I just learned of the existence of this new e-book and can't wait to pick it up. I wish there were a physical copy, though.

Interesting French poster found on ebay this week.

Do not miss today:

- Character Designs from Long Ago by Andreas Deja
- Mel Shaw's Beauty & the Beast by Andreas Deja
- The Imp Press - Part I by Joakim Gunnarson (Do not niss this!)
- Who Disappeared Roger Rabbit From the Disney Parks? by Jim Korkis

I have been extremely busy during the past 2 years, reconstructing the history of Disney in Europe before WWII and have to admit that I am starting to be very happy about the result.

But that made me think that someone should focus at some point on doing the same thing when it comes to Asia. Probably even more difficult, though.

In the meantime, here are a few interesting pre-WWII Disneyana items which I recently found online.

This just in from Garry Apgar: [New York Herald Tribune, Jan. 16, 1938, section 7, p. 4]

Do not miss this upcoming auction. It contains some truly outstanding Disney documents. (Thanks to Gunnar Andreassen for the heads up.)

 This just in from Gunnar Andreassen: [From Photoplay June 1936.]

I will let you know as soon as I manage to pick up the catalog of this upcoming Italian exhibition. I will also review it when I get it. In any case, I thought that European readers of the blog needed to be aware of this event.

I just got from Disney's Press Department those two photos which appear in the members-only section of the D23 site. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Captions:

[Top: This never-before-released photo, taken with Walt’s personal camera, show Walt and his family visited Denmark in June 1951, where this photograph was taken. From the “D’scovered” feature exclusively on D23.com.

Bottom: This never-before-released photo, taken with Walt’s personal camera, show Walt sleeping in the shade on the lawn of his Woking Way home on a state-of-the-art '40-s cushion—a book at his side. From the “D’scovered” feature exclusively on D23.com.]

Ah, the joy of seeing a really GREAT Disney book being released! From my point of view, the upcoming Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse: Color Sundays Vol. 1 "Call Of The Wild", edited by David Gerstein, is not just a "must have", it is also one of the very best "Disney History" books released in Fantagraphics outstanding series and almost certainly the best Disney History book of the year.

To start with, there is the sheer pleasure of seeing Gottfredson's Sunday pages collected in English for the first time. Then there is the tremendous amount of bonus material, including a reprint of the five DeMolay comic strips, long a frustrating mystery for Disney scholars.

My advice: pre-order this volume and the next one right away. I am not often this enthusiastic, but in this specific case, I am certain that, if you read this blog, you will not regret it.

You may have heard this already: D23 relaunched their website yesterday. I have just checked out the members-only section and lto say that I was excited by what I saw would be a complete understatement.

If you are reading this blog, you have to become a member right away.

Here is an email I just received from Becky Cline, Director of the Archives:

[We found photos of Diane, Sharon and even Roy on the Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round recently … some of them were posted on our re-launched D23 website today!  We found an amazing cache of photos recently and we will be rolling out the best of them in the next few weeks on our site and in the magazine! We posted them today in a column we are calling "D'scovered" where we will be constantly sharing new finds as we come across them.  :)]

As soon as you become a member, jump to the following three sections:

- D'scovered
- Lost Adventures
- Weird Disney

There is some truly spectacular new photos and documents in these sections.

And also check out the new episode of Armchair Archivists which contains especially one great surprise connected to Disneyland.

I never thought I would get this excited about D23 but they are really moving in the right direction now as far as I am concerned and are definitely worth supporting.

Who could help me buy a copy of this Danish book, which I heard about through a comment on the blog yesterday?

[UPDATE: I just found a copy.]

Do not miss today:

- Joe Grant Sketch by Andreas Deja
- Anti-War Short “Mickey Mouse in Vietnam” Resurfaces Online by Amid Amidi
- It's a Duck Blur! by Jim Korkis

These great caricatures just in from John Orin Basmajian:

[Top: L-R,  Gus Jekel, Les Elton, John Basmajian;  Bottom:  L-R,  Dick Lucas, Milt Banta, Bruce Mc Intyre.]

This just in from David Peake:

["The Art of Frozen" is finally up on Amazon for pre-order.
 
Pierre Lambert's "Sleeping Beauty" is available for pre-order in the USA here:

http://stuartngbooks.com/new-arrivals/la-belle-au-bois-dormant-sleeping-beauty.html

Also, I found this title on Amazon UK:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Nine-Old-Men-Techniques-Inspiration/dp/0415843359/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1370617099&sr=1-1&keywords=disney

The only sad thing is that it is not released until 2015.]

Let's admit it: I have mixed feelings about Monsters University. Monsters, Inc. was my favorite Pixar movie and the theme of this prequel does not excite me much.

But I have just received the "art of" released by Chronicle Books and it is once again a great one, full of fascinating development art. I never seem to get enough of this. Keep them coming!

Here is another interesting Italian book about Italian Disney comics which should be released soon.

While in Los Angeles two weeks ago, I discovered that there were actually two catalogs on the Japanese Mary Blair exhibition. The one above contains more of Mary's non-Disney art and is unfortunately almost impossible to find.

I was really excited to receive a few days ago this book by Are Myklebust and Jan Ståle Engaas. Granted it is written in Norwegian and I can't read it, but the amount of new pre-War Disneyana material which it contains and which I had never seen makes it worth having it, in my eyes. I am also extremely happy to see the history of Disney in Norway documented for the first time in a serious manner.

My only wish now is to see other Disney historians tackle the same type of project for the other Nordic countries: Sweden, Denmark and Finland.

By the end of the summer Are will send me some information about how to order the book.

Do not miss today:

- Walt Disney and California Living by Todd James Pierce (Outstanding article)
- Disney Unveils “Get a Horse!” Mickey Mouse Poster by Amid Amidi
- D23: The Official Disney Fan Club Launches Reimagined D23.com Website June 17
- Rare, amazing original prospectus for Disneyland by Cory Doctorow (Thanks to Michael Goldberg for the link)
- The REAL Lost Mickey Mouse Cartoons by Jim Korkis
- Voices of the Disney Theme Parks by Jim Korkis
- Chicago Walt by Jim Korkis

This great article from Hollywood Magazine, May 1939 just in thanks to Gunnar Andreassen.

Interesting book just discovered this week while browsing on ebay.

A few more of those great handkerchieves from Hungary being sold on ebay. (Thanks to Hans Crezee for the heads up.)

William Ward was one of the English artists who produced Disney comics for the Mickey Mouse Weekly in the late '30s. The stories he wrote and illustrated are among the most bizarre when it comes to featuring Disney characters. All of his Disney stories are now collected in a beautiful book which will be released next month in Italy. Unfortunately it is in Italian, but I know that the most serious Disney comics fans among you will want to pick it up.

The Secrets of Disney's Visual Effects: The Schultheis Notebooks by John Canemaker, one of the most awaited Disney History books of 2014 is now available for pre-order on Amazon.