The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Washington, and within King County, and especially in the city of Ballard people have enjoyed Disney animated movies with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, whose home is 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 Ballard. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Ballard is known for cartoons such as Toy Story 2, Brave and Knick Knack.
As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films with the first being Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable characters such as The Prince and the dwarfs including Doc and Happy and its most recent release in Ballard being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, 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 Ballard 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 20s
The first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, was released in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey Mouse cartoon Disney added a sound track. Subsequently the 3rd Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first cartoon with synchronized sound.
The Mickey Mouse series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Ballard 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 big 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" becoming a popular chart hit for Ballard residents.
The 1st Walt Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Disney started production of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st animated feature in English and color.
Tremendous development and training went into the creation of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The studio expanded with the addition of established animators and recent college graduate artists. Some may have even come from Ballard - but we're not sure.
What Ballard parent would have guessed that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge hit. It cost Walt Disney a total of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Happy was the highest grossing film of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind two 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 premiered Pinocchio with characters such as Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro. Pinocchio won Oscar for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Mickey Mouse, Daisy Duck and Zeus . It was an experimental cartoon 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 Ballard viewers.
Dumbo premiered in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Jim Crow and The Clown proved to be a monetary success. The feature only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey and less than a 1/3 of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Spring Sprite.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Ballard and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Faline and Mrs. Possum.
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 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 reissuing the previous features beginning with re-releases of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen The Prince and the seven drawfs including Doc and Dopey Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey with Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney films every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella was a a movie success. Ballard movie-goers , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The Mad Hatter, The Cheshire Cat and The Dormouse. Parents in Ballard also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, Mary Darling and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Ballard could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Trusty and Aunt Sarah.
