“First, think. Second, dream. Third, believe. And finally, dare” -Walt Disney
From having an unhappy childhood to building the “happiest place on Earth” for people everywhere, Walt Disney was an extraordinary visionary. The man who left an impression so strong on the childhood of generations, that his work continues to be a synonym for nostalgia and laughter. The man who dared to dream despite all the odds against him suffered the pangs of failure from early on in his career. It was his tenacity to keep going despite the storms that turned his failures into success and made his story one of the most inspiring.
Even today, that one piece of music, or the castle of joy, even the cursive logo of Disney itself, transports us back to the happiest years of our life. The summer days spent in front of the T.V. and the winter nights that bought us cosy movies and stories.
Let us explore the story of Disney’s humble beginnings, the loss of legal rights to his first cartoon, to building his empire:
HUMBLE BEGINNINGS:
The fourth son among his five siblings, Walter Elias Disney, first showed a keen aptitude in drawing and painting at the beginning of his schooling in Marceline, Missouri, where his family had moved to when he was only an infant.
It was there that his love for animals blossomed as his father took over a farm. But his happy times on the farm were short-lived. After the farm failed, the family moved to Kanas City, Missouri and Walt was tasked with helping his father deliver newspapers. Additionally, he worked to sell candies and newspapers on the train that travelled between Kanas City and Chicago, Illinois, his birth city.
Walt Disney watched his older brothers escape their allegedly abusive father and stressful environment at home. When America entered World War I, he followed suit and escaped the home by joining the Red Cross Unit as an ambulance driver at the age of 16.
Ironically, the young Walt Disney with immense sufferings in his childhood had set out on the path to making the childhood of future generations a time to remember fondly.
LOSS OF HIS FIRST CARTOON:
In 1919, Disney returned from the war as a commercial artist for Pesmen-Rubin Commercial art studio at the age of 18. For once, life was going well for him. Until the Depression of 1920-21 struck and Disney was laid off. In a matter of days, his life had turned upside down.
He found himself at the crossroad of his career, on one side, he desired to be an artist. But his father pressurized him to join his jelly factory. To do what his heart desired or what others desired for him?
Disney powered through the unhappy times and with his brother Roy, he launched their company ‘Laugh-O-Grams’. With a rocky start, their cartoon company became successful. They even had six contracts for animated shows from a local theatre.
Disney and his team worked to their bones to finish the animation. Only short of completing the project, the distributors backed off, leaving Disney under a pile of debt.
Once again, refusing to kneel to the hard times, Walt Disney conceptualized a revolutionary idea of inserting real footage of a girl in animation and so ‘Alice in the Wonderland’ was born. Unfortunately, he could not find the distributors for his film, and his company headed to bankruptcy. Packing his dream of publishing ‘Alice in the Wonderland’, Disney headed for Los Angeles.
To his surprise, there were no animation studios in California, Walt convinced his brother Roy to set up one and surely it was a success. Mrs. Winkler gave him a contract of $1500 for six episodes of ‘Alice’, The ‘Disney Brothers’ Company was established and life turned around with his first major success with ‘Oswald the Lucky Rabbit’.
Only to find at the renegotiation of his contract, that his producers had illegally hired most of his employees, to push Walt to the curb and produce new episodes without him. The cherry on the cake, he had lost rights to not only to ‘Oswald the Lucky Rabbit’ but also ‘Alice’!
Walt Disney was devastated as he ought to be after losing the work, he had poured his heart into. Unknown to him then, his most lovable character was set to take the world by the storm.
MICKEY MOUSE WAS BORN:
Success depends on how you deal with failures, Walt Disney had the most perfect response to the betrayal and subsequent failure. Work harder and do things better than anyone in the industry.
Walt and his small team ransacked their brain for a new cartoon and so the beloved character of The Mickey Mouse was born. He took things a step further and decided to provide the audience with an animation synced with music. An experience never had before, an art never attempted. As expected, this was his groundbreaking success. The audience loved it and wanted re-runs. Walt Disney was headed to become a Hollywood celebrity.
‘BLACK SUNDAY’ DISNEYLAND OPENING:
That was not the end of Walt Disney’s crisis. Neither in private life nor professional. After the journey of creating ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarves’ – a never before attempted full-length feature film, Disney failed to perform well at the box office with his subsequent films ‘Pinocchio’, ‘Fantasia’ and ‘Bambi’.
During World War II, his animators went on a strike, adding to his already accumulated debts of around $4 million. He took another challenge to get his beloved characters on TV screens when everyone was sticking to the big screens. With ‘The Mickey Mouse Club’ and ‘Davy Crockett’, he sent off to his most ambitious project ever: The Disneyland.
He had placed a real person inside the cartoon world before with ‘Alice’, now he wanted to bring the cartoon world to the real people. Even when his brother Roy was against the idea, and the bankers were not fully on board to support the idea, Walt Disney pushed through.
On July 17th, 1955, Disneyland opened with forged tickets bringing in more visitors than anticipated, the heat of the weather worsened with defunct water fountains and even some rides malfunctioned. It was an opening that critics referred to as “Black Sunday”. But Walt Disney did not let it dampen the idea of his dreamland.
With his perseverance, the sky was the limit. Not only are there five Disneyland in the world, but Walt Disney went on to fund and create the California Institute of Arts, business ventures like Disney-MGM Studio, Animal Kingdom, Touchstone Films, Hollywood Records, Disney Cruise Line bloomed. Walt Disney also holds the record for most Academy Awards earned by an individual with 59 nominations and 22 Oscars, 2 Golden Globe Special Achievement Awards, 1 Emmy Award to name a few.
Walt Disney and all his enterprises became a colossal success, not because of a stroke of luck, but because of his inability to accept failure. Of all the million reasons life gave him to kneel, Disney pushed back harder. He was a dreamer and a doer. As Walt Disney put it himself: “If you can dream it, you can do it.”
Author Bio: Disha Walia is a writer, editor for those who have trouble putting thoughts into words, and a lifelong storyteller. As a Psychology graduate with a Master’s degree in English, she loves exploring the unknown world of words with an interdisciplinary approach. She has a love for hobbies that focus on finer details, creativity, and intriguing depths.
