How Oswald the Lucky Rabbit returned to The Walt Disney Company - The Walt Disney Company (2024)
Walt Disney once famously said that when it came to the creation of The Walt Disney Company—which celebrates its 100th anniversary this year—he hoped that audiences wouldn’t “lose sight of one thing — that it was all started by a mouse.”
But it’s important that we don’t lose sight that a lucky rabbit also helped Disney get its start.
Oswald the Lucky Rabbit—who first appeared in Trolley Troubles 96 years ago on Tuesday—was one of the first creations of Walt Disney after he opened his animation studio in 1923. From 1927 to 1928, Walt Disney and his team produced many popular Oswald cartoons for Universal Pictures that helped Walt and his early studio get on its feet.
“Although the Disney brothers made their mark on Hollywood’s animation industry with theAlice Comedies, Oswald was truly Disney’s first break-out cartoon star,” Rebecca Cline, director of the Walt Disney Archives, said. “He was very popular with audiences and allowed Walt to create a unique character that was charming, lovable, a bit naughty, and truly appealed to audiences.”
Walt unfortunately discovered on a trip to New York to renew his contract for Oswald that the character was the property of Universal. He returned to Hollywood devastated and in need of a new character that he would completely own. This led Walt to a new character that would go on to become one of the most beloved icons in pop culture: Mickey Mouse.
Disney CEO Bob Iger crafted an agreement with NBCUniversal in 2006 that would bring Oswald back to The Walt Disney Company. Iger—knowing how important Oswald was to the Disney family and the company’s legacy—traded the contract of sportscaster Al Michaels to NBC for the rights to the character.
Oswald has made up for lost time since his return. On Tuesday, he popped up at Disney’s headquarters in Burbank and the company’s offices in New York to celebrate the anniversary of his creation and take photos with employees.
He’s also appeared in video games and merchandising, and to celebrate Disney100, Oswald starred in a special one-minute animated short called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit—his first one at the company in 95 years.
“As the forerunner to Mickey Mouse and an important part of Walt Disney’s creative legacy, the fun and mischievous Oswald is back where he belongs, at the home of his creator and among the stable of beloved characters created by Walt himself,” Iger said in 2006 after bringing Oswald back to the company.
Cline noted that “Walt felt the loss of Oswald deeply in 1928 and would have been absolutely thrilled to have Oswald back home in the fold.”
“He is just as popular with Disney fans today, and probably even more so than he was in the 1920s,” she said.
crafted an agreement with NBCUniversal in 2006 that would bring Oswald back to The Walt Disney Company. Iger—knowing how important Oswald was to the Disney family and the company's legacy—traded the contract of sportscaster Al Michaels to NBC for the rights to the character.
In 2006, The Walt Disney Company acquired the trademark of Oswald (with NBCUniversal effectively trading Oswald for the services of Al Michaels as play-by-play announcer on NBC Sunday Night Football). Oswald returned in Disney's 2010 video game, Epic Mickey.
Universal, feeling there were already enough cartoon cats, suggested a series starring a rabbit. Disney and his best animator Ub Iwerks reworked Alice's Julius into a rabbit named Oswald for Poor Papa (1927).
It was at the Hyperion Studio, after the loss of Oswald, that Walt had to come up with a new character, and that character was Mickey Mouse. With his chief animator, Ub Iwerks, Walt designed the famous mouse and gave him a personality that endeared him to all.
On February 9, 2006, The Walt Disney Company bought the rights to the character, and the 27 Oswald cartoon short films made by the Walt Disney Studio through a trade with sportscaster Al Michaels. Oswald became one of the main characters in Epic Mickey.
Disney CEO Bob Iger crafted an agreement with NBCUniversal in 2006 that would bring Oswald back to The Walt Disney Company. Iger—knowing how important Oswald was to the Disney family and the company's legacy—traded the contract of sportscaster Al Michaels to NBC for the rights to the character.
Oswald starred in a series of popular shorts, but when Universal asserted that it owned the character and continued producing Oswald shorts without Disney, he retired the rabbit from his own animation character stable, and created Mickey Mouse as a replacement that his company would own.
The only one who did not accept the distributor's contract was Ub Iwerks, aware of the deception, since Mintz stole Oswald the Lucky Rabbit from Disney and moved the production of the Oswald cartoons to his new Winkler Studio, along with Margaret Winkler's brother, George.
Disney couldn't afford to fight and so had no choice but to let Oswald go. Walt Disney then decided to create a new character that he could wholly own and control. This decision gave rise to the legendary Mickey Mouse, first introduced in the short Steamboat Willie.
Walt Disney died from lung cancer in 1966, meaning The Walt Disney Company has spent more years without than with him during its 100 years of existence. His brother Roy Disney, who had been Walt's business partner since the early hours of the company, took over.
What was Mickey Mouse originally called? Walt Disney named his first iteration of the character Mortimer Mouse. However, at the urging of Lillian Disney, his wife, the character was renamed Mickey Mouse; reportedly, Lillian disliked the name Mortimer for the mouse and suggested Mickey.
Oswald who? It turns out the big-eared bunny was one of Walt Disney's first animated characters, a star in his own right before Mickey Mouse was even a gleam in his creator's eye. But Disney lost the rabbit after he found out that Universal Studios, now part of NBC Universal, owned the rights to develop the character.
…animated films, featuring the character Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. When his distributor appropriated the rights to the character, Disney altered Oswald's appearance and created a new character that he named Mortimer Mouse; at the urging of his wife, Disney rechristened him Mickey Mouse.
Oswald the Lucky Rabbit is Mickey Mouse's older brother (which is in reference to being Walt Disney's first creation prior to Mickey), uncle to Morty and Ferdie and half-older brother to Amelia Fieldmouse and cousin to Madeline Mouse.
In early November 1966, he was diagnosed with lung cancer and was treated with cobalt therapy. On November 30, he felt unwell and was taken by ambulance from his home to St. Joseph Hospital where, on December 15, at age 65, he died of circulatory collapse caused by the cancer.
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