Wild Minds: The Artists and Rivalries That Inspired the Golden Age of Animation

by Reid Mitenbuler

In 1911, famed cartoonist Winsor McCay debuted one of the first animated cartoons, based on his sophisticated newspaper strip “Little Nemo in Slumberland,” itself inspired by Freud’s recent research on dreams. McCay is largely forgotten today, but he unleashed an art form, and the creative energy of artists from Otto Messmer and Max Fleischer to Walt Disney and Warner Bros.’ Chuck Jones. Their origin stories, rivalries, and sheer genius, as Reid Mitenbuler skillfully relates, were as colorful and subversive as their creations―from Felix the Cat to Bugs Bunny to feature films such as Fantasia ―which became an integral part and reflection of American culture over the next five decades. Pre-television, animated cartoons were aimed squarely at adults; comic preludes to movies, they were often “little hand grenades of social and political satire.” Early Betty Boop cartoons included nudity; Popeye stories contained sly references to the injustices of unchecked capitalism. “During its first half-century,” Mitenbuler writes, “animation was an important part of the culture wars about free speech, censorship, the appropriate boundaries of humor, and the influence of art and media on society.” During WWII it also played a significant role in propaganda. The Golden Age of animation ended with the advent of television, when cartoons were sanitized to appeal to children and help advertisers sell sugary breakfast cereals. Wild Minds is an ode to our colorful past and to the creative energy that later inspired The Simpsons , South Park , and BoJack Horseman .

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Film, Art, Pop Culture, Business, Cultural

432 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2020

Reviews

[Geoff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this history of the early days of UA Animation told largely through the major figures at Disney, Warner Brothers, and Fleischer (Betty Boop, Popeye, and Superman). You really got a feel for who they were, how they approached art and commerce, and where the characters came from. The sections on Tex Avery, Chuck Jones, and Mel Blanc at Warner Brothers were really interesting (Warner Brothers often had no idea what to do with an animation studio so the animators had some interesting freedom to be creative gadflies). The book touches on art and technological advances but spends more time on labor politics, (unexpectedly) rowdy behavior, and the social impact the cartoons in both the film age and the Saturday-morning TV eras. One thing I hadn't realized is that a lot of those classic cartons were chopped up and messed up for TV and didn't necessarily look like what was shown at the movies (either for inappropriate content - the cartoons were originally aimed at adults! - or because the studios wanted more content for TV). A really entertaining book.

**Thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for a free copy in exchange in an honest review.

[Cristie Underwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! Who knew that the history of animation was so interesting? I couldn't put this down. The rivalries were epic. I didn't know that animation was geared towards adults pre-television. I always thought that there were a large number that were geared towards children.

[Gary Sassaman · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. It’s an amazing history of the American animation industry from its infancy up to the 1960s and the limited animation of television. All the big names are here: pioneer Winsor McCay, Max and Dave Fleischer, the Warner Bros. guys (Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones, the McKimson Bros., Mel Blanc), the UPA people, Dr. Seuss, and of course, Walt Disney. It’s an amazingly thorough history, a bit on the gossipy side, and it dishes on the good and the bad rivalries of the industry and doesn’t hide the warts: Disney and Fleischer’s labor problems, Disney the WWII propagandist, the raunchy WB war cartoons, the creation of Disneyland and much more. Snow White, Pinocchio, Popeye, Superman, Bugs Bunny, Felix the Cat, Gertie the Dinosaur, and countless others all make appearances. Author Mitenbuler digs deep and creates an absolutely fascinating story arc for the industry … really great for a guy whose previous book was a history of whiskey. I have a passing interest in animation (modern TV shows like The Simpsons and South Park bore me to tears … I feel if I’ve seen one episode, I’ve seen them all), but this history enthralled me. One small quibble: Mitenbuler didn’t really do his homework on Superman in the comics. He continually calls them “Shuster and Siegel,” maybe for fairness alphabetically, but it’s always Siegel and Shuster (Jerry was definitely the dominant force in that dynamic duo), and at one point calls them both “writers.” But that’s the worst I can say about this great book. You’ve gotta love a book that has this quote from Chuck Jones on one of his rules for the Road Runner cartoons; he didn’t want to see any kind of financial dealings between Wile E. Coyote and ACME because: “It is just fun for me to imagine that somewhere there is a company that provides, absolutely free, their inventions to coyotes.”

[Patrick DiJusto · Rating 4 out of 5]

Click on the thumbnail of the book's cover, above. The cover makes this book look as though it's going to be a raucous, hilarious collection of stories of the hilarious and raucous hijinks of the journeyman animators of golden age hollywood.

You can't judge a book by its cover.

This instead is a well written, well researched, history of the miserable bastards, rapacious thugs (literally!), And brilliant sons of b****** who founded the first animation studios. The book visits Windsor McKay, generally regarded as the father of American animation, as well as others like Paul Terry, John bray and Leon Schlesinger. But running through the book like a melody and counter melody, are the stories of Walt Disney and Max Fleischer.

One, the product of a Norman Rockwell Midwestern upbringing, was more of an artist than a businessman. The other, the neurotic son of immigrants who literally escaped a pogrom, was more of a businessman than an artist. Yet Disney left behind an empire that has grown into a transnational that might as well be The Entertainment Corporation, while Fleischer died penniless in the Motion Picture Home.

[H · Rating 5 out of 5]

fabulous work!
superb: research, writing, thoroughness, edifying
even if you don't have a deep love for animation, this work is still worth reading.

[Danielle · Rating 2 out of 5]

This took me so long to finish, mostly because the author included an introductory note that most of the shorts mentioned were available online and were 10 minutes or less. Since I committed to at least trying to watch everything mentioned (including feature-length animated films that were easily accessible, like Snow White), I found out that I'm not a fan of Golden Age animation. It really slowed me down and even though that impacted my enjoyment of the book, I think it would have been similar had I not watched them.

This is pretty factual in acknowledging how problematic the industry has been, but it really doesn't challenge any of the creators or what they did. I'm someone who can't separate the art from the artist, so that was a problem for me here.

[Jane]

I really thought I would enjoy this but the author's tone about how shitty animation dudes have been from the beginning was so frustrating. He was pretty apologetic about it - not dismissive, but it still felt a bit like a shitty NYT "both sides" kind of cop out. Particularly in regards to race and gender. In the last chapter, he states that Walt Disney being a bigot isn't true and I'm sorry, but it actually is! Just because he wasn't wearing the equivalent of a MAGA hat back in the day doesn't mean he's not racist or sexist. He made a whole movie about Lost Cause revisionism. And by his own words he previously considered himself 'apolitical,' but we should all know by now that such a thing doesn't exist.

So, that was hugely frustrating. However, I did still learn stuff that I hadn't known, so there's that. It's interesting just how adult this industry was and how the perception in popular culture is so skewed about the target audience for animation is, back when it began and now. If there had been more of a focus on that disconnect while still charting the history of it, I would have enjoyed it much more. There was just too much excusing this mostly white boy's club that, after John Lassiter and so many other male art and comic bros, really leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

[EuroHackie · Rating 2 out of 5]

What a disappointment this book was. As someone who approached it after a Looney Tunes appreciation binge, it was incredibly disheartening to see that Warner Brothers only rated a chapter or two in the book, represented solely by Chuck Jones and Bob Clampett, while other studios (like MGM) were completely ignored. How can you write about the golden age of animation without Tom and Jerry, Barney Bear, Droopy Dog, Tex Avery, Friz Freleng, and Robert McKimson?!

By narrowing your focus to the life-long rivalry between Max Fleisher (Betty Boop, Popeye) and Walt Disney, and spending most of that time absolutely fawning over Disney. If I wanted to read a biography of Disney, I would've picked one up. I hope it would've given more space to his flagrant union-busting and the chintzy schmaltz that he was turning out at regular intervals, starting in the 1940s. Anyone with any actual knowledge of the golden age of animation knows that some of the greatest theatrical work was produced in direct opposition to Disney, but it's given the absolute short shrift here.

I'm glad I got this from the library. It's not worth reading, IMO, unless you're a Disney completionist.

[Jonathan White · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a labor of love about a folk art that's had more impact on America than you'd think.

Jim Jarmusch's use of Looney Tunes in Ghost Dog is one of the funniest PIP uses of culture I've ever seen, and has been a little lozenge of an idea I've been twirling around my mind ever since.

A few months back I bought my boys a DVD set of the Looney Tunes/Merry Melodies and was massively impressed by how well they hold up. They're like aural and visual speed. I truly don't understand how they function on all the levels they do.

That's why I decided to pick this book up (couldn't find a book just on the WB stuff). It was so interesting. I spent quite a bit of time on YouTube looking up all the early, seminal short animated films he was mentioning (McCay and all that). The author had a really good nose for how to tell each section of the story and really stuck the landing.

[Anthony Borrelli · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of the best non-fiction books I have ever read. I grew up watching Disney movies, Looney Tunes, and Superhero cartoons. This book pertained to those interests, and I think people who also enjoy animation, art and comedy will gravitate to it, but I recommend this to every and anyone. Max Fleisher and Walt Disney's stories take up the largest chunk of the book, but it spans from the early 1900s to the early 1970s, weaving stories of other artists in and out throught those ages. This is an incredibly detailed, enlightened, and funny book. Please read it and let me know if you also cried at the end.

[Maya · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really great general overview of American theatrical animation!

While it could've stood to be a bit more critical of some of the artists discussed, I still appreciate just how much they were able to cover in one book.

I also appreciated its quick pace and sense of humor.

Great read! Great intro to American animation history.

[Greg Condon · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was great, to put it simply. Written with a real appreciation for animation and the innovation and vision of its pioneers. Mitenbuler does a great job a supplying context and fair look at attitudes films that haven't aged well, though that is just a small part of what the book is about. Really just an inspiring, well written look at the history of a wonderful art form!

[Thom · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a kid in the early 70s, I thought cartoons were pretty lame but we watched them anyway, not realizing this junk was being written to sell us toys and cereal. I do remember seeing the occasional old Warner Brothers cartoon and, although I didn’t understand all the references, the craftsmanship behind the animation and writing made stuff like Scooby Doo look repetitive, cheap and lazy.

I can’t recommend this book enough and I love the author’s suggestion to keep your iPad handy as you read because many of the works referenced in the book can be viewed online. Completely engrossing. My only criticisms are that a book about animation deserves more illustrations and that the author, when referring to his subjects, should stick with using their first or their last name and not use them interchangeably.

[Lloyd Downey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. A history of the wild ride of animation from the late 1880's to around 1970. It's the story of the artists and the promotors and the constantly changing technology, of cartoon characters and their creators, of risk takers, of great successes and great failures. And mixed in with all of this is the politics....exploitation of the workers, unionism, union bashing, Mcarthyism, the rise and fall of great studios ..of Disney and Warner Bros, of Max Fleisher (Betty Boop and Popeye the Sailorman) and a whole host of others. Clearly it was a tough industry in which to survive. Yet it gave us masterpieces such as Snow White and Fantasia....and characters such as Mr Magoo and Bugs Bunny.
Here's a few extracts from the book that I found especially notable:
This book is about animation's origins and rise, the first fifty years, wild decades spanning the early twentieth century to the 1960s.
The cartoons created then were often little hand grenades of social and political satire: bawdy yet clever, thoughtful even if they were rude. Some Betty Boop cartoons contained brief glimpses of nudity. Popeye cartoons were often loaded with sly messages about the injustices of unchecked capitalism. The teaming of animators with jazz musicians like Cab Calloway was, in the 1920s and '30s, just as subversive as hip-hop would be in the 1980s and '90s. The old Warner Bros. cartoons-Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and more—occasionally offered some of the most perceptive social commentary of their era. Much of this colour was censored when these old cartoons were repackaged for new formats and audiences, particularly television and young children. Much of their original spirit was reimagined, if not forgotten.

He [Winsor McCay] would animate only a handful of cartoons during his lifetime, but they were wildly influential, inspiring many other cartoonists- early greats such as Max Fleischer, Otto Messmer, and Walt Disney to do something similar. His influence was profound, but Winsor McCay's impact on animation was all but forgotten by the time of his death, in 1934. Some two decades later, his name would fade from public memory, even though many of his protégés, such as Walt Disney, would become famous.

On December 21, 1937, Snow White premiered at Los Angeles’s Carthay Circle Theater, the 1,500-seat movie palace where Disney's masterpiece short, The Skeleton Dance, had premiered in 1929..... When the final credits rolled, the applause was deafening, everyone shouting praises over the din. It was more than just a good movie; it was a cultural moment. The newspaper coverage of what followed —ecstatic reviews, from popular broadsheets to obscure literary journals-was monumental. "It is a classic, as important cinematically as The Birth of a Nation," said the New York Times.

Nobody looked at it as a "kids' movie." British censors actually banned children under sixteen from seeing it without an adult. By May 1939, eighteen months after it debuted, Snow White had film receipts of $6.7 million, making it the highest-grossing American film ever.

The Fleischer staff had it even worse than that, hounded by supervisors timing their breaks with a stopwatch. An in-betweener at Fleischer who took too long in the bathroom would come back to his or her desk and find Edith Vernick, head of the department, standing there, tapping her toe...... On May 7, 1937, a strike broke out at the Fleischer studio. It was two years after Dan Glass's death; the time in between had been filled by countless hours of negotiations between management and the workers' new union representatives...... The strikers were met with more violence and intimi-dation. Men gripping lead pipes would sometimes creep up behind them as they entered their apartments. At other times, the phone would ring but the only sound at the other end was heavy breathing.
There was speculation that these tactics weren't ordered by Fleischer but had come from anti-union executives at Paramount..... One thing that did unify the staff was that most were immigrants or the offspring of immigrants, transplanted from cultures with their own prickly labour problems.

The big test would come in a few days, after Gulliver's Travels premiered in New York. On December 22, 1939, the film played at the Paramount Theatre in New York. By three in the afternoon, it shattered the movie palace's attendance record: nearly 14,000 people. Galloping through its two-week run, it then moved to the Roxy, where it continued to smash records........ Paramount immediately green-lighted another feature and the Fleischer storymen began working up ideas. Their early favourite was a cartoon about Mount Olympus and the gods. Dave Fleischer, who wasn't a theologian, casually told a colleague that the story of Mount Olympus was "all in the Old Testament."

As with Snow White, Disney wanted to adapt a dark European tale into something more cheerful. Collodi's Pinocchio was a miscreant and thug, but Disney wanted to convert him into a helpless innocent who lands in trouble after inadvertently getting swept up by a bad crowd. This was a story that good-hearted Americans could sympathize with; as with the wolf in Three Little Pigs, it allowed for the possibility of redemption .

After Stokowski walked him through The Rite of Spring, Disney purchased its rights for $6,000. Then he invited Igor Stravinsky, who was originally from Russia but now lived in America, to the studio in December 1939. Stokowski urged Disney not to worry about what a classical music snob might think of their work. He and Disney were not preservationists, he reiterated, but creators.

Geisel [Dr Seuss] eventually earned a Legion of Merit for "exceptionally meritorious service in planning and producing films, particularly those utilizing animated cartoons, for training, informing, and enhancing the morale of troops." While this was a high honour, those wartime films would later become controversial, known for painting their subjects with a broad, ugly brush. They sometimes blamed other countries' problems on race rather than on flawed political and economic institutions. The Japanese were often depicted as rats, sending a message they were a nonhuman species that could be killed without regret. Germans were sometimes depicted as a lost cause, a people permanently anchored to a wrong way of thinking, incapable of change.

In 1940, Bugs Bunny appeared in what most film historians consider his "official" debut, titled A Wild Hare..... A Wild Hare was the first time Bugs Bunny's character exhibited "what you might call controlled insanity, as opposed to wild insanity," according to Chuck Jones. Bugs started as a surrogate for Daffy, but he was now the opposite of the duck. Whereas Daffy would fly into a dither for no reason at all, Bugs would always maintain perfect control, even when staring down the barrel of Elmer Fudd's shotgun. The Warner Bros. artists eventually decided to emphasize this aspect of his personality by adjusting his appearance.

Warner Bros. director Bob Clampett remembered: "Just as America whistled the tune from Disney's Three Little Pigs, 'Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?' in the dark days of the Depression ... so, Bugs Bunny was a symbol of America's resistance to Hitler and the fascist powers." Within a week of Pearl Harbour, Walt Disney received a phone call from Washington, D.C. The Treasury Department wanted him to fly there to meet with Secretary Henry Morgenthau and discuss the prospect of producing a public-service film about the importance of paying taxes........ Disney had actually lost money on the film. After hastily signing a contract with the U.S. govermment, he had paid $6,000 in additional production expenses from his own pocket and lost another $50,000 in forfeited bookings of other shorts. But Disney's film, by convincing people not to evade taxes, probably helped generate far more in tax revenue than his films had cost to make. According to a Gallup poll, 32 million Americans saw The New Spirit, and more than a third of them said the film made them more willing to contribute.

Several UPA artists had, at one point or another, belonged to the Communist Party. When FBI director J. Edgar Hoover learned about the animators' links to Communism, he advised his military contacts of the Bureau's findings. UPA had only one military contract at the time—for a Navy training film called Marginal Weather Accidents-but the studio's hope of similar future contracts was all but ruined..... It was the age of the Red Menace: investigations, hearings, political attacks, Joseph McCarthy snarling at the cameras. In the wake of World War II, Republicans were desperate to return from the political exile they had been in ever since Roosevelt was elected in 1932. Seeking an issue to rally around, they chose Communism...... The strategy, widely compared to witch hunts, was engineered to generate publicity. It involved numerous attacks on Hollywood because celebrities guaranteed flashy headlines.

But these were show trials, focused on political revenge. The HUAC's "friendly witnesses" were often provided by the Motion Picture Alliance for the Preservation of American Ideals, a group founded in 1944 by Sam Wood, a director who had resented the city's elite ever since they denied him an Oscar for Goodbye, Mr. Chips in 1939. Inside his pocket he carried a little black book filled with the names of enemies he hoped to purge from the city...... His organization was stacked with prominent Hollywood figures whose politics leaned right: Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, Clark Gable, Ayn Rand, Barbara Stanwyck, and Cecil B. DeMille, among others. At the top of the MPA's leadership structure, serving as its vice president, was Walt Disney...... Not only had Disney's politics changed since the strike; his personal look had changed as well, from a carefree style into something more sober....... This is how he dressed on October 24, 1947, when he appeared as a friendly witness before the HUAC to talk about Communist infiltration of the animation industry.

In September 1949, Warner Bros. released the first Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner cartoon, Fast and Furryous. Jones and Maltese envisioned it as a onetime short, not a series.After seeing the favourable reviews, however, they started developing more..... The only words would be Road Runner's "beep, beep," which Jones borrowed from background painter Paul Julian, who would shout, "Beep, beep" whenever he was carrying a large painting down the hall.
Barely three months after Pepé's debut in For Scent-imental Rea-sons, the film won Jones his first Academy Award (he would direct nearly a dozen more Pepé Le Pew cartoons by 1962). But Eddie Selzer accepted the statue at the ceremony, since he was technically credited as the producer, even though he originally hated the idea and had contributed nothing creatively to the series.

Walt Disney's Disneyland premiered on October 27, 1954. Most television programs of the era were still so bad that the show couldn't fail to become a gargantuan hit, attracting more than 50 percent of television audiences during its time slot. The New York Times wrote that the rest of the industry should just give up and "suspend operations between 7:30 and 8:30 Wednesday nights." Even the repeat airings beat all other shows, save I Love Lucy. Disneyland accounted for half of ABC's billings and put the network on the map, giving it an identity....... Disney always hosted the show wearing a dark suit, his hair neatly combed. He resembled some kind of national uncle....... Film critic Richard Schickel claimed that none of Disney's admirers seemed to notice that their "loved object was less a man than an illusion created by a vast machinery."

Ground was broken for Disneyland, the park, on July 12, 1954, During construction, Disney resembled how he had been during the happy years leading up to Snow White. He even dressed as he had back then losing the gray suits for loud shirts and floppy hats...... The park would reflect Disney's persona and outlook the same way his movies did, as well as the suspension of reality. At the end of Main Street sat Sleeping Beauty Castle; radiating out from it were "lands" offering guests different options —fantasy, adventure, the frontier, the future—"so that a trip through the park became a metaphor for possibility."....... Park staff was trained at "Disney University." There were no old circus carnies here; employees were carefully chosen. "We don't hire for jobs here," the training program's director told a reporter from the New Yorker, "so much as we cast for parts."

In the late 1940s and the 50s, three catalysts forever changed animated cartoons: the studio system's fall, television's rise, and demographic changes spurred by the postwar baby boom.....In 1948, the Supreme Courted decided a landmark case, The United States v. Paramount Pictures, Inc., which broke up the studio system. It was one of the biggest antitrust decisions in U.S. history, forever changing the movie business....... Between 1950 and 1955, the number of TV sets in U.S. households increased from 3.9 million to 30.7 million..... The third factor affecting the nature of animation was a dramatic shift in audience demographics. Between 1944 and 1961, more than 65 million children were born in the United States....... and by the mid-1960s four out of every ten Americans were under the age of twenty.

Limited animation was the norm for television, where characters often resembled cardboard cutouts floating across a screen, as they had in Crusader Rabbit. While the aesthetic might not have been as visually appealing as before, it enabled far greater output.

Jack Warner had apparently admitted to colleagues that he didn't even know where his cartoon division was located. "The only thing I know," he said. "Is that we make Mickey Mouse." After somebody leaned over and informed him that no, they didn't make Mickey Mouse....... Warner shut down the cartoon unit to make space for what he saw as the next great cinematic revolution: 3-D movies.

When Walt Disney died, his Career was still on an upward trajectory.
Even though animation – the art form he revolutionised – was in the doldrums, he escaped the malaise to become a true American icon. The same can't be said for other animators working during animation's golden age. Most of them were now of struggling in the coal mines of television. They were the last of the ancients who had once thrown lightning bolts, now resigned to doodling toothpaste commercials. The past, not the future, would be the high point of their careers. Walt's death sent shock waves through the industry, a final curtain on a special era.
Disney's death [in 1966] came at a symbolic time— that same year, all three of the major television networks fully converted their Saturday morning programming to cartoons with a juvenile bent. It was also the year preceding Paramount's shutdown of the cartoon studio once owned by Disney's most prominent rival, Max Fleischer.
I learned a lot from the book and I'm happy to give it five stars.

[Jahan Hayes · Rating 5 out of 5]

Can feel like a Walt Disney biography at times, but still an incredibly entertaining read about the history of animation in America.

[J Earl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wild Minds: The Artists and Rivalries That Inspired the Golden Age of Animation by Reid Mitenbuler is both an entertaining and informative read. This will appeal to more than just those interested in cartoons or the graphic arts.

In the past I have taken a couple of courses on comics and cartoons, as well as read several books, so I fully expected to enjoy this volume. What made it an especially good read was the writing. The vast majority of the book reads like a narrative, like a story. This shouldn't be as unusual as it is but such histories tend toward being episodic, and that doesn't really detract from those books. But making the book flow from event to event and personality to personality made it all seem so much more connected.

While this will certainly appeal to those with an interest in cartoons during the first half of the 20th century primarily, it will also offer a great deal for those interested in American history as a whole. We often come to understand historic periods and events in a broad way. To cite an example that this book touches on, the Red Scare and HUAC hearings of the late 40s and 50s. Those interested in US history are familiar with both what happened and the fact that many innocent lives were harmed, livelihoods taken away just for personal political gain of those on the committees. This book illustrates in some detail how this particular industry, tied to but not quite (at the time) fully part of the Hollywood movie industry, was affected. How simply being for worker's rights could get you flagged by a vindictive studio head as a Communist, and even more so as an anti-American communist. This is just one aspect of the larger picture of US history that this specific industry history helps to illuminate.

I highly recommend this to readers and fans of cartoons and early film history. I also recommend this to general history buffs as well. As a partial aside, I recently read a book titled Drawing the Iron Curtain by Maya Balakirsky Katz that offers a similar and parallel history of the Soviet golden age of animation. I also recommend that book to both readers of animation history as well as history in general. While I recommend both, I probably would suggest Mitenbuler for most readers unless your interest is primarily Soviet history and/or Jewish Studies.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.

[EVAN · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an interesting, if incomplete, book. On the one hand, it was great to see Fleischer Studios get the long-overdue credit it deserves, as the original anti-Disney studio. On the other hand, there was next to nothing about Tex Avery who is among the most influential figures in animation and, arguably, film history. Perhaps, the author felt like MGM had been covered sufficiently elsewhere or, he felt the story worked best as a series of Davids (the Fleischers, then Warner Brothers) vs Goliath (Disney).. Either way, it felt like an important part of history was left out.

It also felt like the last few chapters were rushed. Basically, UPA, which revolutionized animation, was given a chapters, Jay Ward (whose influences the author acknowledges) even less.

Again, this was interesting and well-written and maybe I expected something that wasn't promised. Either way, it's certainly worth reading.

#netgalley

[Caitlin · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you like film, cartooning, or pop culture history then you will enjoy this book! In addition to the titular info, the author relays how overall history was shaped by and involved with the animation industry.

[Adam · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not bad overview of a century of animation history. At its best in early chapters, when the connections between such figures as Winsor McCay, the Fleischer brothers and Walt Disney were tighter. But the book loses its footing later on, feeling more like a summary of other, more detailed books without coming to any new conclusions of its own.

[Tanner Morton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hollywood, pop culture and 20th century Americana are bound together to the point where it's nearly impossible to satisfactorily talk about one without touching on the others. They each contribute to the common conception of the American identity—one that's only further developed and taken root in the general public's consciousness since the first studios decided to pull up stakes in New York City and move across the country to sunny California. While rarely in the spotlight, the art of animation—and the history of cartoons in the West—almost inevitably becomes a history of America during the 20th century.

Reid Mitenbuler's Wild Minds: The Artists and Rivalries That Inspired the Golden Age of Animation follows the stories of four major studios and the men that lead them during the height of animation through to its eventual decline.

Disney, Fleischer, Warner, and UPA each had an outsized impact on animation, even if only two of those studios are still well known today. Mitenbuler's book does an impressive job trying to capture a wide scope of American animation without becoming too broad to be sensible as a narrative. From the early days of Windsor McCay through to the death of Disney, Wild Minds balances the ongoing technological innovations in the industry, the greater world context the studios were working in, and the inner personal feuds that animate the early history of cartoons.

Right now, we're living at the seeming height of Disney's cultural power, which makes it all the more impressive that Mitenbuler manages to balance the two impassioned sides of the debate on its founder. The other studios have similarly complicated men leading them, but none have stuck in the cultural conscience like Walt. It'd be easy for the book to pick a side, and probably grab some headlines in the process, but it's a better piece of work by looking at creatives behind animation in their entirety. No one comes off as a saint, but instead, it's a reminder that great achievements in art are often at the cost of others. This approach lends weight to the criticisms and honours given to the varying studios and gives the narrative more credence, even when it runs counter to our common conception of some of animation's pioneers.

Arguably the greatest challenge when writing a book on animation is trying to capture the dynamic visual medium in words. To butcher a quote that's been misattributed to death, it's like trying to dance about architecture. Still, Wild Minds overcomes its formal limitations by serving up a massive helping of context for any of the shorts, films, and characters referenced. Sketches, stills, and plenty of photographs fill the book—attempting to capture what the cartoons and studios were like back when animation first rose to prominence. There's still plenty of reason to hunt down the shorts yourself—most of them are floating around the internet—but the additional material is appreciated while reading. Besides, who doesn't like cartoons filling in the margins of their books?

Whether you grew up watching cartoons and still have a soft spot for them or if you're interested in the seedier side of Hollywood, Wild Minds: The Artists and Rivalries That Inspired the Golden Age of Animation is well worth reading. Maybe it'll even motivate you to pick up a pencil and sketch out some stills after you're done.

[Michael Reilly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a well told story of American animation from Winsor McCay's 1914 "Gertie The Dinosaur" to the 1972 release of "Fritz The Cat", the first X-Rated cartoon.

Walt Disney was at the center of the story. The other studios were either trying to do what he did or were trying to do something different from him. Mitenbuler shows how the Warner Brothers cartoons like Bugs Bunny, Road Runner, Sylvester the Cat and Daffy Duck were deliberate attempts to rebel against the "mawkish and sentimental" Disney cartoons of the 40s and 50s.

Warner Brothers enjoyed mocking Disney. This story surprised me. Warner Brothers released a parody of 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" entitled "Coal Black and de Seben Dwarfs". It was an all black parody including ,for example, Prince Charming as "Prince Chawmin", a black gambler with dice for teeth. It featured the voices of Black actors and Black jazz musicians on the sound track. It was somewhat popular when released in 1943, although the NAACP boycotted it. Not surprisingly, by 1968 it was on the Warner Brothers "Censored Eleven" list of cartoons that were withdrawn from circulation because of potential offensive material.

This book is full of those kind of interesting behind the scenes stuff. The early animators where a mix of visionaries and sharpies. The later animators were a mix of hard nosed business men and artist who wanted to do something worthwhile.

This is a business history primarily. Mitenbuler focuses on the personalities and machinations of the people selling cartoons. Cartoonist were often overworked and underpaid and they frequently went on strike. Walt Disney, Mitenbuler argues, never got over his cartoonist strike. After the strike he changed his personal focus to amusement parks.

It is not fair to complain that someone didn't write the book you wanted to read. But I am not fair. I would have enjoyed more on the technical developments in cartooning. He notes the introduction of new methods for making cartoons but I would have liked to hear more details about how they worked and how they were developed.

[Dan Sendker · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is rare for me to read a book on Golden Age animation that teaches me something new, but every chapter of this book had facts and trivia I'd never heard of before. I especially appreciated and benefitted from the emphasis on early silent animation in the 1900s-1910s, an era I know very little about.

Reid Mitenbuler makes the interesting decision to frame his history of American animation as a rivalry between Walt Disney and Max Fleischer, rather that the usual studio rivalry of Disney vs. WB. This is a shrewd move: much has been written about Looney Tunes, and it is wonderful to see Fleischer get his well-deserved turn in the spotlight. I've spent the last 3 years slowly working my way through Fleischer Studio's filmography in chronological order, and this book has been a valuable resource.

If anything about the book is disappointing, it is that Fleischer, Disney, and WB takes up too much of the narrative. I was stunned to see that the wonderful MGM cartoons are barely acknowledged. The studio deserves at least a chapter, as does Paul Terry and Terrytoons. Strangest of all, Walter Lantz and Woody Woodpecker appear on exactly one page. Ultimately, these are minor quibbles. If Goodreads had half-stars I'd rate this 4.5, but the book is closer to a 5 than a 4.

Between this and Jaime Weinman's Anvils, Mallets, and Dynamite, scholarship on Golden Age animation seems to be experiencing a minor renaissance in the early 2020s. What an exciting thing. With this book, Reid Mitenbuler follows the well-worn path of Michael Barrier, Leonard Maltin, and the patron saint of animation historians, Jerry Beck. More than repeating their books, he advances their research and tells the story of animation in a personal, fresh, and compelling way. I wish the book was a hundred pages longer.

[Clay Doran · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great overview of animation’s roots. From Windsor McCay to Walt Disney, the ups and downs of the animated cartoon are told in a fun conversational tone. The main focus ends up being on Disney and Fleischer studios, in part, because their history is so well recorded. Lots of good stories from studio insiders detailing the struggles of getting animation to be taken seriously by the studio bigwigs. By the end of the book you would think that animated cartoons basically ended with the death of Walt Disney or at least were only used to sell sugary snacks to children. There are a few chapters on Warner Brothers and UPA but only a brief mention of MGM, Lantz, Jay Ward, Hanna-Barbera, and Famous Studios. Understandable for sure because these were not the highest quality cartoons at the time but a history of animation that doesn’t even mention the Flintstones or the Pink Panther seems odd. It is definitely forgivable given that the book is already over 300 pages. I know they try to wrap up around the 60s , which is fair, but I would be interested in seeing a second volume pick up where this left off detailing the rise of Saturday morning cartoons, Hanna-Barbera, the Disney renaissance, Don Bluth, the Simpsons, even the rise of anime in the East. Overall the book is very entertaining and I particularly like the thorough bibliography at the end listing hundreds of the source books for those who want to go deeper on the subject. You know it’s a good book when at the end your main complaint is that you wish it were longer.

[Colleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

* Likely my GoodReads non-fiction pick for best books of 2021; depending on publication date eligibility *

I was approved to review an advance read copy of the audiobook; I was so intrigued by the book that I also wanted to see the pictures and sketches that I knew would be provided in the book; so I also bought the book. How is that for a recommendation? And I'm glad that I took the time to review the physical book and listen to the audiobook.

The book is presented sequentially and begins with how animation began, through the days when television was invented and ends in the 1960's.

This book could be used to provide entertainment for a class in Diversity or Political Correctness; wow ... animators are constantly poking boundaries (and quite creatively). I had no idea that Warner Brothers made a 7 minute all-black parody of Snow White titled Coal Black and the Sebben Dwarfs.

Constantly the animators were being recruited by the competition.

It is so refreshing to enjoy learning about such interesting topic. Who didn't grow up watching animation, Disney films and Saturday morning cartoons? My favorite in grade school was Popeye; it was interesting finding out how the character evolved. I could go on and on, but I really loved the whole book.

The audiobook is 13 hours and 45 minutes long; the hardcover is 432 pages. I learned a lot about animation by reading/listening to this audio; but I'm sure that this had been edited and that this probably could have been double in size. But for me, it was the perfect amount of material. The narration of this audiobook by Kevin R. Free was excellent!

Thank you to NetGalley, the author/Reid Mitenbuler and the publisher/Grove Atlantic (Atlantic Monthly Press) for the opportunity to review the advance review copy of this audiobook. Audio publication date is 1 Dec 2020.

[Alan Braswell · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Ingenious ideas often seem simple and that their genius seeming simple when the act is actually very complex."

Wild Minds by Reid Mitenbuler shows how ingenious ideas came to the forefront in the world of animation by starting with the very beginnings of the craft. The book is filled with short biographical sketches of people who have since been forgotten and some that are not forgotten.
In order for these ingenious ideas to come out there has to be something to make the ideas come out of the mind and into the public persona Max Fleischer with his rotoscope invention opened wide the door for people like: Windsor McCoy, Otto Mesimer, Walt Disney to expand and become more creative in their fields.
Reid Mitenbulher also shows the struggles and the trials of each animator in various court cases, strikes, sound, movies,producers, the government, Hollywood,Hays code the advent of television and how if one doesn't adapt to changes one is quickly out of a job.

Wild Minds is thoroughly entertaining as is watching what the ingenious minds put forth.

Thanks to Netgalley and Grove Atlantic for the arc copy

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

My thanks to NetGalley and Atlantic Monthly Press for an advanced copy of this book.

Reid Mitenbuler in his latest book Wild Minds: The Artists and Rivalries That Inspired the Golden Age of Animation is a history of mostly American animation from the beginning of the twentieth century to about the 1960s. The focus is on some of animations most famous creators, Windsor McCoy, Max Fleisher, and looming above them all Walt Disney, their troubles with finances, financiers and trying to bring respectability to their chosen profession. Also the stealing that seemed quite prevalent through the industry, stealing credit for Felix the Cat, stealing persona at for the character of Betty Book, and stealing animators and talent, as Roy Disney would offer animators in New York double the pay to move to sunny California. Mitenbuler has a very nice writing style with tons of research to his credit about the creators, creations and the technology that advanced this art to what it is today. A great gift for animation fans or for film scholars and those interested in film technology.

[William Dury · Rating 3 out of 5]

RULE 1: THE ROAD RUNNER CANNOT HARM THE COYOTE EXCEPT BY GOING “BEEP-BEEP!”
RULE 2: NO OUTSIDE FORCE CAN HARM THE COYOTE-ONLY HIS OWN INEPTITUDE OR THE FAILURE OF THE ACME PRODUCTS.
RULE 3: THE COYOTE COULD STOP ANY TIME-IF HE WERE NOT A FANATIC. (“A FANATIC IS ONE WHO REDOUBLES HIS EFFORT WHEN HE HAS FORGOTTEN HIS AIM.”-GEORGE SANTAYANA)
RULE 4: NO DIALOGUE EVER EXCEPT “BEEP-BEEP!”
RULE 5: THE ROAD RUNNER MUST STAY ON THE ROAD-OTHERWISE, LOGICALLY, HE WOULD NOT BE CALLED ROAD RUNNER.
RULE 6: ALL ACTION MUST BE CONFINED TO THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT OF THE TWO CHARACTERS-THE SOUTHWEST AMERICAN DESERT.
RULE 7: ALL MATERIALS, TOOLS, WEAPONS, OR MECHANICAL CONVENIENCES MUST BE OBTAINED FROM THE ACME CORPORATION.
RULE 8: WHENEVER POSSIBLE, MAKE GRAVITY THE COYOTE’S GREATEST ENEMY.
RULE 9: THE COYOTE IS ALWAYS MORE HUMILIATED THAN HARMED BY HIS FAILURES. p. 294-95

He also made it a rule you never see Coyote and ACME involved on financial transactions. When an interviewer asked Jones the reason for this, he laughed. ‘It is just fun for me to imagine that somewhere there is a company that provides, absolutely free, their inventions to coyotes,’ p. 296.

[Sara M · Rating 5 out of 5]

This documentary of a book chronicles economic, political, and social climates that unfold as the evolution of moving pictures grows from its infancy.

As someone who got short changed in holistic history lessons throughout American high school, college, and graduate school, I always look for authors that are able to provide a relevant infusion of history through interesting and well written work.

This book is a joy to read, especially if one heeds the author’s advice to view the referenced cartoons as they go. The early handcrafted animation is an underappreciated art, especially in today’s era of programmed CGI and digital animation. This book offers guidance in order to really appreciate the early artist’s work.

Reading this book was as much a creative, artful experience as it was a refreshing review of historical perspectives.

[Rob · Rating 5 out of 5]

I saw this book at a Museum store with a major discount and sort of just shrugged and thought "welp, the subject seems kinda interesting, and it's half-off, so what do I have to lose?" This ended up being a tremendously captivating read!

As someone who loves Disney history and can pretty much tell the entire early history of the company from the memory, it was interesting to read a book that filled in the gaps of what a lot of Disney's rivals and inspirations did both during and prior to his career. This book really opened up a new fascination into Animation history that I didn't have previously.

If you are at all interested in the history of Animation, then give this book a shot because it really does a good job of telling the whole story from the very beginning of the field up to the 1960s.

[Ashley Rossetto · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow. I absolutely loved this account of the earliest years of animation. As someone who normally cannot get all the way through non-fiction books, I devoured this one and wish there was more. (Thank you, additional bibliography!) Beginning with the earliest animated cartoons (which you can watch on youtube as you read your way through the book to really see what Mitenbuler is describing), we learn the behind the scenes world of animation that began in the early 1900s and ended with the deaths of Walt Disney and Max Fleischer. Mitenbuler writes the facts like an engaging story and draws us in to the world of studio-hopping artists, evolving animation techniques, and capitalist America. I really, really enjoyed this book.
I received an Advanced Reading Copy of this book through Edelweiss.