“One reason the Christmas season appeals to me is that it makes us suspend business-as-usual routine and let our minds soar for a while. It is a time when the imagination is more sprightly than at other periods of the year; Christmas seems to release even the most solemn of us from the Scrooge realism that occasionally besets all of us. It is natural, of course, that I should think of Christmas in terms of imagination, for imagination is my business.”
—Walt Disney from READER’S DIGEST December 1941
During this holiday season, it seems appropriate to share a Disney related Christmas story or two. While Walt’s wife, Lillian noted in a TIME magazine article (December 27, 1937 “Mouse and Man”) that even at Christmas “when he got through with the festivities, he went to his room and read”, it is very apparent that Walt was moved at the holiday season and enjoyed giving gifts to others. (Although by all accounts, it was difficult to find him a gift that he would enjoy.)
Remember that the two very first Disney television shows were aired on Christmas Day. ONE HOUR IN WONDERLAND aired on NBC in 1950 at four o’clock in the afternoon and captured ninety percent of the viewing audience. It was made at a cost of $100,000 and was sponsored entirely by Coca-Cola and certainly helped promote ALICE IN WONDERLAND. WALT DISNEY CHRISTMAS SHOW aired on CBS in 1951 at three o’clock in the afternoon. It was made at a cost of $250,000 and was sponsored entirely by Johnson and Johnson and certainly helped promote PETER PAN. The first two Christmas shows were “kind of stuck together with glue and chicken wire, very cheaply” recalled producer Bill Walsh.
Walt confessed that he cried like a baby the first time he saw the Christmas sequence in the Disney live action film THOSE CALLOWAYS where the mother receives a homemade gift from her husband and son.
Walt maintained a file of hundreds of children of his personal friends, members of the press, studio workers, film executives, etc. At Christmas, Walt insisted that each child would receive gifts of Disney character merchandise including one important item like a watch or a big stuffed doll plus a few little items but all of them individually wrapped. (The gifts continued until the child reached the age of twelve, then he or she was dropped from the list and received a Christmas card instead.) A studio soundstage was set aside early in November so that a staff of Disney secretaries including Walt’s own secretaries were kept busy right up to a few days before Christmas, sorting, packaging and wrapping all these gifts in addition to the other Christmas presents for staff and friends. Apparently, Walt used to drop by daily to monitor the progress and to see that his instructions were being carried out.
Diane Disney Miller recalled looking at some of the earlier Christmas home movies that her dad filmed over the years: “There was a huge tree that went to the top of our two story living room. It was covered with a myriad of ornaments and around the tree were toys of every conceivable shape and kind. And there I was sitting, surrounded by the mechanical ones, and hitting at them as they moved and performed. When dad gives gifts he wants to give gifts you can remember him by. He’s afraid that he’s going to be gone and forgotten. He loves to give us jewelry. He gave Sharon and I each a watch when we were seven years old and it was inscribed on the back with the date and his name. And every Christmas he’s given us a little piece of jewelry. He loves antique jewelry. Nothing expensive or elaborate but something like a little pair of antique gold earrings. He gave Mother once some seals in the forms of a necklace and then at a later Christmas there were some seals hanging from a bracelet. Seals used for sealing wax and things like that.”
I have several favorite Walt Christmas stories and here in Walt’s own words is one of them that he shared with an interviewer in the mid-1950s for a magazine article. Walt loved having a dog and he had several over the years: “When we got the first home, I wanted a dog. And my wife would have nothing to do with dogs. For some reason she did not like dogs. She said ‘Oh they get hair on everything. They’re dirty and there are dog odors’. I got a book on dogs and the Chow did not shed hair or have fleas and had very little odor. She said ‘If I had to have a dog that’s the kind of dog I would want’. That’s what I wanted. The next day I went out and bought a Chow and I kept it under wraps until Christmas. I bought it when it was about 6-8 weeks old. And it was about a month before Christmas. We had our Christmas tree and her sister would come over and her little niece was about eleven then. And the niece was always the one who took the presents around and gave them to everybody. We had a kind of little family Christmas. I picked up my chow from the dog kennel in the afternoon. I took it over and kept it at my brother Roy’s.
“I got a big hat box. I got a big ribbon on it. When the time came I went over, put the little puppy in the hat box, tied it up with a ribbon and when they were all busy I put it over by the tree. And my niece was tipped off. So my wife didn’t see me bring it in. So then my niece went over and got this and she said, ‘Oh who is this for?’ and I said ‘To Lilly from Santa Claus’. So she brought this big hat box over and put it in front of my wife and my wife said, ‘Oh, Walt, you didn’t!’ Now she didn’t know I’d bought a dog. She thought I’d bought her a hat. And that’s one thing she doesn’t want anybody to do. She wants to buy her own hats. She was upset because I had bought her a hat. So when she started to open it, it moved. And she let out a scream. And then she was really kind of upset. She was a little mad that I had bought a hat. And when she opened it, this little chow stuck its head out of there and from that time on that was her baby. It had to sleep in our bedroom.”
The dog was named Sunnee. The dog was broken hearted when Diane was born because up until that time he was an only child and got all the attention. This story inspired a similar scene in the animated feature LADY AND THE TRAMP.
One of my new favorite Disney Christmas holiday stories comes from an interview that Disney historian Jim Korkis did with Disney animator Ward Kimball a few years ago. In the holiday spirit, Jim has kindly allowed me to share it with you as long as I mention that it was first published in an extensive article that Jim wrote on Ward Kimball for HOGAN’S ALLEY #11, the magazine of the Cartoon Arts, and that Jim’s articles on animation appear in many of the issues. (HOGAN’S ALLEY is also available through www.budplant.com which is a highly recommended site by both Jim and myself who have been ordering from Bud from over two decades!)
Kimball designed and animated Jiminy Cricket for PINOCCHIO, the crows in DUMBO, the title song sequence from THE THREE CABALLEROS, and the mad tea party scene from ALICE as well as the Cheshire Cat among other animation credits too numerous to mention. He directed the first Disney 3-D cartoon (MELODY), won Oscars for directing the first cartoon in Cinemascope: TOOT, WHISTLE, PLUNK AND BOOM (1953) as well as IT’S TOUGH TO BE A BIRD (1970), produced the classic Outer Space trilogy programs for the Disneyland television show and produced and directed the syndicated television series: THE MOUSE FACTORY. Not to mention his work as an Imagineer, the Firehouse Five Plus Two, his Grizzly Flats railroad and other credits.
Kimball also had the reputation for having an odd sense of humor and was quite the prankster as you might guess from this little known story he shared with Jim Korkis: “I used to dress up as Santa for my kids and Christmas. We made quite a ceremony out of it where someone on the roof would pound on the roof and yell, “Now Dancer, Now Prancer…” and all the kids would storm into the living room just in time to see me at the chimney with my back turned toward them. I would then turn around dressed as Santa and hand out presents.
“This got to be such a big deal that other neighborhood moms started coming by and pretty soon there was a whole gang of kids and parents. So one way I put a stop to this was by giving out condoms to the men one Christmas as presents.
“Years later when my daughter Chloe was old enough, Betty complained that it was a shame that Chloe had missed out on all this. So under duress, I agreed to do it one more time. But I always liked twists so this time instead of a Santa costume, I rented a gorilla outift and drove home wearing it.
“Bill Peet, the storyman, told the other animators that he was going to phone the police and tell them he was a local animal handler and that a gorilla had escaped and was in the vicinity of my home. But Peet on the way home apparently got roaring drunk and forgot all about it and when he did get home, his wife turned on the sprinklers to try and sober him up before he came into the house.
“Well, at the Kimball home, there was the sound of reindeer on the roof. The kids rushed in and I turned around in the gorilla costume with arms raised and growling. It scared Chloe and even today she doesn’t like me to tell the story. The dog got upset at me too and chased me out of the house and there I am panting and sweating in a neighbor’s house where I peel off the costume.”
Walt never got to see his final Christmas in 1966 since he passed away ten days before Christmas Day. Walt checked into St. Joseph’s Hospital on November 30 and during much of the time was heavily sedated and in pain. Every year for decades, Walt had sent his sister Ruth a Christmas letter talking about his accomplishments that year as well as family concerns. The letter was usually accompanied by a check for Ruth to buy for her family what they wanted most for Christmas. In 1966, the letter was written by Walt’s secretary, Tommie Wilck. She wrote: “When Walt is back in his office, I’m sure you’ll get a more up-to-date and personal note from him. In the meantime, he sends his love.”
I think Walt’s final Christmas present is all of us who keep his legacy alive by sharing his stories and honoring his vision.