107 Walt Disney Facts You Should Know | Channel Frederator

ah disney the happiest place on earth we've all seen the movies we all know them we all love them but how did it all start how did it get so big how did the movies become so popular to answer these questions we're going to take a look at the life of the big man himself i'm jeremy and these are 107 facts you should know about walt disney number one and we start at the beginning december 5th 1901 walter elias disney was born as the fourth child in a family with five children he shares this birthday with werner heisenberg yes namesake of walter white's alter ego and breaking bad number two the name of disney is an americanization of the french name designee from the town of isigny sur mare in normandy number three one important event early on in walt's life was when he accidentally killed a small owl he felt so guilty about this that he vowed never to harm another animal and this led to his interest in personalizing them number four taking this to a logical next question was he a vegetarian because of this belief the answer is a firm no one of his favorite dishes was beef chili number five in fact he loved it so much that he would bring cans of the stuff with him wherever he went and he would ask the chefs of the hotels he stayed in to heat it up for him number six in a school play he once played peter pan a story he would later go on to adapt into a movie though reportedly he was not happy with the way that one turned out number seven his first real job was a simple paper route which he had to do so early that he would frequently fall asleep in school number eight disney took an interest in art and drawing very early on his first time working as a cartoonist was when he was still in high school at the school newspaper mainly about world war one which the u.s had just joined number nine walt did enlist in the u.s military was initially rejected for being too young tried again with the red cross and this time lied about his age now he was admitted and he did ship out to france but only arrived when the armistice had already gone into effect number 10 but he did drive an ambulance while there and true to form decorated the sight of it himself number 11 one of the other people in this unit whom walt disney served with was ray kroc who is frequently credited as the brains behind mcdonald's global expansion number twelve back in the us he took a job as an artist for advertisements and commercials at pesman reuben art studio where he met ub iwerks with whom walt would work for years to come number 13 pesman rubin would lay off disney and iwerks only a year later whereupon walt would come to work for kansas city film ad company and this is what would directly lead to the start of his career in animation number 14 technical note here is that he was mainly working with cutout animation whereas walt preferred to work with cell animation unable to convince his boss of this walt left the company to found his own with a co-worker called laughagram studios number 15 that being said the cited reason for him being fired was a quote lack of imagination now that's what you'd call irony number 16 now this failed laughogram went bankrupt in 1923 but walt finished a 12 and a half minute semi-live-action alice in wonderland film just a little too late though the studio went under and that version of alice in wonderland was never released to theaters number 17 importantly though walt did keep possession of the finished film and went to california to try his luck instead as a director of live-action film number 18 in los angeles he met with margaret j winkler then the rights holder to felix the cat among others but she was losing those rights and needed something else disney using the alice in wonderland film as a sort of resume managed to sell her on the idea and got commissioned for six more of those alice films number 19 it's important to note that had this not happened walt would have joined his brother roy in selling vacuum cleaners door to door number 20 and now at last walt and his brother roy formed the disney brothers studio to produce those six films moral of the story walt disney's path to success was anything but a straight line instead being one of continuous trial and error but he persisted and ultimately succeeded number 21 now a couple of notable additions to the early studio in 1924 walt convinced ub iwerks to move from kansas city to work for him in los angeles and in 1925 he hired an ink artist named lillian bounds whom walt would marry a few months later number 22 two years later disney worked with producer charles lintz and after the alice films walt wanted to move to all animation and created his first original character oswald the lucky rabbit number 23 1926 is the point where the studio was renamed to the walt disney studio a name it would carry for the next three years then being renamed to walt disney productions number 24 now the working relationship between mints and disney was strained to say the least though a technicality mints was the owner of oswald the lucky rabbit the two had a falling out over money whereupon mints convinced basically all of the animation staff from the disney brothers studio to come work for him in universal with only eye works remaining with disney number 25 so now the disney brothers studio needed a new mascot which turned out to be quite the team effort walt sketched a cartoon mouse he called mortimer a design which eyeworks would later refine and lillian didn't like the name mortimer instead suggesting to call him mickey number 26 mortimer would show up in an animated short in 1936 though as mickey's romantic rival for minnie's affection apparently mortimer's design was based on walt himself though number 27 here's where things get a little muddy the first finished film with mickey mouse is plain crazy but it wasn't the first one to be published that was steamboat willie number 28 steamboat willie is significant in another way as not only was it the first widely released appearance of mickey it was also the first cartoon ever to be made with a fancy new technology post-produced sound this is what truly made the seven and a half minute short a big hit with the audience number 29 this will also become a running theme in walt's life and by extension this video he was always looking for technological innovations to make his films better and this is a big part of what made him so successful number 30 plain crazy would later be revised now with the addition of sound and released in 1929 to be another hit for disney number 31 walt disney himself famously did the voice of mickey mouse until 1947 leading to many at the company saying that while iwerks gave mickey his shape disney gave him his soul number 32 but this did create friction walt refused to give iwerks the credit he deserved for mickey's final design and iwerks left the studio in 1930 to found his own animation studio number 33 perhaps unsurprisingly eyeworks animation wasn't able to compete though and he returned to disney in 1940 where he started working on special visual effects and technologies which would lead to breakthroughs that would pave the way for more movies like mary poppins number 34 now disney begins the silly symphony series which soon became a decent hit it wouldn't really take off until 1932 when they released the installment flowers and trees which became one of the very first animated films in full color and became a huge hit number 35 this was not a surprise though as walt had managed to secure the technicolor patent making him the only person allowed to make animated films in color this patent was only valid for two years number 36 because most of the animation had already been done in black and white walt nearly went bankrupt converting the whole thing to color but it definitely paid off because it was a huge hit and would also win him his first academy award number 37 this was the first of 22 oscars walt disney would win during his life more than any other individual he won a further four more honorary oscars and was nominated a total of 59 times number 38 in fact walt would receive at least one academy award nomination every year for the rest of his life with the only two exceptions being 1933 and 1941. number 39 that said one of the cartoons he produced in 1933 three little pigs was so popular with the general audience that it was frequently built over the actual feature film it was supposed to accompany number 40 for his 35th birthday his employees threw him a surprise party at the behest of his brother two of the animators thought it would be funny to make a short clip of mickey and minnie consummating the relationship walt fired them both on the spot number 41 by 1934 walt was growing tired of producing nothing but animated shorts they were successful but having spent years trying to make people laugh with his cartoons he started wondering if it would be possible to make people cry with them instead and he decided he needed to make a feature-length animated movie number 42 to say the media were skeptical of this would be an understatement they were so convinced that it would be a disaster they nicknamed the project disney's folly and they may have had a point number 43 the production of snow white and the seven dwarfs cost 1.5 million dollars which doesn't sound so bad until i tell you that it exceeded its originally estimated budget three times over number 44 but it definitely struck a chord with audiences because not only was the film a huge hit with audiences earning eight million dollars it also won him an honorary academy award one full-size statue accompanied by seven smaller ones number 45 but then a tragedy struck the family after the success of snow white walt bought a new house for his parents but there was a leak in the heating and his mother died from carbon monoxide poisoning something walt felt guilty over and is frequently hailed as the reason why so many disney characters don't have mothers number 46 this convinced the studio to begin two more projects in 1938 pinocchio at the start of the year and fantasia by november the problem was animation takes a long time and both of them were released in 1940 by which time world war ii had broken out in europe meaning very little revenue from over there the disney company was now in trouble number 47 so in that same year walt and roy decided to take the studio onto the stock market in an attempt to expand their funds and this in combination with a salary cut of everyone at the company and producing dumbo on the cheap largely worked and it kept the studio afloat number 48 around this time though disney took a stab at adapting hans christian anderson's fairy tale the snow queen but he couldn't quite get it to work it would be 70 years before this finally came to fruition as frozen but given how loose the adaptation is no surprise he couldn't get it to work number 49 it's late 1941 and the us joins world war ii walt doesn't enlist again he's a bit too old for that and instead starts producing training videos for the military and various factories supporting the war effort number 50 on the more cartoony side he also made propaganda films for the us department of the treasury both to promote the sale of war bonds and in an effort to lift public morale which was very low at this point in time number 51 1942 sees the release of bambi another financial loss for disney again because of the war but he couldn't get around it it had been in production since 1937. number 52 the propaganda was more successful though the most famous of which probably being der fuhrer's face featuring donald duck whom we haven't mentioned until now despite having been created in 1934 number 53 this film also went by the titles of donald and nutsy land or nightmares in nutsy land you can see why they didn't go with those even in the context of the war number 54 that said an army draft notice was delivered to the studio following the pearl harbor attack addressed to donald duck number 55 however one of disney's propaganda films victory through air power was shown to among others winston churchill and franklin d roosevelt and actually went on to influence policy and strategy of the allies mostly concerning long-range bombing number 56 one of the scenes in that film a rocket bomb destroying a german submarine pen led to british engineers developing that cartoon into a real weapon that would become known informally as the disney bomb number 57 while that bomb worked well in theory and even in testing a continuous problem the pilots had using it was accuracy so the actual success of the bomb is debated number 58 it's 1945 the war is over and walt disney can now focus back on keeping his company afloat because throughout the war it was perilously close to bankruptcy number 59 the company was four million dollars in debt with the bank of america which is huge and the only reason the bank didn't pull the plug on it was a gut feeling by the executives that even though the risk was high it would pay off in the long run which it did number 60 one thing to note on the war there are very persistent rumors to this day that walt disney was secretly a nazi sympathizer but as far as anyone who actually worked with him was concerned this isn't true even art babbitt developer of goofy who hated walt and went so far as to sue him at one point never mentioned anything of the sword number 61 so why the rumors well they started in 1938 when lenny reifenstahl the famous director and nazi propagandist got a tour of the studio from walt disney himself only a month after the kristallnacht a massive attack on jewish-owned buildings and synagogues in germany so there was no way to make that look good number 62 and that brings us to 1946 when because of their consistent money problems roy disney convinced his brother that they should be including more live-action pieces into their animated movies to save money number 63 walt listens to this and in that year they release song of the south great timing way to make all those racism arguments go away for the record it's set on a plantation in the deep south and even at the time was heavily criticized for its stereotypical portrayal of black people and other archaic depictions among others number 64. if you haven't heard of that movie it's because disney doesn't want you to have heard of it it's never been released on home media in the us and neither is it on disney plus number 65. now while there is no real evidence to support the notion that walt disney was considered a racist by the standards of the time there is plenty of evidence that he was fervently anti-communist he had been passing information on that subject to the fbi from 1940 to his death number 66 for this he was given direct contact with j edgar hoover head of the fbi and given the title of full special agent-in-charge contact in 1954. number 67 walt disney was quite the train enthusiast having originally wanted to become a train engineer obviously this didn't happen but when he moved to holmby hills in 1949 he did get a miniature railway in his own backyard and gave it the rather grandiose title of carrollwood pacific railway number 68 for this he got a rideable working steam locomotive that he named the lilly bell after his wife number 69 sadly he didn't get to enjoy it for very long in 1953 there was an incident while one of his guests was operating the train causing it to derail and a girl suffered burns on her leg from the escaping steam number 70 a lot of investors in the studio were not sold on disney's idea of a theme park so he set up another company with his own money to get different investors to build his park number 71 but he purchased a plot of land outside anaheim and began the construction of what would become disneyland originally he wanted it next to the studio even going as far as getting zoning permission but there wasn't nearly enough space available in burbank number 72 he chose anaheim because demographics experts convinced him there would be a population boom there over the next 10 years or so they turned out to be completely right number 73 of course the studio itself didn't stand still either releasing cinderella in 1950 the first fully animated disney movie since pinocchio and finally another success for the company number 74 but this is also where walt disney starts to distance himself somewhat from the animation department he's still a key figure in deciding the hows and whats of the stories but is more hands-off leaving more decisions to his animators number 75 on july 17 1955 walt disney's pep project opened its doors and it was a complete disaster because of counterfeit tickets it was too busy rides weren't finished and kept breaking down traffic was backed up water fountains didn't work and the weather was so hot that the freshly poured asphalt slightly melted and women in high heels would sink into it number 76 it was however attended by disney's friend ronald reagan reagan was a television host at the time for the show general electric theater number 77 a lot of people also thought that the water fountains being turned off was because the opening ceremony was sponsored by pepsi and that it was a cynical attempt to sell more drinks the truth was that the plumbing wasn't finished because the workers were on strike and walt had to choose between having either the toilets working or the water fountains and chose the former good call number 78 walt's love for trains persisted though the train around the park's four themed areas was designed to look like the miniature train he had in his own backyard albeit a lot bigger number 79 but ultimately those issues were all ironed out and the park soon became a big hit having attracted 3.6 million guests by the end of its first year number 80 around this time as well home media begins to rise and disney ever the innovator latches on immediately he struck a deal with abc believing it could be a powerful marketing tool which he was quickly proven correct on number 81 walt was also called in to produce a film for the world fair in 1958 and produced a short film called america the beautiful which would be moved a year later to the american national exhibition in moscow it was one of the most popular attractions there number 82 when soviet leader nikita khrushchev visited the us in 1959 he had two requests to meet john wayne and to visit disneyland he wasn't allowed into the park but he did get to meet john wayne number 83 walt disney was also chosen to be the head of the pageantry committee and designed the opening medal and closing ceremonies of the 1960 winter olympics number 84 despite not being involved with the day-to-day at the animation studio anymore the technical first did keep up though having the first animated movie in cinemascope lady and the the first animated movie on 70 millimeter film cinderella and the first movie to use xerox cells 101 dalmatians number 85 and of course in 1964 one of his biggest hits came out with mary poppins he had been trying to buy the rights from the author of the books pl travers since 1938 after his daughters had made him promise to turn the book into a movie number 86 the struggle for the rights in the creative direction of the movie was adapted into a movie of its own in 2013 saving mr banks with tom hanks as walt disney number 87 fun thing to note tom hanks is actually a distant cousin to walt disney number 88 incidentally most aspects of this movie are not accurate when travers arrived in hollywood to give her approval of the script walt disney himself left a few days into her visit to go on vacation to palm springs a lot of the dialogue in the movie was adapted from telegrams letters and phone calls between them number 89 and while travers famously didn't like the movie critics and audiences loved it and it was disney's only movie to be nominated for best picture during his life number 90 for the 1964 world fair in new york he developed the it's a small world sorry for putting that incredibly catchy tune in your head great moments with mr lincoln carousel of progress and ford's magic skyway all of which would later be reinstalled in disneyland number 91 with the success of his theme park he was looking to venture out to other places and he started planning a ski resort in mineral king and disney world in orlando florida number 92 ever the futurist he wanted the centerpiece of the park to be epcot his idea for what the community of tomorrow would look like sadly he would never see this project finished number 93 walt disney was diagnosed with lung cancer in november of 1966 and died from it a month later only 10 days after his 65th birthday on december 15th number 94 the lung cancer was not a huge surprise though since walt had been a heavy smoker since he was a teenager however because he sold products aimed primarily at children he avoided smoking in public where they could see him number 95 it also gave him quite a heavy smoker's cough something that was very useful for his employees as it often heralded his arrival they would also warn each other with the phrase man is in the forest a reference to bambi number 96 there are two very persistent rumors one being that he was cryogenically frozen and one that he was buried under disneyland neither are true walt was cremated and his ashes interred at forest lawn cemetery in los angeles number 97 epcot was never built though and even though walt's brother roy came out of retirement to finish the park walt's vision was never fully realized instead being turned into the epcot center in 1982 number 98 neither was the ski resort which would remain a paper project forever as the company saw way more potential in the orlando park number 99 the last few years of his life walt did become more involved with the production of movies though and the last movies he worked on were the jungle book and winnie the pooh in the blustery day number 100 technically he also worked on the happiest millionaire but that movie was such a disaster both critically and financially that we don't really count it number 101 after walt's death you can kind of tell just how much of a driving force he was behind the animated movies as both their frequency and quality would take quite a hit after 1966 for years to come number 102 there is some debate about disney's last words it was either kurt russell who was a child actor at the time but even russell didn't know why walt disney would say his name on his death bed or a comment on how shabby the water tower at disney studios looked number 103 whatever the case studio executives made sure that the water tower is now regularly repainted number 104 people often think that the disney logo was walt's signature but this is not true his signature was much simpler and the logo was designed by an animator at the studio apparently walt himself was never able to replicate it number 105 he quite disliked being referred to as mr disney by his employees and insisted that they just call him by his first name number 106 after his death he left 25 of his estate to cal arts which the private university used to build up the campus number 107 and in spite of his very recognizable appearance walt banned disney employees from wearing a mustache in 1957 a band that was not lifted until the early 2000s and that's it 107 facts about walt disney he lived a fascinating life so there were many facts that we had to leave off this list what's your favorite fact about walt disney be sure to let us know in the comments below and while you're there remember to like and subscribe for more great content every week and remember frederator loves you you

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Keywords: Walt Disney, History, Facts, Life, Biography, 107 Facts, ChannelFrederator, Channel Frederator, Mickey Mouse, Disney World, Disney Land, Peter Pan, Laugh-o-Gram, Alice In Wonderland, Roy, Brothers, Studio, Oswald, Frederator, The Leaderboard, Cartoon Conspiracy, cartoon, movie, facts, top, clip, clips, scene, backstory, episode, bts, battle, entire, online, full, free, youtube, first, fight, moments, timeline, The Amagi, Mortimer, Steamboat Willie, Silly Symphony, Mary Poppins, Technicolor, Oscar, Snow White

Id: 9vCJHjCDMoU

Length: 24min 52sec (1492 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 18 2021