Walt Disney returned home when he
was seventeen and told his Parents he was going to be an artist. His father
wasn’t happy about it because he wanted him to join the family business of
making jelly. Walt refused, went on to apply for the Kansas City Art Institute
and got in. After College he got a job at Gray’s Advertising Company but got
fired during Christmas of all times to be fired.
He and his friend Ub Iwerks decided
to start their own Advertising company, Iwerks-Disney Commercial Artists but it
lasted only one month. They started another company, Laugh-o-Grams and it went
bankrupt after a year.
Walt decided to find a paying job
which he did at a Missouri Newspaper but he got fired for “Not being creative
enough”
He left and created another company
that has survived till today.
They decided to sell their cartoons
to theaters but theater owners didn’t see the potential in showing cartoons in
their cinemas. They finally found a theater that agreed but they weren’t being
paid for it.
Walt met a man named Charles Mintz
who advised they go in a different direction. Mintz recommended Walt to
Universal Studios who needed a cartoon series developed. The series ‘Oswald the
lucky rabbit’ became a hit. In 1928, Walt discovered he had no rights to the
successful character he had created. He’d been cheated. As if that wasn’t
enough, they poached most of his staff.
Walt was in a train heading back to
Hollywood to inform his brother and partner of their bad luck when he started
doodling. The doodling became his most famous character, Mickey Mouse. The
Steamboat Willie cartoon and its star, Mickey was an instant hit.
It went on to be
nominated for 59 Academy awards (Oscars) and won 32.
Walt didn’t stop there.
He created Disneyland, a theme park for children. He also started the merger of
the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music and the Chouinard Art Institute, to form
The Californian Institute of the Arts and entry is based solely on artistic
merit and potential not academic results.
His last company which
became successful, The Walt Disney company has lived on after his death and is
still waxing strong.
Walt had numerous
setbacks. He started companies that failed, he was called untalented and told
to stop drawing, he was cheated not just once but more than of his hard earned
work. Walt never let any of this stop him for long, he kept at it.
If Walt had let any of
his setbacks stop him, we won’t have Disneyland, The Californian Institute of
the Arts and the Walt Disney company that has given us memorable childhoods
with lots of fairytales, animations, cartoons and movies and keeps doing that
for children all over the world.
When life gives you lemons, make lemonade -Common saying
ReplyDeleteThe greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.-
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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