The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of New York, and within Putnam County, and especially in the city of Cold Spring people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, headquartered 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 Cold Spring. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Cold Spring is known for animated movies such as Monsters Inc., WALL-E and A Bug's Life.
As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with notable characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Dopey and its most recent release in Cold Spring being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, Olaf and Grand Pabbie the Troll King.
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 Cold Spring 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 Cartoons in the 1920s
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 included a sound track. Subsequently the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first animated film with synchronized sound.
The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Cold Spring 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 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 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 Cold Spring residents.
The 1st Walt Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney started development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Happy. Snow White became the first cartoon in English and color.
A lot of 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 Cold Spring - but we're not sure.
What Cold Spring parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big hit. It cost Walt Disney a total of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey was the highest grossing production of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.
During the production of Snow White, the designers continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting friends among them Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Disney Productions
In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy. Pinocchio won Oscar for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box . It was an experimental cartoon 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 Cold Spring viewers.
Dumbo hit the screens 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 Snow White and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick and Monstro and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Mickey Mouse, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Cold Spring and we met new friends including Thumper, Friend Owl and Mrs. Possum.
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 Duck 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 Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus. This led to a tradition of reissuing the Walt Disney features every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a movie success. Cold Spring fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Queen of Hearts and The Dormouse. Parents in Cold Spring also took their boys and girls to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Peter Pan, Captain Hook and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Cold Spring could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Tramp and Aunt Sarah.
