The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of New Mexico, and within Colfax County, and especially in the city of Ute Park people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, headquartered in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, is an animation studio which creates cartoon short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Ute Park. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Ute Park is known for cartoons such as Toy Story, Finding Nemo and Luxo Jr..
As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with notable characters such as Snow White and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful and its most recent release in Ute Park being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Hans and The Duke of Weselton.
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 Ute Park 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, premiered in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey cartoon Disney produced a sound track. History was made when the 3rd Mickey Mouse 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 Ute Park 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 1st 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 success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Ute Park residents.
The First Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st cartoon in English and Technicolor.
A lot of training and development 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 Ute Park - but we're not sure.
What Ute Park 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 complete but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful was the highest grossing production of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind two years later.
While working on Snow White, the designers continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters 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, Stromboli 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, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box . It was an experimental cartoon produced 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 Ute Park viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Casey Junior and Elephant Catty proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and Gideon and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Mickey Mouse, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Ute Park and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Flower the Skunk and Mrs. Possum.
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.
Walt Disney also began re-releasing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Donald, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney films every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Ute Park fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Queen of Hearts and Mathilda. Parents in Ute Park also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy Darling, Mr. Smee and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Ute Park could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Tramp and Aunt Sarah.
