This month we celebrate the Season of Giving, and the generous legacy of Walt Disney. As the old year closes we rejoice in and celebrate the innocence of children, the simple joy of family, a healthy love of laughter. All of these things were dear to the heart of Walt Disney. “The worst of us is not without innocence,” Walt once wrote, “although buried deeply it might be. In my work I try to reach and speak to that innocence, showing it the fun and joy of living; showing it that laughter is healthy; showing it that the human species, although happily ridiculous at times, is still reaching for the stars.
How could such a man really exist? In a way, there is a prevailing doubt that is pretty easy to understand. No one man could have given so much to the world, so consistently, and over so much time. No one man could have that huge a creative spirit. No one man could have that kind of vision for the future. No one man could be pretty much what his legend has made him out to be. No one man could be deserving of so much respect and admiration.
A man like that would have to be a mythic figure—like Santa Claus.
By Roy Williams from Backstage Disneyland newsletter. Courtesy of Don Peri. © Disney.
One of the many reasons for the founding of The Walt Disney Family Museum was to perpetuate the history, identity, and ideals of Walt Disney. It was also to provide the public with an ongoing exhibit where they could meet a real person rather than an icon, and understand that sometimes, “too good to be true” can actually be true; and to provide a place where Walt’s philosophies and aspirations could continue to inspire.
Mostly, to show that—for all the myth—there truly was a man, authentic and very real, at the heart of it.
Cartoonist and gag man Roy Williams (“The Big Mooseketeer” of The Mickey Mouse Club) addressed this issue cleverly and succinctly in an early 1960s issue of the Disneyland Cast Member publication Backstage Disney.
Many thanks to Don Peri for inspiring this posting and providing the illustration.