7 Lesser-Known Facts About Walt Disney
Are you curious about the fascinating journey of Walt Disney, the mastermind behind beloved characters like Mickey Mouse and the enchanting world of Disneyland?
Join us as we delve into the life of this visionary filmmaker, tracing his path from the creation of iconic cartoons to his enduring impact on popular culture. From Oscar wins to enduring controversies, explore the highs and lows of Disney’s remarkable career.
#1. Disney had humble beginnings
Walt Disney was born in the bustling city of Chicago on December 5, 1901. He was the fourth of five children. When he was four, his family moved to Marceline, Missouri, where the fertile soil of creativity began to nurture his artistic aspirations.
He loved drawing and got encouragement from his aunt and a neighbor who was a retired doctor. However, his family had financial difficulties, so they sold the farm in 1910 and moved to Kansas City the following year.
There, Walt’s father purchased a newspaper route, and he helped his dad deliver newspapers for six years, before and after school and on weekends. In 1917, his father sold the newspaper route and moved back to Chicago, where he worked at a jelly and fruit juice company.
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Walt wasn’t good at school and dropped out when he was 16. When World War I started, he wanted to contribute to the United States, so he lied about his age to join the Red Cross Ambulance Corps because of the Corps’s minimum age requirement of 17. He was sent to France in 1918 and did different jobs. He came back home in 1919 after the war ended.
#2. He was the voice of Mickey Mouse
After his time with the Red Cross, Walt moved to Kansas City. He wanted to be a newspaper cartoonist, but he ended up making ads for magazines and theaters. Then, he got interested in animation. In 1922, he opened a film studio called Laugh-O-Gram, but it didn’t do well and closed in 1923.
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In 1923, Walt and his brother Roy started the Disney Brothers Studio in Hollywood. They made various short and animated cartoons, and in 1927, they started a series about a character called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. But things went bad in 1928 when they lost Oswald and many workers in a fight.
To bounce back, Disney developed a new character: Mickey Mouse. Mickey’s first big movie was “Steamboat Willie,” one of the first cartoons ever to use synchronized sound effects, in 1928.
Mickey Mouse became a big hit, and many people loved this character. And soon there were Mickey Mouse Clubs and lots of stuff with Mickey on it.
In 1929, in a cartoon called “The Karnival Kid,” Mickey spoke for the first time, saying, “Hot dog, hot dog.” Walt even did Mickey’s voice until he got too busy in 1947.
#3. Disney produced propaganda films for the U.S. government during World War II
During World War II, Disney pitched in to help the country. They made movies for government agencies like the Treasury Department. One of these films, “The New Spirit,” came out in 1942. It starred Donald Duck and was all about why people should pay their taxes to support the war. This movie was a big hit, shown in lots of theaters, and even got nominated for an Academy Award.
Disney didn’t stop there. They also made training videos for the military to help soldiers get ready for battle. Plus, they designed over a thousand logos for different military units, using both their famous characters and some new ones.
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At first, Walt Disney was worried about making cartoons that were too political. But eventually, they made one called “Der Fuerher’s Face” in 1943. This short film made fun of the Nazis and featured Donald Duck again.
Then, after reading a popular book called “Victory Through Air Power,” Walt Disney decided to turn it into a movie in 1943. This film was both live-action and animated, just like their other work. It aimed to support the book’s ideas about how important long-range bombing was in the war. Even President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill watched it, and it left an impression on them.
#4. He was a train buff
The famous filmmaker, Walt Disney, always had a thing for trains. His dad and uncle worked on railroads, and when Walt was a teen in Kansas City, he sold newspapers and snacks on trains for a bit. But it was in 1928, on a train ride from New York to Los Angeles, that he got the idea for Mickey Mouse, after finding out he had lost the rights to another character.
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To relax, Walt liked to build model train sets. In the late 1940s, he even made a small steam locomotive. When he moved to a new home in Los Angeles in 1950, he built half a mile of tracks around his property for his own railroad, the Carolwood Pacific Railroad, named after the street he lived on. He’d dress up like a train conductor and give rides to visitors.
His love for trains didn’t stop there. Disneyland, which opened in 1955, has its own railroad, showing just how much Walt loved trains.
#5. The original plans for Disneyland were small in scale
Walt Disney had a big idea to make a small amusement park near his studio in Burbank. But soon, he wanted something even bigger. So, in 1953, he hired a group to find the best spot for a huge theme park in Southern California. They looked at things like how many people lived there, the weather, and how easy it was to get there. They picked a place in Anaheim, with lots of orange trees.
Construction started in July 1954, and Disneyland opened a year later, on July 17. But the first day wasn’t perfect. People made fake tickets, so too many showed up. Some rides didn’t work, and parts of the park weren’t done. There was even a gas leak that made them close one area.
The opening day was shown on live TV, with Ronald Reagan hosting. But it wasn’t smooth. There were a lot of technical problems. Still, about 70 million Americans watched it.
#6. He holds the record for the most Academy Awards
Disney won many individual Oscars (22) and nominations (59)! His first win was in 1932 for a short cartoon called “Flowers and Trees.” It was special because it used a new color process called Technicolor. After that, he kept winning for cartoons for seven years in a row. He also got nominated for best picture once, for “Mary Poppins” in 1964, but he didn’t win. Still, the movie won other awards, including one for Julie Andrews.
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Disney got four special Oscars too. One was for creating Mickey Mouse, another for “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs,” and a third for “Fantasia.” The “Snow White” award was unique—it had a regular-size statue and seven tiny ones, like the dwarfs!
#7. Disney wasn’t cryogenically frozen
In November 1966, doctors found out that Disney had lung cancer. He was a smoker for a long time. Sadly, he passed away at a hospital in Burbank the next month, on December 15, when he was 65 years old.
After Disney died, some gossip magazines said he was frozen after death, hoping to come back to life someday. But that’s not true. He was cremated, and his ashes were put in a special place at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Glendale, California.
The first person to be frozen like that was a professor in January 1967. Since then, over a hundred others have been frozen too, including famous baseball player Ted Williams, who died in 2002.