The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of Oklahoma, and within Muskogee County, and especially in the city of Warner people have enjoyed Disney animation with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates cartoon short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Warner. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Warner is known for animated movies such as Cars, Ratatouilli and Luxo Jr..
As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with unforgettable characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey and its most recent release in Warner being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, Olaf and The King and Queen of Arendelle.
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 Warner 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, was released in select theatres 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 cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Warner and the United States. A second Disney series of sound cartoons, 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 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 Practical Pig became a tremendous box office and pop culture hit and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Warner residents.
The 1st Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney started 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.
A lot of development and training 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 Warner - but we're not sure.
What Warner 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 complete but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey was the highest grossing movie of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a few years later.
While working on Snow White, the animators continued work on the Mickey Mouse 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 Walt Disney Productions
In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Honest John 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 Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box . It was an experimental animated film created 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 Warner viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Casey Junior and Crow Chorus proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost 1/2 the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and Gideon and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Warner and we met new friends including Pheasant, Faline and Mrs. Rabbit.
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 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 re-releasing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Chernabog, Daisy Duck and The Magic Brooms. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney films every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success. Warner fans , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Caterpillar and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Warner also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, George Darling and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Warner could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Jock and Jim Dear.
