The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Washington, and within Grays Harbor County, and especially in the city of Ocean City people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is in Burbank, California, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates cartoon feature films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Ocean City. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Ocean City is known for animated movies such as Cars 2, Brave and Luxo Jr..
As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with notable characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey and its most recent release in Ocean City being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Hans and The King and Queen of Arendelle.
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 Ocean City 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. History was made when the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with synchronized sound.
The Mickey Mouse series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Ocean City and the United States. A second Disney series of sound animated films, 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 tremendous 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 major box office and pop culture success and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Ocean City residents.
The First Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney started production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey. Snow White became the 1st cartoon in English and Technicolor.
Considerable 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 Ocean City - but we're not sure.
What Ocean City parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge 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 seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful was the highest grossing movie of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a few years later.
During the production of 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's dog Pluto and their friends Donald Duck and Goofy.
New Disney Productions
In 1940, the premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy. Pinocchio won ”Gold Statue” 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 animated film 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 Ocean City viewers.
Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Elephant Matriarch, The Ringmaster 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 Dopey and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Lampwick and Gideon and 2/5 of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite.
In August 1942, Bambi was released in Ocean City and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, 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 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.
Walt Disney also began reissuing 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 Sleepy and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Donald, Yen Sid and The Magic Brooms. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its premier in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success. Ocean City movie-goers , also saw the premier Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Queen of Hearts and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Ocean City also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy Darling, Mr. Smee and Tiger Lily. What dog-lover in Ocean City could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Jock and Boris.
