The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Back in the roaring twenties America was seeing such world-changing phenomenons such as The Great Gatsby, and penicillin, but what took the world by surprise was none other than Walt Disney and his lovable creation, Mickey Mouse. Walt Disney, throughout his entire lifetime and career, always had an idea, a spark, and a way to make things better. Even in the face of tough times, he never failed to keep his optimistic attitude and kind faith in humanity from infecting those around him. A major part of his success was due to the technological innovations that revolutionized the film industry.
Walt Disney was on a train ride to Hollywood after the loss of his character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit when he decided to start from scratch. He bounced ideas off of his wife as to what would make a cute character. Walt started doodling and eventually settled on a mouse. He wanted to name the mouse Mortimer but his wife laughed and said Mickey was a nicer name, and thus a star was born. (Miller)
Disney partnered up with his older brother and old partner, Ub Iwerks, and began producing a cartoon short for Mickey Mouse, called Steamboat Willie. During the production of Steamboat Willie, Disney watched the Jazz Singer and became intrigued at the idea of synchronized sound.
"When the picture was half finished, we had a showing with sound" Disney later recalled. ”A couple of boys could read music and one of them could play a mouth organ. We put them in a room where they could not see the screen and arranged to pipe their sound into the room where our wives and friends were going to see the picture. The boys worked from music and sound effects score. After several false starts, sound and action got off with the gun. The mouth organist played the tune...

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...ee dimensional animation, and stereophonic sound are all commonplace in today’s times. One can question a group of young people and find that most are unaware of the existence of silent or black-and-white movies. We can thank Disney for his work and the revolution it spurned that continues to evolve today’s media almost one-hundred years later.

Works Cited

Garity, WM. E., and J.N. A. Hawkins. "FANTASOUND*." American WideScreen Museum - provided as a public service by Martin Hart, henceforth known as the "Curator". THE AMERICAN WIDESCREEN MUSEUM, n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2014.
Maltin, Lenard. Of Mice and Magic: A History of American Animated Cartoons, Revised and Updated Edition. 3rd ed. Plume, 1987. Print.
Miller, Diane. Walt Disney.org. Walt Disney Family Foundation. Web. 27 Feb 2014.
"Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)." IMDb. Amazon.com, n.d. Web. 27 Feb. 2014.