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Walter Lantz
Walter Lantz (April 27, 1899 – March 22, 1994) was an American cartoonist, animator, producer and director best known for founding Walter Lantz Productions and creating Woody Woodpecker. Biography Early years and start in animation Lantz was born in New Rochelle, New York, to Italian immigrant parents Francesco Paolo Lantz (formerly Lanza) and Maria Jarvis (changed to Jarvis to avoid prejudice) from Calitri. According to Joe Adamson's biography ''The Walter Lantz Story'', Lantz's father was given his new surname by an immigration official who anglicized it. Walter Lantz was always interested in art, completing a mail-order drawing class at age 12. He was inspired when he saw Winsor McCay's animated short "Gertie the Dinosaur". While working as an auto mechanic, Lantz got his first break. Wealthy customer Fred Kafka liked his drawings on the garage's bulletin board and financed Lantz's studies at the Art Students League of New York. Kafka also helped him land a job as a ...
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Walter Lantz Productions
Walter Lantz Productions was an American animation studio. It was in operation from 1928 to 1972 and was the principal supplier of animation for Universal Studios. The studio was originally formed as Universal Cartoon Studios on the initiative of Universal movie mogul Carl Laemmle, who was tired of the continuous company politics he was dealing with concerning contracting cartoons outside animation studios. Walter Lantz, who was Laemmle's part-time chauffeur and a veteran of the John R. Bray Studios with considerable experience in all elements of animation production, was selected to run the department. In 1935, the studio was severed from Universal and became Walter Lantz Studio under Lantz's direct control, and in 1939, renamed to Walter Lantz Productions. Lantz managed to gain the copyright for his characters. The cartoons continued to be distributed by Universal through 1947, changing to United Artists distribution in 1947–49, and by Universal again from 1950 to 1972. T ...
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Woody Woodpecker
Woody Woodpecker is an animated character that appeared in theatrical short films produced by the Walter Lantz Studio and distributed by Universal Studios between 1940 and 1972. Woody, an anthropomorphic woodpecker, was created in 1940 by Lantz and storyboard artist Ben "Bugs" Hardaway, who had previously laid the groundwork for two other screwball characters, Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck, at the Warner Bros. cartoon studio in the late 1930s. Woody's character and design evolved over the years, from an insane bird with an unusually garish design to a more refined looking and acting character in the vein of the later Chuck Jones version of Bugs Bunny. Woody was originally voiced by prolific voice actor Mel Blanc, who was succeeded in the shorts by Danny Webb, Kent Rogers, Dick Nelson, Ben Hardaway, and, finally, Grace Stafford (wife of Walter Lantz). Woody Woodpecker cartoons were first broadcast on television in 1957 under the title ''The Woody Woodpecker Show'', which featur ...
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Chilly Willy
Chilly Willy is a cartoon character, a diminutive penguin. He was created by director Paul Smith for the Walter Lantz studio in 1953, and developed further by Tex Avery in the two subsequent films following Smith's debut entry. The character soon became the second most popular Lantz/Universal character, behind Woody Woodpecker. Fifty Chilly Willy cartoons were produced between 1953 and 1972. Inspiration and Conception Chilly Willy was inspired by mystery writer Stuart Palmer, according to Scott MacGillivray's book ''Castle Films: A Hobbyist's Guide''. Palmer used the Lantz studio as a background for his novel ''Cold Poison'', in which the cartoon star was a penguin character, and Lantz adopted the penguin idea for the screen. The character Pablo the Penguin from the 1945 Disney film ''The Three Caballeros'' was the inspiration for Chilly Willy. Paul J. Smith initially based Chilly's design on a separate penguin character from Lantz' 1945 cartoon ''Sliphorn King of Polaroo' ...
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Andy Panda
Andy Panda is a cartoon character who starred in his own series of animated cartoon short subjects produced by Walter Lantz. These "cartunes" were released by Universal Pictures from 1939 to 1947, and United Artists from 1948 to 1949. The title character is an anthropomorphic cartoon character, a cute panda. Andy became the second star of the Walter Lantz cartoons after Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. He achieved considerable popularity until being eventually supplanted by Woody Woodpecker. History When Oswald the Lucky Rabbit retired in 1938, following a nine-year run, Walter Lantz's studio went for months without recurring characters. It wasn't until late 1937, when Lantz had a trip to a zoo. There, the main attraction of the place was a young panda which Lantz drew pictures of. He would then use his drawings to construct a new character. Andy's first cartoon was the aptly titled ''Life Begins for Andy Panda'' in 1939. (This was obvious wordplay on the perky titles of the popular An ...
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New Rochelle, New York
New Rochelle (; older french: La Nouvelle-Rochelle) is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States, in the southeastern portion of the state. In 2020, the city had a population of 79,726, making it the seventh-largest in the state of New York. Some residents refer to the city as '' New Ro'' or ''New Roc City''. History Etymology and early history The European settlement was started by refugee Huguenots (French Protestants) in 1688, who were fleeing religious persecution in France (such as '' Dragonnades'') after the king's revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Many of the settlers were artisans and craftsmen from the city of La Rochelle, France, thus influencing the choice of the name of "New Rochelle". 17th and 18th centuries Some 33 families established the community of ''La Nouvelle-Rochelle'' () in 1688. A monument containing the names of these settlers stands in Hudson Park, the original landing point of the Huguenots. Thirty-one years earlier, the Siwanoy In ...
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Gregory La Cava
Gregory La Cava (March 10, 1892 – March 1, 1952) was an American film director of Italian descent best known for his films of the 1930s, including ''My Man Godfrey'' and ''Stage Door'', which earned him nominations for Academy Award for Best Director. Career La Cava was born in Towanda, Pennsylvania. His father was a shoemaker, and the family moved to Rochester, New York. La Cava reported for the ''Rochester Evening News'' and studied at the Art Institute of Chicago. He was a member of the Art Students League of New York, Art Students' League. Animator Around 1913, he started doing odd jobs at the studio of Raoul Barré. By 1915, he was an animator on the ''Animated Grouch Chasers'' series. Towards the end of 1915, William Randolph Hearst decided to create an animation studio to promote the comic strips printed in his newspapers. He called the new company International Film Service, and he hired La Cava to run it (for double what he was making with Barré). La Cava's first ...
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Art Students League Of New York
The Art Students League of New York is an art school at 215 West 57th Street in Manhattan, New York City, New York. The League has historically been known for its broad appeal to both amateurs and professional artists. Although artists may study full-time, there have never been any degree programs or grades, and this informal attitude pervades the culture of the school. From the 19th century to the present, the League has counted among its attendees and instructors many historically important artists, and contributed to numerous influential schools and movements in the art world. The League also maintains a significant permanent collection of student and faculty work, and publishes an online journal of writing on art-related topics, called LINEA. The journal's name refers to the school's motto '' Nulla Dies Sine Linea'' or "No Day Without a Line", traditionally attributed to the Greek painter Apelles by the historian Pliny the Elder, who recorded that Apelles would not let a da ...
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Copy Boy
A copy boy is a typically young and junior worker on a newspaper. The job involves taking typed stories from one section of a newspaper to another. According to Bruce Guthrie, the former editor-in-chief of the ''Herald Sun'' who began work there as a copy boy in 1972: Reporters typed their stories on slips of butcher's paper...then a copy boy ran the story into the neighbouring subs' Copy_editing.html" "title="/nowiki>Copy editing">sub-editor's] room, hence the cry of 'copy'. Each slip of the story had about six carbon copies...stapled together and it was the job of the copy boy - or girl - to separate the original and run it to the subs, and then separate the carbons for distribution. With the advent of new publishing and printing technology the position is now almost extinct, but in the first two decades after World War II, most editors of medium and large newspapers in the US still considered their copy boys indispensable to "getting the paper out". The position was also con ...
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New York American
:''Includes coverage of New York Journal-American and its predecessors New York Journal, The Journal, New York American and New York Evening Journal'' The ''New York Journal-American'' was a daily newspaper published in New York City from 1937 to 1966. The ''Journal-American'' was the product of a merger between two New York newspapers owned by William Randolph Hearst: The ''New York American'' (originally the ''New York Journal'', renamed ''American'' in 1901), a morning paper, and the ''New York Evening Journal'', an afternoon paper. Both were published by Hearst from 1895 to 1937. The ''American'' and ''Evening Journal'' merged in 1937. History Beginnings ''New York Morning Journal'' Joseph Pulitzer's younger brother Albert founded the ''New York Morning Journal'' in 1882. After three years of its existence, John R. McLean briefly acquired the paper in 1895. It was renamed ''The Journal''. But a year later in 1896, he sold it to Hearst.(23 June 1937)Hearst to Merge New York ...
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William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst Sr. (; April 29, 1863 – August 14, 1951) was an American businessman, newspaper publisher, and politician known for developing the nation's largest newspaper chain and media company, Hearst Communications. His flamboyant methods of yellow journalism influenced the nation's popular media by emphasizing sensationalism and human interest stories. Hearst entered the publishing business in 1887 with Mitchell Trubitt after being given control of ''The San Francisco Examiner'' by his wealthy father, Senator George Hearst. After moving to New York City, Hearst acquired the '' New York Journal'' and fought a bitter circulation war with Joseph Pulitzer's '' New York World''. Hearst sold papers by printing giant headlines over lurid stories featuring crime, corruption, sex, and innuendos. Hearst acquired more newspapers and created a chain that numbered nearly 30 papers in major American cities at its peak. He later expanded to magazines, creating the largest ne ...
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Vernon Stallings
George Vernon Stallings (September 9, 1891 – April 9, 1963) was an American animation director and writer. He started working for Bray Productions in 1916 where he directed the Colonel Heeza Liar series of shorts, and the Krazy Kat shorts. He invented "the animation disk placed in the centre of the drawing board" in the 1920s. Its primary use by 1930 was as an aid in inking cels. He then worked for Van Beuren Studios from 1931 through 1934. In 1938, Stallings directed the ''Silly Symphonies'' short ''Merbabies'', and worked in story development for the Disney studios on the feature films ''Fantasia'' (1940), ''Dumbo'' (1941), ''Bambi'' (1942) and ''Song of the South'' (1946). Also for Disney, he wrote the ''Uncle Remus and His Tales of Br'er Rabbit'' comic strip from 1946 to 1963. He is the son of famous baseball manager George Stallings George Tweedy Stallings (November 17, 1867 – May 13, 1929) was an American professional baseball catcher and manager. He played in Major ...
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Bray Productions
Bray Productions was a pioneering American animation studio that produced several popular cartoons during the years of World War I and the early interwar era, becoming a springboard for several key animators of the 20th century, including the Fleischer brothers, Walter Lantz, Paul Terry, Shamus Culhane and Grim Natwick among others. History The studio was founded sometime before 1912 by John Randolph Bray. It was perhaps one of the first studios entirely devoted to serial animation at the time instead of one-off experiments. Its first series was Bray's ''Colonel Heeza Liar'', but from the beginning, the studio brought in outsiders to direct promising new series. Carl Anderson, later known for the comic strip ''Henry'', directed ''The Police Dog'' from the beginning of the company. The year 1915 brought Earl Hurd and Paul Terry; the former became J. R. Bray's business partner and directed ''Bobby Bumps'', the latter was employed under duress and directed ''Farmer Al Fa ...
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