Living A Fairy Tale: Disney’s Rise To The Top

While working at Pesemen-Rubin Art Studio, Disney met a fellow cartoonist named Ubbe Iwwerks and the two became instant friends. They created their first company, Iwerks-Disney Commercial Artists, but it collapsed because they found few clients. The two then went to work for Kansas City Film Ad, where they continued to experiment with animation and different techniques. After two years, Disney quit his job to launch his second business.

Laugh-O-Gram Films, Inc. was devoted to creating short cartoons based on children’s fairy tales. Disney’s films found success in Kansas, but little elsewhere and proved too expensive a venture to sustain. Alice’s Wonderland would be the last short created before the company went bankrupt in 1923. Still determined, Disney sold his camera and bought a one-way train ticket to Los Angeles, California. He applied all over the city for work as a film director, but was turned down everywhere he went. He then decided to return to animation.

He sent a copy of Alice’s Wonderland to a New York distributor, who immediately wanted a distribution deal with Disney. After convincing his brother Roy to help him with his finances and Iwwerks to move to California, the Disney Brothers’ Studio was officially founded. He also hired a painter by the name of Lillian Bounds, who would later become his wife.

After four years of modest success, The Alice Comedies series ended. Universal Pictures then commissioned Disney for a new animated series called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. It was an instant success and it allowed the Disney studio to expand. But, after a dispute with the distributor, Disney lost the rights to Oswald as well as most of his staff.

In 1928, Disney would rebound with the most famous creation of his career: Mickey Mouse. Mickey Mouse appeared for the first time in Steamboat Willie, the world’s first synchronized sound cartoon. Disney continued to add to his portfolio with Silly Symphonies, a series of musical shorts. Unhappy with his share of the profits, Disney signed a new distribution deal with Columbia Pictures. Iwwerks left Disney to create his own studio and Disney was forced to replace him with numerous other cartoonists. Disney’s success with Mickey Mouse was rewarded with an Academy Award in 1932.

The Disney roster of cartoon characters continued to grow with the addition of Donald Duck, Goofy and others in a spinoff series, which proved equally successful. But, Disney wanted to keep expanding. In 1934, against the advice of his family and colleagues, he decided to create a full-length animated film based on Snow White. After three years and large loans from the Bank of America, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs premiered to a standing ovation. It became the most successful motion picture of 1938, grossing today’s equivalent of $98 million.

The Disney studio continued to expand, producing such animated classics as Pinocchio, Bambi, and Dumbo. During WWII, it was also commissioned to created instructional films for the military. It wasn’t until the late-1940s that the studio would again branch out in a major way. It began creating live action films such as 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and The Parent Trap, which proved to be major successes.

But, perhaps the biggest change for the company came after visiting a children’s theme park in Oakland, California, when Disney began to sketch his own plans for an amusement park to be called Disneyland. Five years in the making, Disney formed WED Enterprises to create the park in Anaheim and it opened on July 18, 1955. In 1964, Disney decided to create Disney World, a similar, but larger and more elaborate version of Disneyland in Florida. Both ventures would prove to be extremely successful, becoming two of the largest theme park resorts in the world. The Disney theme park has since also become an international phenomena, with ones in Tokyo, France and Hong Kong. The theme parks have since also become successful resorts and an associated cruise line has been launched.

Disney died of lung cancer in 1966 but not before creating one of the most successful billion dollar companies and entertaining millions of children and adults alike around the world.

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