The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of South Dakota, and within Gregory County, and especially in the city of Saint Charles people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, headquartered in Burbank, CA, 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 Saint Charles. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Saint Charles is known for cartoons such as Up, Brave and Day & Night.
As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with classic characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy and its most recent release in Saint Charles being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Olaf 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 Saint Charles 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 1920s
The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, premiered in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney added a sound track. In the end the third Mickey 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 Saint Charles 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 1st 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 Fiddler Pig became a major box office and pop culture success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Saint Charles residents.
The First Walt Disney Cartoon Feature
In 1934, Disney started production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st cartoon in English and color.
Tremendous development and training went into the production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The studio expanded with the addition of established animators and artists from other fields. Some may have even come from Saint Charles - but we're not sure.
What Saint Charles parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Walt Disney a total of $1.4 million to produce but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Happy was the highest grossing movie of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind a few years later.
While working on Snow White, the designers continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters including Mickey's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Disney Productions
In 1940, the released Pinocchio with characters such as Pinocchio, Honest John 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, Daisy Duck and Jack-in-the-Box . It was an experimental cartoon produced 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 Saint Charles viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Jim Crow and Elephant Catty proved to be a monetary success. The movie 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 third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and The Blue Fairy and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Saint Charles and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Flower the Skunk and Mrs. Rabbit.
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 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 Prince and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and Gideon in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney films every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Saint Charles movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Queen of Hearts and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Saint Charles also took their boys and girls to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, Captain Hook and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Saint Charles could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Jock and Jim Dear.
