On December 5, 1901, there was heard the cry of a newborn child from the home of Elias
Disney, a carpenter by trade, in Chicago. No one could have imagined that this
crying newborn would be the one who would bring smiles and laughter to millions of
children (as well as adults) around the world in just a few decades. His name was Walter
Elias Disney.
Elias Disney was working at the Columbian World Fair in Chicago when his son was born. He
and his wife Flora had three children before their fourth child, Walter, was born. Walter
had three brothers elder to him: Herbert, Raymond and Roy, and his sister, Ruth, was the
youngest. When Walt was four years old, Elias Disney migrated with his family to
Marceline, Missouri, where they settled in a small house. Their house was shaded by broad
weeping willows, cedars and silver maples, where they lived happily with grandma Disney,
Uncle Mike, Uncle Robert and his wife Margaret.
Young Walt was very excited by the move to Marceline. After a crowded, smoky city to a
farm where there were cows, horses, chickens, and orchards with trees of apples whose
aroma was like a fresh touch from another world to young Walt. We can imagine the look of
wonder that must have come to this young impressionable lad of four. This place left such
an imprint on his mind that he would later, when he grew up, be able to draw a mental map
of the whole community as he saw it then, and even after the Disneys had changed house,
thier son, Walter, would remember every plank and nail that made up the house. He would
also remember many of the animals on the farm and would develop a special feeling for
animals which he would later apply to his wonderful stories and cartoons.
There was a herd of cows, and flocks of chicken, but
there was no pigsty when the Disneys took over the farm. So while one was being built, the
hogs would forage for themselves and one of young Walt's first chores would be herding
them. Although he was just a child, he became a hog-rider and when people dropped in to
visit, his father would say proudly, "I'd like to show you Walter riding the
hogs." When an audience would have gathered, young Walt would climb on to a sow's
back and grab her by her ears. When she headed for the pig pond, as she always did, Walt
would ride her into the muddy pool.
Aunt Margaret was the favorite aunt of young Walt; she was the wife of his Uncle Robert.
She was the only one whom Walt would call Auntie.
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She was a Bostonian, took life easy, and could afford to travel. She also loved children,
and she always brought him a gift whenever she came to Marceline. Once she brought him a
box of crayons so he could draw pictures for her, which he would settle down to do now and
then with great enthusiasm, and 'Auntie' would always praise his pictures. Even at the age
of seven, he drew drawings that would draw praise from many people of the Marceline
Community, so much so that he succeeded in selling his first sketches to his
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From early childhood, Walt was deeply influenced by Erastus Taylor, a civil war veteran, who would tell him heroic stories of action and bravery of battles of the past. In 1908, his brothers, Herbert and Raymond grew tired of the life on the farm and decided to go to Chicago. At the age of nine, Walt joined Park School in Marceline, but didn’t stay there long. A year later, his father contracted typhoid, which almost killed him. After recovering, Elias decided to move to Kansas City, where he took up a job delivering newspapers. This move was one of the first sad moments in Walt's life. |
In Kansas City, he and his brother Roy helped their father in his newspaper delivery.
Their father would drive them to be perfectionists, instructing them to deliver their
newspapers properly; placing them behind the storm doors of thier customer's homes and not
throw them on the lawn like other newspaper delivery boys. Walt would arise at 3:30 am in
the morning, and more than once, he would come close to tears, carrying a heavy newspaper
bundle while climbing up steps in the icy Kansas winter. This rugged routine would make
the challenge of staying awake for school a difficult task. Nevertheless, there would be
times when he would surprise his teachers.
Walt memorized the Gettysburg Address when he came to school, dressed up as Abraham
Lincoln. He liked theatrics and Charlie Chaplin movies, and had also sketched his own
version of the then popular comic characters, Maggie and Jiggs. He had a very good friend
called Walt Pfeiffer along with whom he would work up little skits which they would
perform out at amateur-night competitions.
In the meantime, Elias changed his job to become an executive with a firm in Chicago. He
then moved with family to Chicago, leaving Walt behind for summer. Walt later joined his
family when he was admitted to the McKinley High School for further studies. But he could
not concentrate on his studies. His mind was far away in the battlefields of Europe. As he
was too young to join the military, he joined the Red Cross Ambulance Corps. The Ambulance
Corps sent Walt to France as a driver, where he chauffeured Red Cross officials. His
ambulance was covered from stem to stem, not with stock camouflage, but with cartoons and
drawing. He proved himself successful making money by painting helmets and selling them to
Americans.
In the fall of 1919, Walt returned home from his job of ambulance-driver in France. He was
still determined to become an artist. He moved into the old Disney house in Kansas City
with his brothers, Roy and Herbert (and Herbert's family), and tried unsuccessfully to get
a job as an artist at the Kansas City "Star." His brother, Roy, helped him in
acquiring a position of an apprentice at the Pesmen-Rubin Commercial Art Studio, where he
drew horses, cows, and bags of feed for farm-equipment catalogues. Of course, he didn't
ask what he'd be paid: the sum of $50 a month. Unfortunately, just before Christmas, the
firm decided that there wasn't enough business to keep an artist on the payroll, and Walt
was told that his services were no longer required. So he and another out-of-work artist,
Ub Iwerks, decided to start a commercial-art business together, called Iwerks-Disney.
Iwerks-Disney had one prominent client that they could rely on. The father of Walt's old
friend Walt Pfeiffer hired them to work on the United Leatherworkers Journal. But business
was not very good for this firm either. Walt was offered a job that offered $40 a week at
the Kansas City Slide Company (later renamed the Kansas City Film Ad Company), where he
worked on animated commercials. A few months later his friend Ub joined him.
Animation and making cartoons was in its infancy. Even the best cartoons, like Krazy Kat
and the Katzenjammer Kids, were jerky, hazy, and repetitive black and white efforts based
on popular newspaper comic strips. But nevertheless, the public was intrigued and amazed
by this new form of entertainment and so was Walt. He wanted to improve upon the clumsy
means of animation techniques used at Kansas City Film Ad. He read books about animation
and discovered how the leading New York animators worked, and soon enough, he was making
his own cartoons.
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