I just ordered the books Pacific Ocean Park: The Rise and Fall of Los Angeles' Space Age Nautical Pleasure Pier and Pleasure Island (Images of Modern America). They are not Disney history books, of course, but so many former Disney Imagineers worked on those two parks that I know many of you would like to be aware of their existence.

The documentary about Disney and Italy, which I mentioned a while back on the blog has finally been released in DVD. The good news is that the DVD contains English subtitles (but it uses the European format, so unless you have a multi-zone player you will not be able to watch it in the US).

The documentary is very weak, both from a structural standpoint and from the point of view of historical accuracy. However it contains enough rare sequences of Walt visiting Italy for me to be happy to own it. I am a very special nut case, of course, so I would not really recommend any of you outside of Italy to pick that one up.

This just in from Jim Lentz at Heritage Auctions:

[Did you know Heritage auctions weekly Comic and Animation auction is selling tons of vintage disney animation drawings cels and extibles each week? If you could let people know I'd appreciate it.  This week a ton of feature animation 1990 crew jackets as well as great 30s Disney animation drawings.  These type itmes are up every week!]

I didn't know and I enjoyed what I saw.

Not 100% Disney history related but I am very much looking forward to Sebastien Roffat's second volume of his history of animation in France, now available on Amazon.fr

This just in from one of Disney Legend Cy Young's relatives. Does one of you speak Mandarin? Could you help me dig out the info related to Young's early career in China?

If so, please email me at didier.ghez@gmail.com

[Dear Didier，

My Grand-uncle Cyrus Young’s given name in Chinese is 锡冶 （See Yeh）, and his second name is 左匋 (Zuo Tao).  The following websites might help you to find some of his early activities in fine arts in China.

http://blog.sina.com.cn/s/blog_5992bc5c0100tacs.html

http://wenku.baidu.com/view/df498a8eb9d528ea81c77909.html]

Very interesting ebook released recently on the iTunes Store for $4.99. If you want to get the pdf copy, you cal email Dexter Francis at dwf@d-innovation.biz.

Two upcoming books which might prove quite interesting:

- Walt Disney, from Reader to Storyteller: Essays on the Literary Inspirations
- A Wish Your Heart Makes: From the Grimm Brothers' Aschenputtel to Disney's Cinderella by Charles Solomon