2008:
Nominations for the 80th Academy Awards are announced. Disney/Pixar's Ratatouille
receives five nominations (the most ever for a Disney/Pixar film at this time). Nominations include-
-Best Animated Feature Film: Ratatouille
-Best Original Screenplay: Ratatouille (Brad Bird, Jan Pinkava & Jim Capobianco)
-Best Original Score: Ratatouille (Michael Giacchino)
-Best Sound Editing: Ratatouille (Randy Thom and Michael Silvers)
-Best Sound Mixing: Ratatouille (Randy Thom, Michael Semanick and Doc Kane).
-Best Original Song: "Happy Working Song" (Enchanted – Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz),
"So Close" (Enchanted – Music by Alan Menken; Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz), & "That’s How You Know"
(Enchanted – Music by Alan Menken; Lyrics by Stephen Schwartz)
-Best Makeup: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
-Best Visual Effects: Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End
Winners will be announced Feb 24.
Hong Kong Disneyland kicks off the Chinese New Year
with the "Year of the Mouse" Celebration (through February 24.)
Disney's 2007 family comedy The Game Plan is released on Blu-ray.
2006:
A celebrity-attended premiere for Disney's newest attraction Monster's,
Inc.: Mike & Sulley to the Rescue! takes place at Disney's California
Adventure. A dark ride that replaced Superstar Limo, it follows the story of the 2001 animated
feature. In soft-openings since December 2005, Monster's, Inc. will officially open the following day.
1934:
Actor/director Bill Bixby is born Wilfred Bailey Bixby in San Francisco, California. He appeared in Disney's 1975 comedy The Apple Dumpling Gang (playing the role of bachelor Russel Donavan) and directed the short-lived TV series Herbie, the Love Bug. (TV fans know Bixby best for his roles on My Favorite Martian, The Courtship of Eddie's Father and The Incredible Hulk. He even appeared in a 1963 Twilight Zone episode.)
1940:
Actor John Hurt, the narrator of Disney's 2000 release The Tigger Movie and the
voice of The Horned King in the 1985 The Black Cauldron, is born in England.
Film fans will know him from such features as Alien, The Elephant Man, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, and Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
1949:
A radio series out of Nashville called Wormwood Forest - featuring
puppeteer Tom Tichenor - airs. Today's 15-minute episode "Dippy Dwarf’s Special Letter
From Walt Disney" features Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck, voiced by Walt Disney and Clarence Nash!
1958:
The Disneyland TV series airs episode 90 - part 1 of "The Littlest Outlaw" (originally released to theaters in December 1955).
1960:
The TV series Walt Disney Presents airs "Swamp Fox: A Case of Treason,"
the sixth episode of an 8-part miniseries starring actor Leslie Nielsen as real-life
Commander Franics Marion. A leader in South Carolina during the American Revolutionary War, Marion
was nicknamed "The Swamp Fox" by the British for disrupting their plans with his outstanding guerilla warfare
tactics. In this episode, Marion has again succeeded in thwarting the plans of Redcoat officer Col. Tarleton (John
Sutton). Escaping from Marion's men, Tarleton takes refuge in the home of Mary Videaux (Barbara Eiler), whom he
believes is a British loyalist. But when Tarleton sees Mary kissing Marion during a secret rendezvous, he puts two
and two together and realizes that Mary is working for the Continentals!
1961:
Walt Disney Presents airs "A Salute to Father." In this episode Goofy appears in the guise
of "George", a typical example of Yankee manhood (or is it doghood?). After a brief segment in which
bachelor George's head is turned by the pretty girl who will soon become his wife, the episode switches to
clips from previous Disney theatrical animated shorts stitched together to illustrate an average day in the life
of a suburban father.
2001:
The Walt Disney Company re-launches its lucrative Winnie the Pooh franchise with a new television series, The Book of Pooh. Using a mix of ancient Japanese puppeteering techniques as well as state-of-the-art computer technology, Pooh and friends come to life as never before.
It is reported that five World War II Royal Navy bombs were detonated at Penny's Bay, the site of the future Disney theme park in Hong Kong.
1989:
At Super Bowl XXIII, quarterback Joe Montana of the San Francisco 49ers declares, "I'm going to Disney World!" upon his team's 20-16 win over the Cincinnati Bengals.
2000:
Mickey Mouse Works airs on ABC-TV with the shorts "How to be a Baseball Fan"
(featuring Goody), "Locksmiths" (featuring Mickey Mouse), and "Minnie Takes Care of
Pluto".
The thirty-fourth episode of Disney's Recess, "The Library Kid/The Ratings Game"
premieres on ABC-TV. This episode marks the finale of season three.
The Disney Channel Original Movie Up, Up, and Away, the story of Scott Marshall, whose
parents are superheroes (Bronze Eagle & Warrior Woman) debuts.
Years before Ariel surfaced to
worldwide fame in Disney's The
Little Mermaid, Disneyland featured
"live mermaids" at the Submarine
Voyage lagoon. Between 1965 and
1967, these "Cast Mer-members"
(women in mermaid tails) swam,
brushed their hair and sunned
themselves on nearby rocks for
4 hours a day. These mermaids
were found during a special
tryout at the Disneyland Hotel
swimming pool!
JANUARY 22
2005:
Disney Channel airs "Dragon Breath," the second episode of the
new animate series American Dragon: Jake Long, for the first time.
1984:
Super Bowl XVIII is played at Tampa Stadium in Florida. The halftime show is a
Disney production called "Salute to Superstars of Silver Screen," featuring the University of Florida and Florida State University bands. The Los Angeles Raiders beat
the Washington Redskins 38-9. (The Apple Macintosh, the first consumer computer to popularize the computer
mouse and the graphical user interface, is introduced during the third quarter of Super Bowl XVIII with its
famous "1984" television commercial.)
"I'm going to Disney World!" -Joe Montana
JANUARY 22
THIS DAY MADE
IN THE
USA
The Living Desert wins Golden Globe
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"I'll say one thing for television. It has taken children and educated them far beyond anything I was ever involved with as a child." -Bill Bixby
2009:
Tickets for Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion’s 40th anniversary event (at a cost
of up to $475 each) sell out within 10 minutes! The event will take place September 9.
Nominations for the 81st Academy Awards are announced. Among the nominations:
-Best Original Screenplay: Wall-E
-Best Animated Feature: Wall-E and Bolt
-Best Original Score: Wall-E (Thomas Newman)
-Best Original Song: "Down to Earth" (from Wall-E; Music by Peter Gabriel & Thomas Newman; Lyrics by Peter Gabriel)
-Best Sound Editing: Wall-E
-Best Sound Mixing: Wall-E
Oscars will be handed out February 22, 2009.
1964:
The live-action comedy The Misadventures of Merlin Jones is released in select U.S.
cities. Merlin Jones, a precocious and intelligent college student, played by future Disney Legend Tommy Kirk,
experiments with hypnosis and creates a mind-reading machine! Annette Funicello plays his girlfriend Jennifer (and sings
the film's title song written by brothers Robert and Richard Sherman). The film will open nationwide in March.
2010:
About 400 Walt Disney World employees volunteer to staff phones during a
global telethon aimed at raising money for earthquake-devastated Haiti. They field calls
and process donations out of the resort’s Orlando reservations center during the two-hour Hope for Haiti Now
live telethon.
Disneyland's Main Street Cinema opens after a brief refurbishment to install new floor.
Maria Helen Alvarez, one of the original financiers of the Disneyland Hotel, passes
away at age 88 in her Rancho Santa Fe, California home. A millionaire by age 29, she helped
create Tulsa, Oklahoma's very first television station.
Dick Van Dyke, one of the original stars of the 1964 feature Mary Poppins, makes a
surprise appearance in the touring stage version of Mary Poppins at the Ahmanson
Theatre in Los Angeles, California. The 84-year-old Disney Legend does not portray Bert, the Cockney
chimney sweep he made famous in the film ... instead he reprises his other (and less well known) screen role as Mr. Dawes Sr., the crotchety bank president and boss of Poppins’ boss, Mr. Banks! After seeing the Disney-Cameron
Mackintosh production when it first opened in November, Van Dyke volunteered to join the cast for a cameo (and
the role had to be written in - as the character doesn't appear in the stage version). In the audience this evening is
Disney Legends Richard M. Sherman (one of the film’s songwriters) and historian/archivist Dave Smith.
"Old actors don't die, they keep doing the same part over and over." -Dick Van Dyke
1965:
Actress Diane Lane, the star of Disney's 2010 release Secretariat, is born
in New York City. The film tells the story of Penny Chenery (played by Lane) and her United
States' Hall of Fame racehorse, Secretariat who, in 1973, became the first horse in 25 years to win
the United States Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing. Lane is the voice of Riley's Mom in Pixar's
2015 animated Inside Out. With a movie career spanning three decades, Lane has appeared in
such films as Touchstone Pictures' Under the Tuscan Sun, Unfaithful, and A Walk on the Moon.
1930:
The day after Ub Iwerks (Walt's top animator) leaves the Disney Studios, Disney's resident music director Carl Stalling resigns as well! Like Iwerks, he has been lured away by distributor Pat Powers. Neither will work for Powers for too long, as Stalling will eventually team up with Warner Brothers and Iwerks will return to Disney.
(Two years earlier, Pat Powers had sold Walt Disney a Cinephone system so that Walt could make sound cartoons such as Steamboat Willie. Unable to find a distributor for the sound cartoons, Disney began releasing his cartoons through Powers' company Celebrity Pictures. After two years of successful Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphonies cartoons, Walt Disney confronted Powers in 1930 about money due to Disney from the distribution deal. Powers responded by signing Disney's head animator Ub Iwerks and musical director Carl Stalling to an exclusive deal to create an animation studio.)
1993:
Disney releases the Hollywood Pictures live-action feature film Aspen Extreme to U.S. theaters. The film tells the story of two ski buddies, TJ Burke (Paul Gross) and Dexter Rutecki (Peter Berg), who move from Brighton, Michigan to Aspen to seek a better life.
2011:
Darla K. Anderson wins the animated trophy at the 22nd Annual Producers
Guild Awards for her work as producer on Toy Story 3.
JAN
JAN
1955:
The Los Angeles Examiner reports that:
Jack Wrather is building a 500-room hotel at Disneyland at a cost of $10,000,000.
1995:
A preview of the film Frank and Ollie, a documentary of the lives and careers of Disney animators Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, is screened at the Sundance Festival.
Directed, produced and written by Theodore Thomas, Frank Thomas' son, the film will have a limited release in October.
The second of 40 trading cards, celebrating Disneyland's 40th Anniversary, are handed
out to park guests. This day's card "1956 - Astro-Jets" commemorates the Tomorrowland attraction that later
became Rocket Jets.
2013:
The 2013 readers' poll for Top Cruise Ships in the World are announced
by Condé Nast Traveler. Disney's oldest ship, the Disney Magic, is named the No. 1 Large Cruise
Ship. Also placing in the top 10: the Disney Wonder at No. 2, the Disney Dream at No. 3, and the new
Disney Fantasy at No. 8.
January 22
This Day in Disney History - THE FIRST - THE ORIGINAL
Traveling in time since 1999!
2015:
The Disneyland Band officially opens the 2015 National Association of Music
Merchants (NAMM) Show being held at the Anaheim Convention Center (through
January 25). Yamaha, the official sponsor of musical instruments to the Disneyland Resort, helps make the
appearance possible. Guest conductor Mickey Mouse also joins the performance, which includes musical
numbers ranging from jazz to classic Disney tunes.
2018:
Minnie Mouse receives a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame
(40 years after her male counterpart, Mickey Mouse). Her star, which is the 2,627th
star, is dedicated in the category of Motion Pictures at 6834 Hollywood Boulevard
in front of the El Capitan Theatre.
2019:
Nominations for the 91st Academy Awards are announced. Nominees include-
-Best Picture: Black Panther
-Best Animated Feature: Incredibles 2 and Ralph Breaks the Internet
-Best Animated Short: Bao
-Best Original Score: Black Panther and Mary Poppins Returns
-Best Original Song: "All The Stars" (from Black Panther) and "The Place Where Lost Things Go" (from Mary Poppins Returns)
-Best Sound Editing: Black Panther
-Best Sound Mixing: Black Panther
-Best Production Design: Black Panther and Mary Poppins Returns
-Best Costume Design: Black Panther and Mary Poppins Returns
-Best Visual Effects: Avengers: Infinity War, Christopher Robin and Solo: A Star Wars Story
The ceremony will be held on February 24, 2019.
Disney Parks announces an eighth themed land based on Disney’s Zootopia
will be coming to Shanghai Disneyland Park in China. Construction is scheduled to
begin sometime in 2019.
1975:
Actor/musician Balthazar Getty is born in Tarzana, California. His ABC-TV credits include the action drama Alias as Thomas Grace, and Tommy Walker on the drama Brothers & Sisters. Getty also appeared in the 1995 film Mr. Holland's Opus.
Hazel Mae Sewell Bounds Cottrell, the first head of Walt Disney Studio's Ink and Paint Department, passes away at age 76 in California. Hired shortly after her sister Lillian Bounds (future wife of Walt Disney), Hazel first began working at the studio as an artist. Later as the head of the Ink and Paint Department, she developed new techniques in the inking and painting processes. Shortly after the release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Hazel resigned from the Studio in May 1938 after 11 years with the company. She soon after married studio employee Bill Cottrell (who later became the first president of what is today known as Walt Disney Imagineering). In 1941, Hazel accompanied the Disneys, Cottrell, and several other notable Disney artists, who referred to themselves as El Grupo, on a trip to South America.
1937:
Songwriter & producer Al Kasha is born in Brooklyn, New York. He is one of those rare artists who, as a composer/lyricist, has had hit records over five decades (starting in the sixties), ranging from Elvis Presley to Aretha Franklin to Helen Reddy to Sherrie Austin to Donna Summer. Kasha has been awarded two Oscars and had two other Academy Award nominations for his critically acclaimed work in films. His first Academy Award for Best Song was for "The Morning After" from The Poseidon Adventure, and his second for "We May Never Love Like This Again" from The Towering Inferno. Two additional nominations came from the live-action animated Walt Disney 1977 classic Pete's Dragon. He co-wrote the film's signature song "Candle on the Water" (first recorded by Helen Reddy).
1923:
Animator and comic artist Fred Peters is born in Oklahoma. Starting his career at the Walt Disney Studios in the mid 1940s, he contributed to many Pluto cartoons and the animated features Bambi and Fun and Fancy Free. In 1949, he became a freelance illustrator and comics artist; mostly working for EC Comics. Peters eventually settled down in Boston, where he worked for the newspaper Boston Globe for 32 years.
2021:
Pixar Popcorn premieres on Disney+. A collection of 10 mini shorts, it features characters from Pixar favorites like "Toy Story," "Finding Nemo," "Cars" and "The Incredibles" in all-new, bite-size stories.
The Radio Disney app and website shut down on, although the station continues to broadcast on iHeartRadio. (It will be removed sometime during March.)
