The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of Texas, and within Hood County, and especially in the city of Tolar people have enjoyed Disney cartoons with great enthusiasm.

Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, CA, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates animated feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Tolar.   It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Tolar is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 2, Ratatouilli and Partly Cloudy.

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 Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful and its most recent release in Tolar being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, 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 Tolar 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 Animation in the 20s

The first two Mickey Mouse animated films, 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 included a sound track.  Subsequently  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 cartoon series in Tolar 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 animated film 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 tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Tolar residents.

The First Walt Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Walt Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Bashful.  Snow White became the first cartoon in English and color.

A lot of 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 Tolar - but we're not sure.

What Tolar parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney  a total of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Prince and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Happy was the highest grossing production of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.

While working on Snow White, the designers  continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series.  Mickey 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 Walt Disney Productions

In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Jiminy Cricket, 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 Spring Sprite .  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 Tolar viewers.

Dumbo premiered in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, The Ringmaster and The Clown 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 seven drawfs including Sleepy and Happy and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro  and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms.

In August 1942, Bambi was released in Tolar and we met new friends including Thumper, Faline and Mrs. Possum.

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 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 seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Zeus. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney films every 7 years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success.  Tolar fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Cheshire Cat and Tweedledee and Tweedledum.  Parents in Tolar also took their boys and girls to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Peter Pan, George Darling and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Tolar could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Trusty and Boris.