The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Animation

Throughout the state of Oregon, and within Morrow County, and especially in the city of Irrigon people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Productions, is an animation studio which creates animated feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Irrigon.   It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Irrigon is known for animated movies such as Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo and Partly Cloudy.

As of 2013, the studio has produced 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with classic  characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Happy and its most recent release in Irrigon being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Elsa, Kristoff 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 Irrigon 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, premiered in limited engagements during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey cartoon Disney produced a sound track.  Subsequently  the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with matched sound.

The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Irrigon and the U.S..  A second Disney series of sound cartoons, 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 first 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 Practical 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 Irrigon residents.

The First Walt Disney Cartoon Feature

In 1934, Disney began production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Happy.  Snow White became the first cartoon 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 animators and recent college graduate artists.  Some may have even come from Irrigon - but we're not sure.

What Irrigon parent would have imagined that 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 film of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.

During the production of Snow White, the artists  continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series.  Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting friends including Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.

New Disney Productions

In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Stromboli and Gideon. Pinocchio won Oscar for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Zeus .  It was an experimental cartoon created 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 Irrigon viewers.

Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, The Ringmaster and The Clown proved to be a financial income success. The feature only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Bashful and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and Monstro  and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Daisy Duck and The Magic Brooms.

In August 1942, Bambi was released in Irrigon and we met new friends including Thumper, Flower the Skunk and Great Prince of the Forest.

Also in the 1940s, Walt 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 Goofy 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 Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Lampwick and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney movies every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success.  Irrigon movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Caterpillar and The King of Hearts.  Parents in Irrigon also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Peter Pan, Mary Darling and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Irrigon could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Trusty and Aunt Sarah.