Walt Disney

Disney, Walt (Walter Elias Disney; 1901–66), U.S. pioneer of animated film cartoons. Starting in the 1920s, the Disney studios in Hollywood created the cartoon characters Mickey Mouse, Pluto, Donald Duck, and Goofy. Disney produced the first full-length cartoon feature, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1938), which was followed by Pinocchio (1940), Fantasia (1940), and Bambi (1942), among others. The company he founded continues to make movies in his tradition, such as The Fox and the Hound (1981), The Little Mermaid (1989), and Beauty and the Beast (1991). Disney also produced many popular nature films. He opened the first of his theme parks, Disneyland, in Anaheim, Calif., in 1955. The park now includes over 160 acres of elaborate mechanized amusements and re-creations based on Disney movie features. Built on a permanent World's Fair scale, the park is one of the major tourist attractions in the United States. A similar, far larger park opened in 1971 on a 27,400-acre site near Orlando, Fla.; it was joined by the futuristic Epcot Center in 1982. The Tokyo Disney World also opened in 1982 and a European Disney World was opened in 1991.

See also: Cartoon.