The History Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Habits
Disney Cartoons
Throughout the state of Pennsylvania, and within Carbon County, and especially in the city of Lehighton people have enjoyed Disney cartoons 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 short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Lehighton. It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Lehighton is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 3, Finding Nemo and Lifted.
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 Dopey and its most recent release in Lehighton being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as Anna, Olaf 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 Lehighton 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 cartoon Disney produced a sound track. In the end the third Mickey cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st cartoon with synchronized sound.
The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular animated film series in Lehighton and the United States. A second Disney series of sound cartoons, 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 1st full-color cartoon 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 Practical Pig became a major box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" also became popular for Lehighton residents.
The 1st Disney Animated Film Feature
In 1934, Disney began development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with The Prince and the dwarfs including Grumpy and Bashful. Snow White became the 1st cartoon in English and color.
Considerable development and training went into the creation of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The studio expanded with the addition of animators and recent college graduate artists. Some may have even come from Lehighton - but we're not sure.
What Lehighton parent would have imagined that Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a big success. It cost 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 Sleepy and Bashful was the highest grossing production of all time before the success of Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.
During the production of Snow White, the artists continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series. Mickey Mouse switched to Technicolor in 1935 and added several major supporting characters including 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 Geppetto, Honest John and The Blue Fairy. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.
Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Daisy Duck and Spring Sprite . It was an experimental cartoon designed 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 Lehighton viewers.
Dumbo hit the screens in October 1941 with characters including Timothy Q. Mouse, Casey Junior and Elephant Catty proved to be a financial income success. The film only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Prince and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Jack-in-the-Box.
In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Lehighton and we met new friends including Bambi's Mother, Faline 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.
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 Grumpy and Happy Pinocchio and his friends Geppetto, Honest John and Monstro in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey Mouse with Donald, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Spring Sprite. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Disney features every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.
Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella proved to be a box office success. Lehighton fans , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to The March Hare, The Queen of Hearts and The King of Hearts. Parents in Lehighton also took their kids to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Michael Darling, Mr. Smee and Jeffrey Silver. What dog-lover in Lehighton could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Si and Am, Trusty and Boris.
