Ward Kimball: Walt Disney’s Protege
Ward Kimball was an animator at Walt Disney Studios from 1934-1972 and was also a member of Walt Disney’s “Nine Old Men.” Throughout his employment at the studio, Kimball was always looking to do things differently, much like Walt Disney himself. He animated a wonderful variety of non-human characters, preferring those to human characters. In 1953, Kimball was promoted to director and he created the short Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Bloom which won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject, Cartoons. Kimball has a very intriguing history at Disney, and I thought we would explore that in this blog.
When Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) was in production, Walt assigned Ward Kimball to do some animation for the Seven Dwarfs. Kimball began work on a “soup” sequence for the film, which was to take place right after the scene where the little people wash up for dinner. Kimball spent eight months working on the sequence and it finally got to the point of being to be “inked and painted,” and edited into the film. Unfortunately, not long after it reached that point, Walt called Ward into his office and explain that-as well as the sequence worked-it delayed the timing of the film’s storytelling and sadly, would have to be cut for the film. Ward was devastated beyond belief, but Walt said, “Don’t fret. I have a great new character I want you to be in charge of animating.” The character was Jiminy Cricket in Pinocchio (1940).
In addition to Jiminy Cricket, Ward Kimball was also responsible for animating the Crows in Dumbo (1941), Ichabod Crane in The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949), Lucifer the Cat, and Gus and Jaq and the Mice in Cinderella (1950), The White Rabbit, and Tweedledee and Tweedledum in Alice in Wonderland (1951), The Lost Boys and the Darling Children in Peter Pan (1953) and the Pearly Band in Mary Poppins (1964). When he was promoted to director, he also directed shorts called Melody (1953), Cosmic Capers (1957), and The Mickey Mouse Anniversary Show (1968). He received an Academy Award for Best Short Subject, Cartoons for directing the short It’s Tough to Be a Bird (1969), which made him the only one of Walt’s “Nine Old Men” to win an Oscar.
Besides being a highly regarded animator at the studio, Ward Kimball also founded and led the Dixieland band Firehouse Five Plus Two in which he played the trombone, having been a jazz trombonist before becoming an animator. (Frank Thomas, another one of Walt’s “Nine Old Men” was also in the band as the piano player.) Ward Kimball also shared Walt Disney’s love of railroads/trains and he even helped Walt create the “Disneyland Railroad” attraction at Disneyland. Because his help, Walt reciprocated with his own assistance to help Ward Kimball build a railroad in his own backyard in which he nicknamed “Grizzly Flats Railroad.” (Ollie Johnston, another one of Walt’s “Nine Old Men,” and a close friend of Ward Kimball, also worked on “Grizzly Flats Railroad.”) Kimball also created the EPCOT attraction known as “World of Motion” which was at EPCOT from 1982-1996. It was replaced by the attraction “Test Track” in 1998.
Ward Kimball’s last projects to work on for Disney before his retirement in 1972 were directing the animation in Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971), and designing the titles for The Million Dollar Duck (1971). He also produced and directed the Disney television show The Mouse Factory (1971-1973).
Ward Kimball is truly one of the most unique Disney artists of all time. Throughout his career, he worked his way up from being an animator, to a director, to theme park attraction designer. And he even found time to form a band at the studio along with other animators! Having shared many things in common with Walt Disney, Ward Kimball helped keep the Disney legacy of magical storytelling alive, but he also has a legacy of his own: his humorous characters and the “Disneyland Railroad” attraction. Through his wonderful artistry, Ward Kimball inspired the whole world to hold on to special things about your childhood, or as Peter Pan might say, to “never grow up.”
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