The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Animation
Throughout the state of Arkansas, and within Dallas County, and especially in the city of Fordyce people have enjoyed Disney animation with great enthusiasm.
Walt Disney Animation Studios, located in Burbank, California, formerly known as Walt Disney Feature Animation, is an animation studio which creates animated short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Fordyce. It took on its current name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios with Pixar Animation Studios which in Fordyce is known for animated movies such as Toy Story, The Incredibles and A Bug's Life.
As of 2013, the studio has created 53 feature films beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with lovable characters such as The Evil Queen and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful and its most recent release in Fordyce being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, 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 Fordyce 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 Cartoons in the 20s
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 included a sound track. Subsequently the 3rd Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's first animated film with matched sound.
The Mickey series of sound animated films quickly became the most popular animated film series in Fordyce and the United States. A second Disney series of sound animated films, the Silly Symphonies, released 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 Fifer Pig became a huge box office and pop culture hit and the theme song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Fordyce residents.
The 1st Walt Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Walt Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful. Snow White became the first cartoon in English and Technicolor.
Considerable development and training went into the creation 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 Fordyce - but we're not sure.
What Fordyce parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge hit. 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 Doc and Bashful was the highest grossing film of all time before being de-throned by Gone with the Wind a few years later.
During the production of Snow White, the artists continued work on the Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey 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, Lampwick and Monstro. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and The Magic Brooms . It was an experimental animated film 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 Fordyce viewers.
Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, Casey Junior and Mr. Stork proved to be a monetary success. The movie only cost half 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 Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and Monstro and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Daisy Duck and The Magic Brooms.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Fordyce and we met new friends including Thumper, Friend Owl and Great Prince of the Forest.
Also in the 1940s, 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 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 Geppetto, Stromboli and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which reunited Mickey Mouse with Donald, Daisy Duck and The Magic Brooms. 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 proved to be a box office success. Fordyce movie-goers , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Caterpillar and Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Parents in Fordyce also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet John Darling, Mary Darling and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Fordyce could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Lady, Jock and Tony.
