The Backstory Which Started Disney Collector's Collecting Desires

Disney Cartoons

Throughout the state of South Dakota, and within Jerauld County, and especially in the city of Lane people have enjoyed Disney animation 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 short films and television specials for The Walt Disney Company seen in Lane.   It took on its present name in 2006, when it was folded under The Walt Disney Studios alongside Pixar Animation Studios which in Lane is known for animated movies such as Toy Story 3, Brave and Day & Night.

As of 2013, the studio has released 53 feature films starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 with unforgettable  characters such as Snow White and the dwarfs including Sleepy and Dopey and its most recent release in Lane being Frozen in 2013 including characters such as The Snow Queen, Olaf and Grand Pabbie the Troll King.

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 Lane 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 cartoons, Plane Crazy and The Galloping Gaucho, which also included Minnie Mouse, premiered in movie screens during the summer of 1928. For the third Mickey cartoon Disney produced a sound track.  In the end  the third Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, became Disney's 1st animated film with matched sound.

The Mickey series of sound cartoons quickly became the most popular cartoon series in Lane 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 cartoon 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 Practical Pig became a huge box office and pop culture hit and the theme tune "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf" becoming a popular chart hit for Lane residents.

The First Walt Disney Animated Film Feature

In 1934, Disney started development on of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs characters with Snow White and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Dopey.  Snow White became the first 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 animators and recent college graduate artists.  Some may have even come from Lane - but we're not sure.

What Lane parent would have known Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs would be such a huge success. It cost Disney  a then-expensive sum of $1.4 million to create but Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Sleepy and Happy was the highest grossing production of all time before being surpassed by Gone with the Wind a couple of years later.

While working on Snow White, the animators  continued work on the Mickey and Silly Symphonies series.  Mickey 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 Pinocchio, Stromboli and Gideon. Pinocchio won an Academy Award for Best Original Song and Best Original Score.

Disney released Fantasia in 1940 with characters including Chernabog, Yen Sid and Zeus .  It was an experimental cartoon produced 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 Lane viewers.

Dumbo was released in October 1941 with characters including Dumbo, The Ringmaster and The Clown proved to be a financial income success. The feature only cost half the cost of Snow White with its ensemble of with The Evil Queen and the seven drawfs including Grumpy and Dopey and less than a third of the cost of Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Honest John and Gideon  and two fifths of the cost of Fantasia’s cast of Donald Duck, Yen Sid and Spring Sprite.

In August 1942, Bambi was premiered in Lane and we met new friends including Thumper, Flower the Skunk and Mrs. Rabbit.

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 Goofy 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 re-releasing the previous features beginning with the rerelease of Snow White in 1944 which brought back to the screen Snow White and the dwarfs including Doc and Bashful Pinocchio and his friends Jiminy Cricket, Stromboli and The Blue Fairy in 1945 and Fantasia in 1946 which returned Mickey with Chernabog, Tyrannosaurus Rex and The Magic Brooms. This led to a tradition of re-releasing the Walt Disney movies every seven years, which lasted into the 1990s.

Upon its release in 1950, Cinderella was a a box office success.  Lane movie-goers , also saw the release Alice in Wonderland and were introduced to Alice, The Caterpillar and The Dormouse.  Parents in Lane also took their childres to see Peter Pan and were delighted to meet Wendy  Darling, Mr. Smee and The Crocodile. What dog-lover in Lane could forget the first time they saw Lady and the Tramp on screen and were delighted to meet Darling, Trusty and Jim Dear.