Growing up in Florida, I have been surrounded by Walt Disney my entire life. As a kid, I associated the name with my most favorite theme parks, but as I've grown, the name Walt Disney has been synonymous with so much more than just rides and attractions. For me, Walt Disney was an artist .... a storyteller ... a visionary ... a dreamer — a man whose legacy will carry on for generations and generations to come.
Having this great admiration for Walt Disney, I was especially excited to visit The Walt Disney Family Museum during my my stay in San Francisco for the INSIDE OUT event at Pixar Studios.
Founded by Walt’s daughter, Diane Disney Miller, The Walt Disney Family Museum illuminates Walt’s fascinating life, from Disney’s childhood, young adulthood and his early, fitful starts at developing live and animated films, including the difficulties with his first cartoon company.
It was interesting to learn that after Laugh-O-gram Films went bankrupt in 1923, Disney took the train to California with only $40 in his pocket. He truly lived and breathed the American Dream!
By the end of the 1920s, Disney had risen to international fame and recognition with the creation of the world’s most famous mouse. His studio also enjoyed great financial success—and changed the animation industry—with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), its first feature-length animated film.
Walt Disney received a custom-made Oscar at the 11th Academy Awards from Shirley Temple for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs — the award included one statuette and seven miniature statuettes.
During my visit to The Walt Disney Museum I learned a lot of interesting facts about the man behind one of the most iconic brands in the world. Here are a few of my favorites:
- Walt Disney was born in Chicago, IL on December 5, 1901. In 1906, his family moved to a Missouri farm, where he had an idyllic early childhood and first learned to draw. The farm failed, and in 1911 his family moved to Kansas City, MO where he rose at 3:30 a.m. to deliver newspapers on his father’s paper route and fell in love with vaudeville and movies.
- Walt was rejected from joining the U.S. Army for being underage, and instead joined the American Ambulance Corps and arrived in France as World War I ended.
- Walt arrived in California in 1923 hoping to find work as a director. But when he received a contract for his own work, he launched Disney Bros. Studio with his brother Roy.
- Disney’s animation studio nearly went bankrupt after the completion of Fantasia (1940), a film that received favorable reviews but did not win large audiences.
- After a hiatus mandated by World War II, during which the Studio produced morale-boosting films, Disney began to expand the scope of the studio’s work by making live-action nature documentaries that grew out of his childhood love of the outdoors.
- Walt Disney’s work on the World’s Fair pavilions inspired him to develop a new paradigm, EPCOT (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow) — a project Walt described as “a community of tomorrow that will never be completed, but will always be introducing, testing, and demonstrating new materials and new systems…a showcase to the world of the ingenuity and imagination of American free enterprise.”
Walt Disney was a visionary who turned his dreams and the dreams of children into a reality. He never gave up when he was told something was impossible. This legacy is still a driving force behind all things in the Walt Disney company, and can even be seen with the upcoming release of legendary director Brad Bird's and Walt Disney Pictures Tomorrowland.
TOMORROWLAND opens in theaters everywhere May 22nd!
In addition to its galleries, the Museum presents screenings of a different Disney classic film every month, as well as related lively programs and concerts, featuring Disney Legends, actors, animators, musicians, character voices, historians and Disney family members. Weekly Disney Discovery classes and workshops teach animation, illustration, sketching, painting, stop‐motion cinematography, voice‐acting and more for all ages. A series of one and two week summer camps encourage children to explore acting onstage, learn the secrets behind special effects, create an animated short, unwrap the magic of illusions, explore the outdoors with a video camera, create a comic book hero and more.
Hours: The Museum is open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Wednesdays through Mondays. Closed Tuesdays, and January 1, Thanksgiving Day, and December 25.
Admission: Admission can be purchased at the door or at waltdisney.org. Tickets are $20 for adults, $15 for seniors and students, and $12 for children 6 to 17. Admission is free for members and children under 6. Movies are $7 for adults and $5 for children. For information about annual memberships, please check waltdisney.org/membership.
Special thanks to Walt Disney Pictures for hosting my visit to San Francisco. All opinions are my own.
Darlene Ysaguirre
Lots of fun facts i never knew before, but thank god he took that train with only $40.00 in his pocket are we would of missed out on lots of great movies.