Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination, Neal Gabler, c. 2006.

Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination, Neal Gabler, c. 2006. B DIS.

Chapter One: Escape

Family history: from Ireland, to America, via Liverpool, in 1834.

First to Canada, then plans to move to California (gold rush) but en route, bought 300 acres from UNP in Kansas. Not American citizens so couldn't acquire land under the Homestead Act.

Then to Florida.

Then, one of the sons moved to Des Moines, Iowa, and ultimately, Ohio. Charles Disney, a teacher for 20 years in Ohio.

At age 56, Charles decided to move to Ellis, Kansas, and after a year, the family began to scatter.

A son, Elias Disney, still in Kansas, marries Flora Call. 

They eventually move to Chicago.

Elias' younger brother Robert had been in Chicago for 2+ years.

Elias and Flora, first child Herbert and one on the way, 1890.

Second son, Ray, born, December, 1890; followed by Roy O. Disney, about 1892.

Walter Elias Disney, born 1902. 

Family moves to remote location in Missouri.

By now a new sister, Ruth.

And it goes on and on and on. More later, perhaps.