Walt Disney

Walt Disney

Over the sumer I did a bit of research on Walt Disney.  I really didn't know to much about him besides general knowledge so it was quite interesting to delve into his life and find out just how driven he was. There's no doubt in my mind that Disney would not be the giant corporation it is today if it wasn't for Walt.


That might seem like I'm stating the obvious but I'll go into it more in later posts. For now I'll just say it was because of Walt Disney going against everything his peers were telling him that got "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" to happen. The big deal about this is that it was one of the first American feature length animations, it was a massive success and opened the door for future feature length animations to be produced.


When you think about how influential those early Disney films have been to scores of other animators you can start to understand how important this was for the film and animation industries.


I think it's his strong work ethic that made him so successful. He never gave up after the failures of his first two businesses, Iwerks & Disney Commercial Artists and Laugh-O-Grams Studio. He basically did what it took to make things happen.


When "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" ran into financial trouble during production (just like his peers said it would!), he took what had been produced so far and secured a bank loan to cover the remainder of the production.


I also found myself being really interested in his later project, EPCOT, The Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow. EPCOT was to be a place where corporations would be encouraged to tackle the problems inherent in modern American cities with an aim to spread this ideal to other parts of the world by creating a self sustained city, suburbs and the Disney World Theme Park and Holiday Resort and inspiring visitors. He unfortunately died before completing the project and the board of directors decided to abandon the project.


What really interested me about this is that, given what I had already learned about Disneys drive, ambition and work ethic, he might have actually pulled it off. I wonder how successful it would have been and what sort of impact it would have had. How different would the world be? It might have totally failed. It's just really fascinating to me!


I've probably more to say on Walt Disney and EPCOT but I'll keep this short and just end on a quote from the man himself the day before the launch of Disneyland which I think is a nice little ideal that shows his desire to entertain and to give back what he enjoyed in his childhood.


"To all who come to this happy place; welcome. Disneyland is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past .... and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future. Disneyland is dedicated to the ideals, the dreams and the hard facts that have created America ... with the hope that it will be a source of joy and inspiration to all the world."

Walt Disney Sunday, July 17, 1955