U.S. #4194Dumbo was Disney’s fourth animated feature film.

Dumbo Debuts to Positive Reception

On October 23, 1941, Walt Disney released Dumbo, based on the children’s book by Helen Aberson-Mayer.

Helen Aberson-Mayer (1907-99), born in Syracuse, New York (less than an hour from Mystic’s home in Camden), attended Syracuse University and was one of the city’s first female radio hosts. Always a creative thinker, Helen enjoyed inventing animal characters and plots that reflected people she knew or situations she had been in. By the late 1930s, she created a number of detailed story book characters. Among these characters was a flying elephant named Dumbo.

Dumbo, a young elephant with oversized ears, was mocked by the other circus animals and longed to fit in. Little did they know that with hard work and dedication, his floppy ears could act as wings. As the “Flying Elephant,” Dumbo became the star of the circus. Dumbo, the Flying Elephant, which consisted of just eight drawings (by Harold Pearl) and a few lines of text, was published in 1939. Within a year of its publication, Walt Disney bought the rights and delivered the story to his writing team with instructions to keep it simple.

In fact, the 64-minute film is one of Disney’s shortest animated features. Disney specifically instructed his staff to work economically, as the war in Europe had led the previous two movies (Pinocchio and Fantasia) to lose money. The story was drafted in chapters, which was an unusual way to produce a script. The animators also used watercolor paint – making Dumbo one of just two animated features to used the medium (the other being Snow White).

Released on October 23, 1941, the economically produced Dumbo received a warm welcome from audiences – it was Disney’s most successful film of the decade. It was praised by critics for its touching sentiment and a great “return to roots” for Disney. Animator Bill Tytla’s artistry is still considered one of the best examples of traditional American animation.

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6 Comments

  1. one of the great advantages of stamp collecting is tha you become aware of all types of information. Thank you.

  2. Disney’s Dumbo ,was one of the best anamated
    cartoons,that was released by Walt Disney
    Picture. I think that they shiould put out
    another stamp on Dumbo>

  3. I live in Syracuse and read the story to my 93 year Mom& Dad. we all love the story and thank you for another piece of trivia from your wonderful Stamp of the Day”
    Cindy

  4. When I saw the subject line I was not expecting the story to be very good. But, yet again, you made it interesting and informative.

    I always learn something, in your “This Day”, that I never heard before.

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