
Youd think that everything that could or should
be written about Walt Disney was already in print. And yet, every
now and then along comes an article or a book that adds something
important and new to the mix. Most recent among these contributions
to a good Walt Disney library is a book called "Walt Disneys
Missouri." Its published by Kansas City Star Books
and was written by Brian Burnes, Robert W. Butler and Dan
Viets.
The beautifully illustrated book combines familiar stories about
Walts early years with material that will be new even to people
who have read all the mainstream biographies. Following are a couple
of excerpts, featuring episodes from Walts Missouri years
that influenced his later work. If youre interested in ordering
a copy, you can do so online at the following URL:
www.thekansascitystore.com
You can also call 816-234-4636, and say "Star books,"
when the recording asks you for a department name.
Snow White

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is now considered the first feature-length
animated film. Walt Disney risked his company to produce it. Made
at a cost of $1.4 million over about three years, the film was derided
by Hollywood insiders as "Disneys folly." Many of
the same insiders, upon its Hollywood premiere in 1937, wept at
the sight of Snow White in a deathlike trance and then stood to
applaud her romantic return to life.
Money poured into the Disney Company. For a while, "Snow White
and the Seven Dwarfs," was the highest grossing motion picture
of all time, until it was surpassed by "Gone With the Wind."
To judge from Disneys own remarks, the choice to produce
"Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," was an almost casual
one.
"I dont know why I picked "Snow White,"
he said many years later. Its a thing I remembered as
a kid. I saw Marguerite Clark in it in Kansas City one time when
I was a newsboy." Disneys recollections dont convey
the scale or novelty of the presentation of the black-and-white,
live action silent film version of "Snow White" in Kansas
City in January 1917.
Over the weekend of January 27-28, some 67,000 people saw the movie
for free at five separate showings in the Kansas City Convention
Hall. The Kansas City Star sponsored the screenings and all the
newsboys came. "It was the biggest thing ever done in Kansas
City in motion pictures," an official with the amusement inspection
bureau of the citys public welfare department said at the
time. Congratulatory telegrams from Clark, the films star,
as well as from Adolph Zukor, head of the films production
company, appeared in The Star. The turnout was judged sufficiently
news-worthy that a newsreel camera positioned outside the Convention
Hall doors filmed one audience in the act of leaving.
Yet there was additional novelty in the films physical presentation.
The film was displayed on a four-sided screen by four projectors
stationed in the upper reaches of the hall. From his particular
perch, Disney followed the action on two screens at once. The film
consisted of seven reels and 100 feet before the end of each reel,
a gong sounded at the arenas south end. It was a signal to
the other projector operators that they, too, should be the same
distance from the end, allowing them to increase or slow down their
projectors.
Still, on occasion, one reel would jump a half-beat ahead of another
or lag an instant behind. The effect of seeing this as well
as the subsequent ripple of audience reaction across the filled
arena apparently was memorable. "A large number of the
people were able to see two screens at once and some would clap
their hands at some fortunate development in the action, first for
one screen and then for the other," The Star reported.
This "instant deju vu," according to Disney biographer
Richard Shickel burned the experience into Disneys memory.
"He could not forget the story because he could not forget
the oddity of projection." Disney also saw "Snow White"
from still another unique perspective his own age at the time.
In January 1917, Disney had recently turned 15. Its possible
that his reaction to the film was less like the exuberant cheering
from the children who dominated most of the screenings and more
like the enchanted reserve exhibited by the adults who outnumbered
the children during the films Saturday evening presentation.
There was a difference in this crowd. Grown-ups, The Star said,
monitored every move on the screen "In almost absolute quiet."
The unfolding drama of Snow White was followed with a feeling somewhat
akin to reverence, The Star added. "People unconsciously tiptoed
when obliged to move about during the action." The idea that
adults could invest any interest or emotion in a fairy tale could
perhaps be an unexpected result of the new motion-picture technology,
The Star noted. "Magic is quite possible now," the newspaper
said. "It is easily placed in the hands of the scenario writer.
And so those old unused brain paths which responded to the appeal
of the fairy story long ago are awakened and the bridge of decades
is spanned in a single night."
Electric Park
Before television, before radio and even before recognizable movie
theaters, Kansas City had Electric Park.
In pre-World War I Kansas City, the amusement park defined diversion.
Its easy to understand how Kansas City residents, at the end
of gaslight era, were charmed by the sight of an estimated 100,000
electric lights outlining the various buildings and towers of the
park, which opened in 1907 near 46th Street and the Paseo. Electricity
was employed in a variety of ways, most notably with the "Living
Statuary" attraction. Every hour after 9 p.m., young women
appeared on a platform rising out of a fountain, posing while being
washed by multi-colored lights.
The effect of all this upon 9-year-old Walt Disney who arrived
in Kansas City with his family in 1911 can be imagined. The familys
first home on East 31st Street stood only 15 blocks north of the
park, not all that far by streetcar.
The similarities between Electric Park and the Disney theme parks
are several. At Electric Park there were fireworks at night. A train
encircled the acreage. And just as brothers Walt and Roy Disney
later built Disneyland Park, a trio of brothers J.J., Mike
and Ferdinand Heim, operators of Kansas Citys Heim Brewing
Co. built Electric Park
The park burned in 1925. Though it was never rebuilt, a swimming
pool and lake beach continued to operate into the 1930s.
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