My Personal Hero: Walter Elias Disney: My Personal Hero

Walter Elias Disney, My Personal Hero Imagine going to Los Angeles California with only 40 dollars with you and trying to start a company. Sounds impossible right? Not! Walter Elias Disney was a very famous innovator and animator in the 1900’s and he created the famous company called “Disney” and the very famous cartoon “Mickey Mouse.” Walt Disney is a hero in my eyes because Walt failed throughout his lifetime at numerous things and was told that he coldn’t do anything, but he never gave up and he ended up building a huge company that is one of the world’s greatest known motion-picture companies in the world!

Walt’s Early Life was happy at times and sad at times. Walt faced many difficulties throughout his early life. Walter Elias Disney

Walt would work at Disney often ’till midnight and demanded the same of his employees (JustDisney.org). (what does this say about him, as a person?) In grueling “sweatbox” sessions he could fire an animator for a poorly drawn dwarf’s thumb (JustDisney.org). But Walt also had a nice side, he built a corporate campus with airy rooms, air-conditioning and top furniture, in the manner of today’s coolest ad agencies or software firms. Dress, led by Walt, was casual and he also encouraged pranks among the staff (Forbes.com). I appreciate how Walt was rough at times but also nice and happy at times. There are not many bosses who can do that so I idolize Walt for that. But In 1941 Disney studio animators went on strike because they were promised a reward after they spent long hours and hardly ever left the Disney studio while they were working on the film “Snow White” (SaysDigitalCommons.ric.edu). But what set the workers off was when 17 workers were fired for “pro-union activity (SaysDigitalCommons.ric.edu). Later on fellow outraged employes made stirring speeches in support of their colleagues and the next day three hundred workers went on strike (SaysDigitalCommons.ric.edu). Walt was shattered (Forbes.com). He would never again feel the same passion for cartoons

Walt Disney invented the multiplane camera in 1936 (Yahoo.com). The multiple camera brought a new way of seeing things from different angles that nobody ever thought was possible (Yahoo.com). Another one of Walt’s inventions was Mickey mouse who was actually named “Mortimer,” until Walt’s wife, Lily, suggested “Mickey” was a better choice (Google.com). But the thing I like most about Walt Disney was that Walt failed numerous times but never gave up. Before Walt Disney built the empire he has today, he was fired by a newspaper editor because “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas” (Forbes.com) Than when Walt first tried to get MGM studios to distribute Mickey Mouse in 1927, he was told that the idea would never work because a giant mouse on the screen would terrify women (Forbes.com). Later at age 22, Walt experienced bankruptcy after the failure of a cartoon series in Kansas City. He then headed to Los Angeles with $40 in cash and started making billions of dollars (MousePlanet.com). From Walt’s failures I have realized that every time Walt has failed it has lead him closer to success. An example is when Walt failed with a cartoon in Kansas, when Walt failed he headed to L.A. hoping he could get a job and that led him to richness and success. Walt’s fails has also helped me be more comfortable with