The Walt Disney Company is the largest media and entertainment company in the world. Walt Disney has diverse holdings in a number of areas including movie and television studios, broadcast and cable television stations, interactive media production, travel, consumer products and theme parks.
The Walt Disney Company was founded on October 16, 1923 in Los Angeles, California by brothers Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brother's Cartoon Studio. The name was soon changed to the Walt Disney Studio at the suggestion of Walt's brother Roy.
The company was originally founded to sell a series of short film cartoons, called the Alice Comedies, to distributors. These shorts featured the adventures of a girl named Alice in a cartoon world. After these cartoons came to an end, studio introduced Oswald the Lucky Rabbit in 1927. Though these early cartoons were successful, the inexperienced Walt Disney had signed away the rights to them to his distributor Winkler Pictures. Disney soon found that he had lost control of his creations and that Winkler Pictures hired away most of his animators.
After learning this lesson with Oswald and Winkler Pictures, Walt and Roy Disney developed a new character that they would control, Mickey Mouse. Originally named Mortimer, the name was changed at Walt's wife's suggestion to Mickey before the first cartoon was even released. Mickey's first major breakthrough was with the release of his third film "Steamboat Willie" in 1928. Mickey would go on to become one of the most recognizable characters in the world and the symbol of the Walt Disney Company.
With its success in short films well established by the early 1930s, Disney decided to take on a new challenge in 1934: a full-length animated feature. To date, this type of production had never been commercially viable; critics were skeptical, dubbing the production "Disney's Folly." The film was expected by many in Hollywood to bankrupt the studio due to its astronomical cost. Instead, the film, 1937's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, was remarkably successful both commercially and artistically. Noted for its technological achievements, it won an Honorary Oscar for its "significant screen innovation."
Built in less than year, the Disneyland theme park in Anaheim, California opened on July 17, 1955. The park, despite some early troubles that led to bad press, has gone on to become one of the most popular attractions in the world. Walt began working on ideas for the park in the 1940s, using mostly his own money. The idea finally got off the ground in 1953 when, as part of a deal to produce what would eventually become the "Wonderful World of Disney" on ABC, he got the financing to bring his plans to reality.
