid and Zeus .  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 Truman viewers.

Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Jim Crow and Elephant Catty proved to be a financial income success. The movie only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and Gideon  and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Zeus.

In August 1942, Bambi was released in Truman and we met new friends including Pheasant, 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 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.

Disney also began re-releasing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Disney films every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success.  Truman movie-goers , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Queen of Hearts and The Dormouse.  Parents in Truman also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Mr. Smee and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Truman could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Trusty and Jim Dear.