2005:
A joint statement from The Walt Disney Company and Roy E. Disney & Stanley P. Gold announces that they have agreed to put aside their differences.
Roy E. Disney rejoins the company as a consultant with the title of Director Emeritus.
1909:
Publisher and Disney Legend Mario Gentilini is born in Luzzara, Italy. As director of "Topolino" magazine, he popularized Mickey Mouse throughout his home land. First studying at the Accademia di Brera in Milan, he became a well-known figurative painter with work featured in exhibitions in Paris and Rome. While teaching high school, Gentilini was offered the opportunity to fill in for an artist on leave from Arnoldo Mondadori Editore. While at the prestigious publishing firm, he learned of "Topolino" magazine, which the company had recently acquired the rights to publish. Gentilini became enchanted by Disney's mouse and as a result, quit teaching and began a new career in publishing and retouching drawings for "Topolino." Nine years later, in 1945, he was promoted to its editor. Under his leadership, "Topolino" was transformed from a monthly into a weekly publication featuring original Disney stories by classically-trained Italian artists.
1913:
Radio & voice actor Bill Thompson, the voices of Mr. Smee in Peter Pan, King Hubert in Sleeping Beauty, and Uncle Waldo in The Aristocats, is born in Terre Haute, Indiana. His Disney credits also include Alice in Wonderland, Melody, Toot Whistle Plunk and Boom, Hooked Bear, The Story of Anyburg U.S.A., and How to Have an Accident in the Home (released on this day in 1956). Thompson's most famous voice creation is the mush-mouthed cartoon hound, Droopy.
1926:
Disney Legend Horst Koblischek is born in Reichenberg, Czechoslovakia.
Working in character merchandising, he created the Sport Goofy Trophy and negotiate Disney's first
television contract in Germany.
1938:
Disney's Donald Duck cartoon Good Scouts is released. Donald acts as scoutmaster for his three nephews for a nature hike through the wilderness. The second Disney cartoon released to feature Donald Duck's three nephews - Huey, Dewey and Louie, it will be nominated for an Academy Award.
1956:
The Disney animated short How to Have an Accident in the Home, featuring Donald Duck and J.J. Fate (an imaginary personification of Donald's bad "luck"), is released.
1958:
Disney's live-action feature The Light in the Forest, starring Fess Parker, James
MacArthur, and Jessica Tandy is released. The film centers around the struggles of a boy named
John Cameron Butler/True Son, who has been taken from his parents by Indians while young. It is based on a
novel first published in 1953 by author Conrad Richter.
1964:
Disney's live-action feature film The Moon-Spinners, starring Hayley Mills and Eli Wallach, is generally released. About a jewel thief hiding on the island of Crete, the film first premiered July 2. The Moon-Spinners is Mills' fifth - of what will be six - films for Disney.
1977:
The New Mouseketeers appear on CBS-TV's Dinah!
1994:
The premier opening of the Legend of The Lion King in the Fantasyland Theater (at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom) takes place with a 5-minute ceremony.
A predecessor to the Lion King Broadway show, the Legend of The Lion King will run for nearly 8 years.
1995:
Disney's live stage show Beauty and the Beast first opens
internationally at The Princess Theatre, in Melbourne, Australia.
1997:
Michael Eisner attends the first preview of Disney's new stage musical
The Lion King at the Orpheum Theatre in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
2002:
Academy Award-winning Disney animator/director Ward Kimball passes
away of natural causes at Arcadia Methodist Hospital in Arcadia,
Disney Studios in 1934.)
Disneyland's Flying Saucers attraction of the early 1960s was not technologically perfect and was constantly breaking down. After
several years it
was closed.
2007:
The Disney Broadway musical Tarzan - based on the animated film of
the same name - plays its final performance at the Richard Rodgers Theatre in New York City. Running since May 2006, the musical has played 35 previews and 486 regular performances.
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1877:
Actor Nigel De Brulier, the inspiration for the model of the Sorcerer in "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" segment of Fantasia, is born in Bristol, England.
"We thought we were always going to be 21 years old. We thought we would always be putting goldfish in the bottled drinking water, balancing cups of water on the light fixtures, changing the labels on cans of sauerkraut juice. We were 21 years old, Walt was 30, leading the pack. Working there was more fun than any job I could ever imagine." -Ward Kimball
1776:
According to tradtion, the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania is one of many bells rung to summon citizens for the reading of the Declaration of Independence (which had been adopted by the Continental Congress on July 4).
Today a replica of the Liberty Bell sits on display in Walt Disney World's Liberty Square. The replica was cast
from the mold of the actual Liberty Bell! (In 1976, 50 replicas were cast and molded in honor of the 200th birthday of the USA. Each state received one and placed it in a spot of their choice. As Pennsylvania now had two Liberty Bells, Disney asked if they could acquire the replica for their Liberty Square.)
2008:
Tokyo Disneyland Hotel has its grand opening. The new Victorian-style hotel stands
in front of the main entrance of Tokyo Disneyland Park. The third Disney-brand hotel of the Tokyo Disney Resort, Tokyo Disneyland Hotel offers 700 guestrooms along with dining and shopping facilities.
Walt Disney Records releases "Country Sings Disney" featuring such artist as Billy
Ray Cyrus, Rascal Flatts, Martina McBride, Tim McGraw, Faith Hill, SHeDAISY,
and Brad Paisley.
JULY
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JULY 8
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JULY 8
THIS SITE MADE
IN THE
USA
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In Memory of Ward Kimball (1914-2002)
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1944:
Actor Jeffrey Tambor, the voice of Big Nose Thug in Disney's 2010 animated
Tangled, is born in San Francisco, California.
2009:
A groundbreaking ceremony takes place at Disney California Adventure park.
John Lasseter, Chief Creative Officer, Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios and Principal Creative Advisor, Walt Disney Imagineering, digs up the first bit of ground that will become Cars Land. During the ceremony, Lasseter even spray-paints an impromptu Lightning McQueen on the pavement!
