The history of Walt Disney and the origins of Disney

The Walt Disney Company has a rich history full of interesting stories and facts. In this article we try to tell as much as possible about the rich history of this company and its founder Walter Elias Disney.

The Magical Beginning

In the summer of 1923, Walter Elias Disney traveled from Kansas City to California. Here he arrived with a cartoon about a girl in an animation world, better known as Alice in Wonderland.

He was determined to sell this cartoon to a producer, and after some time he succeeded and sold a series of Alice in Wonderland cartoons to MJ Winkler in New York. This contract began on October 16, 1923.

The official start date of the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio. Walt and his brother Roy both owned half of this company. Later, on Roy's advice, the name was changed to Walt Disney Studio.19

Walt continued for another 4 years with the success of Alice in Wonderland. In 1927 he decided to move on to another project starring Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. He made no fewer than 26 cartoons in one year with Oswald. Then after a year he tried to get more money from the developer.

He found out that the developer had tried to sign his team behind his back. Walt decided to review his contract with the developer. When he found out that it was not he but the developer who owned Oswald.

This was an expensive lesson for Walt, but one he learned from, and from that point on, Walt never worked on a project he didn't own.

It all started with a mouse

In the meantime, Walt moves his studio to a larger location and starts looking for a new project together with Ub Iwerks. After many sketches and discussions, the well-known Mickey Mouse is born.

The first two films starring Mickey are so-called 'silent cartoons', which means that the cartoons did not yet contain sound. At this time (1928), films with sound were on the rise. Because of this, Walt had enormous difficulty selling these films.

As a result, Walt and Ub decided to once again develop a film with Mickey Mouse in the leading role. This time with sound, it was one of the first cartoons with fully synchronized sound. This film called 'Steamboat Willie' had its premiere on November 18, 1928 at the Colony Theater in New York and was immediately a huge success.

This success was followed by a whole series of cartoons starring Mickey Mouse.

Since Walt Disney couldn't sit still, he soon came up with another series of cartoons called the Silly Symphonies. Various different characters emerged in these cartoons. In these series there was less humor and jokes as was the case with Mickey Mouse, but the focus was on emotions and musical themes. Ultimately, Disney uses the Silly Symphonies as training for all Disney artists. To let them master the tricks of the trade.

In 1932, Disney won an Oscar for best cartoon with the first colored cartoon of the Silly Symphonies. From then on, Disney will manage to win this award 10 years in a row.

Development

As the popularity of cartoons grows enormously, Disney discovers how important merchandising can be as an additional source of income. A New York man offers Walt $300 to sell licensed pens featuring Mickey Mouse. Walt needs the money to further develop his business and agrees. The well-known cuddly toys, toothbrushes and figures soon follow. Almost everything you wanted was also available with an image of the famous mouse.

1930 was an important year for the well-known character Mickey Mouse, as the first comic book of the world-famous mouse was published in this year.

In 1934, Walt Disney told his animators the plan to develop the now world-famous film Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs . In the beginning, many people are still skeptical, they are afraid that it does not fit into Disney's current story. Three years later, on December 21, 1937, the film was released to the world. It quickly became the best-selling film of all time until being overtaken by "Gone with the Wind" in 1939.

The War and Disney

From this moment on, Disney's strategy changed, Walt knew that the small cartoons would cover the costs, but that he would bring in profits for his company with the larger film productions. The next two films to be released were Pinocchio and Fantasia in 1940. These two films were technical works of art, but the costs were much too high, partly due to the arrival of the Second World War. Due to the war, Disney lost many foreign markets, causing revenues to be lower than expected. During the war, Walt also released a cheaper produced film called Dumbo (1941). After this film, Disney made a mistake they had made before. Again she produced a very expensive film called Bambi (1942). Due to the war, costs were again too high. As a result, Disney decided to take a different approach from that moment on.

Walt also produced another cartoon during this time and released his first live action film. Because no one expected this from Walt Disney, it was difficult to get started, but in the end he also managed to win a prize.

In addition to the films, Disney was also very busy helping America during the war. For example, he had his animators make instruction and training videos for the army. Disney also developed gas masks for children in the shape of Mickey Mouse.

After the war

It wasn't until after the war that Disney's great success began. For example, Disney had some very nice highlights in 1950 with, for example, the first full live action film of Disney Treasure Island and of course the animations had not disappeared either, so Cinderella also became a great success that year. In addition, that was the first year in which Disney made an animation for Christmas Time. From that moment on things only seemed to get better for Disney in 1954 they created the Disney Anthology Series, today this series is called The Wonderfull World of Disneyland. This is the longest running Prime Time series on TV to date. The Mickey Mouse Club also appeared on TV in 1955, which attracted many young fans and a name soon emerged for this group: "Mousketeers".

The First Imagineer

Walt was a real perfectionist, he was never really satisfied with what he had already achieved. He had many plans that he still wanted to carry out. Because as a father he liked to take his children out for a day, he knew better than anyone what it was like to go to a zoo, circus or other event as a parent. Usually the children had a great time, but the parents ended up waiting on a bench. He believed that this could be done differently and wanted to create a park where the whole family could have a fun day. This is still the thinking at Disneyland. After years of planning and construction, the first Disneyland Park Annaheim opened on July 17, 1955.

Walt said then that Disneyland would never be finished as long as thinkers continue to exist, this statement remains true to this day. Disney parks are still getting new attractions, for example the recently opened Avenger Campus in Disneyland Paris.

The end.

In the 1950s to 1960s, Walt Disney produced many TV series and films, including the famous Zorro, and in 1964 Walt released the legendary Mary Popins film. In this film Walt uses all the knowledge and experience he has acquired in his long career as a filmmaker. This film also became a huge success worldwide. Not much later on December 15, 1966, Walt died. This brings an end to a special era.

From that moment on, Roy Disney takes control and continues with his brother's plans. This is followed by the films Junglebook in 1967 and Aristocats in 1970. This reassures the audience, despite the loss of the company's most important image, quality films are still produced.

Disneyland worldwide

As mentioned earlier in this article, Walt was never satisfied with what he had already accomplished. It was therefore more than logical that after the enormous success of the first Disneyland park, new parks were soon considered. Before his death, he bought a huge plot of land in Orlando, Florida, so that the world-famous Walt Disney World park could be built here. In addition to the theme park, a golf course, shopping center and hotels were also built to create the ultimate experience for their guests. This also became a huge success and today the park is even known as one of the most visited holiday destinations in the world.

In the years that followed, The Walt Disney Company built a huge empire and now has a theme park on almost every continent. There are now no fewer than 11 parks. Consider, for example: Disneyland Paris, Disneyland Tokyo and Hong Kong.

Disney Originals

Roy Disney was at the helm of the company until 1971, but when he died a team of three gentlemen was appointed; Card Walker, Donn Tatum and Ron Miller. These gentlemen had been trained by the Disney brothers themselves and knew better than anyone what the company's philosophy was. They managed to push the company in the right direction for more than 10 years. This team also ensured that Walt's Epcot plan was implemented with adjustments.

In the early 1980s, the film industry changed enormously due to the arrival of new techniques, and the market was less focused on family films. As a result, Disney found it a bit difficult in the beginning, but soon they set up a special label aimed at teenagers and young adults in order to tap into a new market. This was not a great success and the company's shares collapsed. This caused a lot of unrest again. In an attempt to save the company, two new directors were appointed, who ensured that peace was restored.

So in 1983 they started preparing Disney Channel, a cable network channel. This channel still exists today and has been important for Disney to convey its content to new generations.

May the Force be With You

At the end of the 1980s, Disney also entered into a partnership with the famous filmmaker George Lucas, creator of the Star Wars films. This collaboration created new attractions in the parks such as Star Tours and Space Mountain.

Milestone

1988 was a milestone for the Disney company through several films such as Good Morning Vietnam. The company achieved a turnover of no less than 100 million for the first time. That was an exceptionally high turnover at this time. This year they also became co-owners of a major TV channel and opened several profitable Disney Stores.

Greater Audience

In the 1990s, Disney's audience grew dramatically with films such as The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast (1991). The audience grew enormously, this was followed up with many series and projects. The next big success for Disney was The Lion King in 1994, this timeless film made Disney even more famous and sales went through the roof again. The Lion King is the highest grossing film of all time.

In 1992 the time came that European fans could also enjoy a Disney Theme Park. Disneyland Paris officially opens its doors under the name Euro Disney. The magical park was initially a great success, but due to high costs and little confidence in the stock market, it unfortunately went bankrupt in 2014. The Walt Disney Company decides to take the company completely private and takes matters into its own hands. That turned out to be a success. Today, Disneyland Paris is a household name in Europe and the most visited park on the continent.

Investors still complain about the high costs of the Disney parks, but fortunately Disney continues to stick to their strategy!

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