The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of New York, and within Jefferson County, and especially in the city of Black River people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, headquartered in Burbank, California, formerly known as Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, is an animation studio which creates animated short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Black River.   It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Black River is known for cartoons such as Toy Story 3, Ratatouilli and Lifted.

As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with unforgettable  characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Dopey and its most recent release in Black River being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Hans 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 Black River 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 1920s

The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, premiered in select theatres during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey cartoon Disney added a sound track.  In the end  the 3rd Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with matched sound.

The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular animated film series in Black River and the United States.  A second Disney series of sound animated films, the Silly Symphonies, released 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 success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Black River residents.

The First Walt Disney Cartoon Feature

In 1934, Walt Disney began production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful.  Snow White became the first cartoon in English and Technicolor.

Tremendous training and development 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 Black River - but we're not sure.

What Black River parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Walt Disney  a then-expensive sum 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 movie of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind two years later.

While working on 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 friends among them Mickey Mouse’s dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.

New Disney Productions

In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick and Gideon. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex 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 Black River viewers.

Dumbo debuted in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, Casey Junior and Elephant Catty proved to be a monetary success. The feature only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful 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 Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Zeus.

In August 1942, Bambi was released in Black River and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Flower the Skunk and Great Prince of the Forest.

Also in the 1940s, 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 re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Disney films every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success.  Black River movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Cheshire Cat and The King of Hearts.  Parents in Black River also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, Captain Hook and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Black River could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Jock and Aunt Sarah.