Who were Disney’s 9 Old Men?
A Brief Introduction to Animation History
If you’ve watched any of the original Disney films then you have seen the work of at least one of the 9 old men. The 9 old men are 9 animators who worked at Walt Disney Studios with Walt himself and helped to shape the Disney film company into what it is today. Before the Walt was even born animation had already made some massive steps forward. For example animation began back in the cave man era. Cave men and woman would draw images of important hunts and special moments on the walls of their homes in a step by step way.
Speeding towards the 1800’s and you have the development of a Thaumatrope and a Zoetrope. If you don’t know what this is it is a machine made out of a hollow drum that on the inside are images of something moving over time, for example a horse jumping or a child eating an ice cream. When the item is spun you look through the tiny slits it appears as though the image is animated.
In 1908, Fantasmagorie is the first hand-drawn animated cartoon which was created on a chalk board by subtly changing the image between each photo until you have a complete series of movements. This moved onto animation drawn on paper and this is where you find Gertie the Dinosaur. The first animated character to actually appeal to an audience. He was the 1914 Mickey Mouse, that is until 1919 when Felix the cat comes along and steals the limelight. He’s treated like a movie star until 1928 when the real Mickey Mouse comes along in the form of Steamboat Willie and you finally have sound matching what is seen on screen, rather than just background music. Sounds logical now-a-days but back then it was revolutionary.
Animation again jumped forward by using cels to paint the images on. This is what was used to create Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the first full length animated feature film in 1937. It isn’t enough to just create an animated sequence, you need people to fall in love with the characters, to see themselves in them, to route for them and for this to happen it requires talent. Luckily enough Disney had 9 talented men who knew just how to make a feature work and they were: Les Clark, Marc Davis, Ollie Johnston, Frank Thomas, Milt Kahl, Ward Kimball, Wolfgang “Woolie” Reitherman, Eric Larson and John Lounsbery.
Les Clark
Growing up Les had shown no interest in animation when growing up so he got a job in a candy store. However one day when he was painting some decorative wording for a display at the shop, Walt Disney, who was a regular visitor to the shop notices Les’s work Walt complimented him. This stuck with Les and after he finished school not long later, he decided to take a chance and asked Walt for a job. Les got the job and immediately started working as a cameraman. Quickly though, they needed an animator to work on an important knew character: Steamboat Willie, and the man for the job was Les Clark. Along with Ub Iwerks and 3 other animators Steamboat Willie was created. Ub was the leader of animation at Disney Studios, so Les was getting the best education available.
After Ub left the studio, Les was now in charge of animating the main man Mickey Mouse and felt confident enough to start tweaking his look to more of what we know him as today.
Les went onto to work on Pinocchio, Sorcerer Mickey Alice, Pete Pan, Cinderella and more.
Marc Davis
Marc loved to draw, even from a young age. One of his favourite places to draw was the zoo, where there would be a wide variety of subjects to draw. All of that practice was paying off but his job as an illustrator was unfulfilling. It wasn’t until someone suggested he try out animation that Marc found the right direction. He went to work at Disney on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs as an inbetweener. An inbetweener is an artist’s that paints and animates all of the shots in-between the major movements and action sequences. It is very simple, repetitive work that means you build up a lot of hours of practice.
Next Marc worked on Bambi and the animals in Song of the South. This is where the many hours he used to draw animals at the zoo paid off.
Marc grew in confidence and started working on some important characters including Cinderella, Alice, Tinker Bell and Cruella De Ville. Marc is also credited with animating Walt’s most favourite scene: Cinderella’s transformation into her ball gown.
Ollie Johnston
Ollie was the last of the 9 old men to come to work at Disney, this is probably because he never had any encouragement from his teachers to pursue animation. Instead he studied journalism at Stanford and took some classes in drawing and this is where he met Frank Thomas (another of the 9 old men). They both started taking classes at the Chouinard Art Institute and one of the teachers, Don Graham encouraged Ollie to try out at the Disney studio where he was welcomed. He started work as a cleanup artist. He would clean up the cel work of other animators. Fred Moore, a talented animator was impressed and took Ollie under his wing. Fred taught Ollie the ropes of animation while working on the Dwarfs in Snow White. Ollie was a quick learner and so he, Frank and Fred were able to move on as equals and work together to animate Pinocchio, the title character.
The thing that made Ollie a fantastic animator was that he understood emotions and people’s behaviour and he put that into his animation.
Ollie ended up working for the Disney animation company for 43 years until he retired in 1978.
Aside from animation, Ollie had a great love of trains and it was this he passed onto Walt Disney.
Frank Thomas
Frank loved art and had a real passion for it from a young age which is why he found himself at Chouinard Art Institute, where he was recommended to work at Disney, so he did.
Frank started working as an inbetweener on the Silly Symphonies, the cartoons that came before Snow White was released. Fred Moore, always keen to spot talented, mentored Frank and brought him on to work on the Dwarfs. Frank is the one credited with giving each of the Dwarfs there own personality.
Frank went from strength to strength working on Fantasia and Dumbo. Then he was asked to accompany Walt Disney and several other animators on a trip around South America for research for Saludos Amigos and The Three Caballeros.
Frank would continue to work at the company, helping on the majority of features over the next 30 years.
Frank retired from Disney in 1978 when he and Ollie Johnston decided to collaborate and write a book about animation, entitled “Disney’s Animation: The Illusion of Life”.
Frank and Ollie also appeared in animated form in Brad Bird’s The Incredibles.
Milt Kahl
Milt had a rocky beginning with his father leaving early on, he turned to drawing to express himself.
To support his family, Milt worked at an art department at a newspaper with a man named Hamilton Luske.
Years later when Milt found himself unemployed he turned to Hamilton who recommended that he join him at the Disney company. He ended up doing a good job working on the Mickey cartoons so was promoted to work on Snow White. His talent was recognised when several top animators were having trouble animating Pinocchio. Milt stepped in and made him the character we see in the film. Milt then worked on Bambi where people believe he did his best work ever. Making a deer look realistic in animation was hard, but Milt did it. This was the beginning of Milt’s 40 year career at the studio.
Ward Kimball
Ward worked as a magazine illustrator when he saw the Disney cartoon “Three Little Pigs”. This cartoon encouraged Ward to focus on his interest in animation, so he took his portfolio to the Disney Studio where he was hired in 1934.
Ward was mentored by Hamilton Luske and together they worked on the Tortoise and the Hare which won Disney there third Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.
All seemed to be going well for Ward until the two scenes he worked on for Snow White were cut, he couldn’t help but take it personally so he went to Disney to hand in his notice. Walt didn’t want to Ward to leave, he really appreciated and admired the work Ward had done, so to fill Ward with confidence, Walt gave him the important job of animating Jiminy Cricket.
When war broke out Ward remained behind at the studio to continue to work on propaganda material.
Ward continued to work at the Disney company, he worked on Tweedle Dee and Dum, the Cheshire Cat, the Mad Hatter and many more until 1974 when he retired.
One of Wards other hobbies was being a trombonist in a Disney jazz band titled The Firehouse 5 plus 2. They ended up making 13 albums and even recorded on occasion with Bing Crosby.
Wolfgang “Woolie” Reitherman
Woolie wasn’t initially interested in becoming an animator, his first love was being an aircraft engineer or pilot. He even went as far as taking flying lessons and got a job at Douglas Aircraft, but he wasn’t happy. He instead found a passion for watercolours and started working at Chouinard Art Institute where Don Graham worked. Don was employed by Walt to teach his animators so he knew the Disney style. This made it easy for him to recognise artists at Chouinard who matched the Disney style.
At Disney Woolie worked on the Silly Symphonies, Mickey Mouse cartoons and then Snow White, where he animated the Magic Mirror. Woolie’s challenges got bigger, literally, as he was tasked with animating Monstro, the whale from Pinocchio.
When the war broke out Woolie used his flying skills to help with the war, but returned when it had ended. Woolie worked on film after film and was such a key animator and worker at Disney that when Walt passed away in 1966, it was he that helped to keep the animation department alive.
Eric Larson
Eric had a love of drawing that continued with him until his adult life. He worked in very creative jobs, but it was his friends who noticed his real talent and recommended that he try and get a job at Disney. Eric sent in some sketches and was hired to work under the guidance of Hamilton Luske, but within a year was doing so well that he promoted to assistant animator.
Eric worked on Snow White and was in charge of the animals in the film, especially the “Whistle While You Work” segment. From there he worked on Pinocchio, Dumbo, Lady and the Tramp, The Jungle Book, Mary Poppins, The Sword in the Stone and many more.
Eric also participated in a recruitment training programme which was a complete success. It brought in Brad Bird, Tim Burton, Glen Keane and more.
Eric ended up being the longest Disney worked of the 9 old men, working for the company for an impressive 53 years.
John Lounsbery
John’s father sadly passed away when he was 13 and this resulted in money being tight for the family. John worked hard to be able to fund his interest in art. It was while at an illustration course at an art centre that he was recommended to try working at the Disney Studios.
John was mentored by Norman Ferguson who coached him to work in the Disney style while working on the cartoons.
John excelled and was quickly trusted to worked on the villains of Pinocchio, Honest John and Gideon. John certainly had his own style when he wanted but one of his best skills was that he would be able to mimic other animators. This meant that he could draw any character perfectly.
By the time he worked on Fantasia, John was an independent worker rather than an assistant and then when he worked on Dumbo, John was promoted to directing animator.
One thing that all of the 9 old men had in common is that they worked on the first few films of the company, they set the standard, they were the ones who stayed for the long haul, they were the ones that pushed hand drawn animation to new limits, they were the 9 old men.
If you’re wondering how they got their name, Franklin D. Roosevelt called his Supreme Court of Justices his “9 old men” and Walt Disney liked the sound of that.
Come back on Monday 2nd July for a blog all about Fox and the Hound.
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