User:Kaileyflohr/Walt Disney: An American Original

Walt Disney: An American Original is a 1976 biographical book of Walt Disney by Bob Thomas. It was revised by Disney Editions in 1994. Walt Disney is known as an American hero by changing American culture with his creation of Mickey Mouse. He was a man who developed animated film into an art form and made a massive contribution to the traditional beliefs, customs, and stories of our world passed through the generations by word of mouth. After years of research, Bob Thomas, a Hollywood biographer, produced a biography of the man behind the legend of Disney, with the inside help of the Disney family and the access to private papers and letters. Walt Disney: An American Original is a biography of Walt Disney, complete with a rare collection of photographs and inside details about the creator himself.

Summary
An American Original: Walt Disney shows the life of Walt Disney before he was born, during his life, and after his death. The author starts the novel by describing how Walt had first established a business soon after he returned from France in World War One. The company was called Laugh - O - Grams, and they produced mostly political cartoons with a few ads and comics. As the company was unable to make long-term contracts and the cartoons that Walt drew were mostly forgotten and thrown away, the company was short lived. Soon after, Disney met a man, Ub lwerks, who together they founded another cartoon business called lwerks Disney. Within the company, Disney and lwerks developed Oswald the Rabbit and later the world-famous Mickey Mouse. Although Disney and lwerks tried to make deals all over the country, the business ran poorly throughout all of its existence. One occurrence when Disney returned from a trip, he found that lwerks had left the business. The company soon created lots of debt by the loss of lwerks. Then with the sale of a group of short cartoons, the company soon was slowly brought out of debt.

Walt and his older brother, Roy Disney, then changed the name of the company to The Walt Disney Company and developed a new form of cartoons, full length animated color cartoon movies. Their first well known movie was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Although this movie was a hit and the Disney Company was growing in world-wide fame, they were still not saved from their debt woes. They continued their work, and after the success of several more full-length animated movies, the company gradually arose from debt. As a new invention known as the television graced America, Walt wanted to plan a show. Knowing this was not enough, he was also working on a plan to build an amusement theme park. Soon later, the television movies were big hits and Disneyland was set up within a matter of a few years. Within the ten years following the introductory of Disney World, Walt’s health steadily declined. Walt planned another theme park in Florida but was never able to see his dream of Disney World completed. Sadly, Walt Disney passed away from a cancerous tumor brought on by his habit of smoking.

Author
Robert Joseph Thomas was an American Hollywood film industry biographer and reporter. He started working for the Associated Press in 1944. He was born in San Diego on January 26, 1922 and grew up in Los Angeles where he then attended UCLA. He soon married his wife Patricia and raised three daughters. Bob Thomas wrote at least 30 books and had been writing about the movie business since the days when Hollywood was run by the men who founded it. He then passed away on March 14, 2014 at the age of 92.

Details
Language: English

Release Date: November 1978

Publisher: Touchstone

Author: Bob Thomas

Length: 379 Pages

Weight: 1.65 lbs