The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of New Hampshire, and within Cheshire County, and especially in the city of Hinsdale people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, is an animation studio which creates cartoon feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Hinsdale. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Hinsdale is known for cartoons such as Toy Story, Brave and Knick Knack.
As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with notable characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey and its most recent release in Hinsdale being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Olaf 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 Hinsdale 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 select theatres during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney produced a sound track. In the end the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with synchronized sound.
The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular animated film series in Hinsdale and the U.S.. A second Disney series of sound animated films, 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 1st full-color animated film 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 big box office and pop culture success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Hinsdale residents.
The 1st Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful. Snow White became the first animated feature in English and Technicolor.
Tremendous development and training went into the creation 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 Hinsdale - but we're not sure.
What Hinsdale 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 create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey was the highest grossing production of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind two years later.
During the production of Snow White, the artists continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey 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 Gideon. Pinocchio won Oscar for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Mickey Mouse, Yen Sid and Zeus . It was an experimental animated film designed 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 Hinsdale viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Jim Crow and Mr. Stork 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 seven drawfs including Doc and Happy and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Gideon and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Hinsdale and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Friend Owl and Great Prince of the Forest.
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 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 re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Prince and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Zeus. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney films every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success. Hinsdale movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Caterpillar and The Dormouse. Parents in Hinsdale also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Captain Hook and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Hinsdale could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Trusty and Tony.
