2002:
Disney names James Rasulo, who had been chairman and chief executive of Euro
Disney, to be the new president of Walt Disney Parks and Resorts worldwide.
Rasulo, 46, succeeds Paul Pressler, who suddenly left Disney to become
president and chief executive of the clothing retailer Gap Inc.
The Disney-owned Anaheim Angels wrap up their regular season
with a 7-6 victory over Seattle. At 99-63, it is the most successful season in franchise
history! (The Angels will go on to beat the San Francisco Giants and become World Series Champs.)
The second season of Alias premieres on ABC-TV with the episode "The Enemy
Walks In." Created by J. J. Abrams, the series stars Jennifer Garner as Sydney Bristow, a double agent for
the Central Intelligence Agency posing as an operative for SD-6, a worldwide criminal and espionage organization.
1904:
Actress Greer Garson is born in London, England. One of MGM's major stars of the 1940s, she
later played the role of Mrs. Cordelia Biddle in Disney's 1967 live-action musical feature The Happiest Millionaire.
1934:
The Mickey Mouse cartoon Mickey Plays Papa, directed by
Burt Gillett, is released.
1938:
Walt Disney Enterprises, Disney Film Recording Company, and Liled Realty and
Investment Company are merged into Walt Disney Productions.
Later this evening, Walt convenes about 60 artists on his soundstage for a two-
and-a-half hour piano concert. Walt provides a running commentary on what the audience will be
seeing in a new "concert feature" (later titled Fantasia). A rough of The Sorcerer's Apprentice is also
screened.
1958:
The LP record Firehouse Five Plus Two - 16 Dixieland Favorites is released.
The band is made up of such notable Disney Studio employees as Harper Goff (on banjo), Ward Kimball
(on trombone), and Frank Thomas (on piano).
1962:
Actor & singer Roger Bart - the voice of young Hercules in Disney's 1997
animated feature - is born in Norwalk, Connecticut. He is also the singing voice of Scamp in
Lady and the Tramp II: Scamp's Adventure. Among his many theater credits - the Alan Menken/Tim Rice
musical King David, co-produced by Disney Theatrical Productions (and presented as the inaugural
production at Disney's newly renovated New Amsterdam Theatre). Fans of TV's Desperate Housewives
(produced by Disney's ABC Studios and Cherry Productions) will recognize Bart as the murderous pharmacist
George Williams. (His Broadway credits include The Producers and Young Frankenstein.)
1963:
The NBC-TV series Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color airs part 1 of
"The Horse Without a Head" for the very first time. A group of poor French children who
share only one toy - a headless wooden horse on wheels - foil a robbery when a thief stashes the key to his
hiding place inside the horse! This episode marks season ten of Disney's television series.
1973:
Singer-actor Brad Kane, the singing voice of Disney's Aladdin, is born in New
Rochelle, New York. He can also be heard in the 1994 The Return Of Jafar and the 1995 Aladdin
and the King of Thieves. On September 11, 2005, Kane was invited to a ceremony at Hong Kong
Disneyland, the night before the theme park's opening. He performed the song "A Whole New World"
from Aladdin.
1994:
Innoventions grand opening takes place at EPCOT (although it has been open
since July in the pavilion formerly known as Communicore). The Future World pavilion
divided into Innoventions West and Innoventions East, focuses on technological advancements and their
practical applications in everyday life. Innoventions is a portmanteau of the words "innovation" and "invention".
1998:
The popular Disney barbershop harmony group, the Dapper Dans appear on an
episode of ABC-TV's Home Improvement. They appear as the 'Flannels' singing a
rendition of the Tool Time theme song.
The Jungle Book: Mowgli's Story is released direct-to-video. It is a live-action sequel to
the the 1967 animated feature.
Walt Disney Records releases Return to Pride Rock in conjunction with the direct-to-
video Lion King sequel of the same name.
Felicity, a new prime-time drama produced by Disney's Touchstone Television and
Imagine Television for The WB Television Network, debuts. Revolving around the fictional
college experiences of the title character, Felicity Porter (played by actress Keri Russell - an original Disney
Channel Mouseketeer), the series will run for 4 seasons.
2000:
In Disneyland, Mickey's Mouseworks opens on Main Street.
Disney invites over 1,200 children from across Europe, South Africa, and Israel,
to join Winnie the Pooh and his friends in Disneyland Paris for The Winnie the Pooh Friendship Celebration.
Disney's Remember the Titans, starring Denzel Washington as football
coach Herman Boone, is released in theaters. The true story of a newly appointed
African-American coach and his high school team on their first season as a racially integrated unit,
the cast includes Will Patton, Wood Harris, Ryan Hurst, Hayden Panettiere, and Kate Bosworth.
Disney World announces plans for an attraction and merchandising area
based on their 1992 animated feature Aladdin. "The Magic Carpets of Aladdin" will take Magic Kingdom guests on a carpet ride in Adventureland.
2003:
Country & western singer Wesley Tuttle (who in 1944 was the second country artist
ever to sign with Capitol Records) passes in California. Tuttle yodeled as one of the
dwarfs in Disney's 1937 classic Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
The Walt Disney company introduces a new video-on-demand service called
MovieBeam, that lets users download and store films via a set-top device.
1971:
Actor & comedian Mackenzie Crook - known for his comical role of Ragetti in Disney's
Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead
Man's Chest and Pirates of the Caribbean: At Worlds End - is born in Kent, England.
2006:
The Epcot International Food and Wine Festival kicks off its 11th season the same
day the 1st Annual NFFC WORLD Convention begins its 3-day event at Walt
Disney World.
Disney Channel debuts the 16th Hannah Montana episode "Good Golly, Miss
Dolly" featuring country music legend Dolly Parton as Miley's godmother.
The Guardian, an action-adventure drama film directed by Andrew Davis, is released by Touchstone Pictures. Coast Guard rescue swimmer Ben Randall, played by Kevin Costner, who still mourns losing his crew in a fatal accident, copes by dedicating his life to training new recruits. The cast includes Ashton Kutcher, Neal McDonough, and Melissa Sagemiller. The mishap in The Guardian where Randall loses his crew is loosely based on an actual U.S. Coast Guard aviation mishap in Alaska.
2004:
The late Frank Thomas is remembered at a special event held at the
El Capitan Theater in Hollywood. One of the most beloved of the celebrated
"Nine Old Men" - Thomas passed September 8.
1906:
Musical director, composer, orchestrator, and conductor Charles Wolcott is born in
Flint, Michigan. His Disney credits include Bambi, The Three Caballeros, Make Mine Music, Song of the
South, and Fun and Fancy Free. (By 1950 he will transfer to MGM Studios as Associate General Musical
Director, and in 1958 become General Musical Director. In 1961 Wolcott will move to Israel and serve as a
member of the Universal House of Justice - the supreme governing body of the Bahá'í Faith.)
Award-winning actress
Jodie Foster made
her motion picture
debut in Disney's
1972 live-action film,
Napoleon and Samantha,
playing the role
of Samantha.
1999:
At Epcot, the Mickey Mouse arm holding a wand is dedicated with "2000" over
Spaceship Earth - signaling the start of the Millennium Celebration.
2001:
Disney's House of Mouse debuts the episode "Goofy for a Day."
2007:
High School Musical: The Ice Tour has its world premiere at Madison Square
Garden in New York City. The tour will visit more than 100 cities in its first year
alone, including cities in Europe, Canada and Mexico.
2005:
Disney Electronics introduces Disney Mix Sticks digital audio MP3/WMA players.
The fifth (and final) season of the drama/adventure television series Alias premieres on ABC with the episode "Prophet Five." Created by J. J. Abrams, the series stars Jennifer Garner as Sydney Bristow, a double agent for the Central Intelligence Agency posing as an operative for SD-6, a worldwide criminal and espionage organization.
1954:
Actor, puppeteer, and voice-over artist Jeff Breslauer is born in New York. His Disney
theme park roles include Chester Diggs at Animal Kingdom, Papa Noel at Epcot's Canada pavilion, and The
Dreamfinder (while manipulating Figment) in front of Epcot's Imagination pavilion. Breslauer puppeteered in The
Muppets Take Manhattan (operating an Irish setter) and The Muppets at Walt Disney World.
"You've heard of the golden rule, haven't you? Whoever has the gold makes the rules!" -Jafar (from Aladdin)
2008:
It is announced that classical musical composer Philip Glass has been commissioned
by the New York City Opera to compose an opera that imagines the final months in
the life of Walt Disney. The opera, "The Perfect American," is based on a recent novel by American-born
writer Peter Stephan Jungk in which a fictional Austrian cartoonist who worked for Disney in the 1940s-50s
recounts the story of the legendary founder of the Walt Disney Company. It is scheduled to open City Opera's
2012-2013 season and honor the composer's 75th birthday. (Although originally commissioned by New York City Opera, "The Perfect American" will debut in Madrid in January 2013.)
SEPTEMBER 29
THIS DAY MADE
IN THE
USA
SEPTEMBER 29
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2009:
Disney launches a new volunteer program called "Give a Day, Get a Disney Day."
The program (which guests can begin participating January 1, 2010) will provide certified volunteers with a one-
day ticket next year to any park at Walt Disney World or at Disneyland.
Dear Agony, the fourth studio album by American rock band Breaking Benjamin, is
released through Disney's Hollywood Records.
Also released by Hollywood is Kiss & Tell, the debut studio album by American band Selena Gomez & the Scene.
Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, an action role-playing video game developed by h.a.n.d. and Square Enix for the Nintendo DS, is released in North America. The fifth installment in the Kingdom Hearts series, it takes place near the end of the first game, continuing parallel to Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. The game is dedicated to Wayne Allwine, the long time English voice of Mickey Mouse, who died on May 18, 2009, 12 days before the game's release in Japan. This is the final game to feature his performance as Mickey.
1995:
The Big Green, a Walt Disney Pictures comedy starring Steve Guttenberg and
Olivia D'Abo, is released. Fresh from England on a foreign exchange program, teacher Miss Anna (d'Abo)
arrives in a small Texas town where the local students don't have much to be happy about. Determined to boost
their spirits, Anna forms a soccer team with the help of her assistant coach, Sheriff Tom (Guttenberg), hoping the
sport will help them out of their funk.
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11th Food & Wine Festival begins
Innoventions Grand Opening
"Frank Thomas retired the year before I got to work at Disney, but he was there with Ollie of course
making, writing, preparing and researching their book, The Illusion of Life." -John Lasseter
"Frank Thomas, during the years that I knew him, was a gracious legend in the art of animation. His
loyalty to the Walt Disney Co. and to his close friend, Ollie Johnston, was admirable. He knew the
art inside out." -Gary Goldman, animation producer
1980:
Actor Zachary Levi, the voice of Flynn Rider for
Disney's 2010 animated Tangled, as well as the 2012 short Tangled Ever After and the 2017 Disney Channel
television series based on the film, is born in Lake
Charles, Louisiana. He also played Fandral in the 2013 Thor:
The Dark World. (TV fans know Levi best from his roles of Kipp Steadman
in Less than Perfect and Chuck Bartowski in Chuck.)
1942:
Actor Ian McShane is born in Blackburn, Lancashire, England. He portrayed
Blackbeard in Disney's 2011 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.
Actress, comedian, voice actress, and singer Madeline Kahn is born in Boston, Massachusetts. She was the voice of Gypsy in the 1998 A Bug's Life. She is best known for her comedic roles in such films as What's Up, Doc? (1972), Young Frankenstein (1974), High Anxiety (1977), History of the World, Part I (1981), and her Academy Award–nominated roles in Paper Moon (1973) and Blazing Saddles (1974).
1939:
Walt Disney and his family – wife Lillian, daughter Diane, brother Roy, sister-in-
law Edna, and nephew Roy – depart Honolulu, Hawaii, aboard the S.S.
Matsonia. They are scheduled to arrive at the Port of Los Angeles Harbor on October 4.
2012:
Disney's 1937 classic animated feature Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs is
screened as part of the 50th New York Film Festival. Also shown is Paperman, an
innovative animated short about a young New Yorker who relies on heart, imagination, and a stack of papers
to change his destiny and win the girl of his dreams. A Walt Disney Pictures release, animator Eric Goldberg
and director John Kahrs appear in person. (A major film festival since it began in 1963 in New York, the films
are selected by the Film Society of Lincoln Center.)
The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror 10-Miler race takes place with a new 10-mile
course taking runners through ESPN's Wide World of Sports Complex and
Disney's Hollywood Studios theme park. The course starts in Hollywood Studios, then leads to
ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex before returning to the Studios where participants will run through the
Lights, Motors, Action Extreme Stunt Show, then turn down New York Street before going past the Sorcerer’s
Hat and rallying for a finish in the shadows of the Tower of Terror.
September 29
"We never thought of ourselves as some elite group, and the only time it even crossed our minds was when Walt made a kidding remark about his Nine Old Men being over the hill, or getting too decrepit
to work, or losing all their old zip." -animator Frank Thomas
2015:
Although over the last several weeks, "Disney Springs" has started to replace
"Downtown Disney" on roadway signage and throughout Walt Disney World, the
name change becomes official on this day. Featuring more than 150 stores, restaurants and entertainment locations, Disney Springs (still under construction) consists of The Landing, The Town Center,
The West Side and The Marketplace.
The third season of the ABC television series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., based on the Marvel Comics organization S.H.I.E.L.D., kicks off with the episode "Laws of Nature."
Set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (and acknowledging the continuity of the franchise's films), Phil Coulson
(played by Clark Gregg) and his team of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and Inhumans face new threats to the world.
Aladdin is released to Digital HD and Disney Movies Anywhere (DMA).
2017:
BaseLine Tap House, a pub on the new Grand Avenue at Disney's Hollywood Studios,
opens. Located among the vintage office buildings and warehouses that represent the glory of Grand
Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles, this pub specializes in beer and wines from the Golden State of California.
BaseLine Tap House sits just around the corner from Sci-Fi Dine-In Theater Restaurant.
Tell Me You Love Me, the sixth studio album by singer/actress Demi Lovato, is released
by Island, Hollywood, and Safehouse Records.
2013:
"Journey to Neverland," the first Season Three special for ABC-TV's Once Upon a Time, airs.
It is followed by the third season premiere of Once Upon a Time with the episode "The Heart of the Truest Believer".
Season 3 of the ABC drama series Revenge debuts with the episode "Fear."
Walt Disney Imagineering Blue Sky Cellar, located at Disney California Adventure, closes. Originally replacing the Seasons of the Vine Theater back in October 2008, it promoted upcoming attractions coming to the park. Blue Sky will reopen again on April 13, 2018, to provide a preview of Pixar Pier.
1984:
Touchstone Pictures' second production, Country, is released the day after its premiere on September 28 at the New York Film Festival. The drama follows the trials and tribulations of a
rural family as they struggle to hold on to their farm during the trying economic times experienced by family farms in 1980s America. Country stars Jessica Lange, Sam Shepard, and Wilford Brimley.
2019:
Season 2 of ABC's The Rookie debuts with the episode "Impact." The crime drama series stars Nathan Fillion as John Nolan; the oldest rookie at the Los Angeles Police Department.
1925:
Actor Steve Forrest is born in Huntsville, Texas. He starred in the 1969 Rascal and the 1970 The Wild Country. Forrest also narrated the 1972 documentary short The Magic of Walt Disney World.
2020:
Singer-actress Helen Reddy, whose credits include Disney's 1977 Pete's Dragon (as Nora), passes away at age 78 in California. She sang the film's Academy Award-nominated "Candle on the Water" love song. The first Australian to win a Grammy Award (in 1973), she was best known for her songs "I Am Woman,"
"Delta Dawn," and "Angie Baby."
1977:
Animator and illustrator Robert McKimson passes away suddenly at age 66 in California. Best known for his work on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of cartoons from Warner Bros., he worked for Disney's studio for 2 years early in his career.
1992:
Animator John Reed passes away at age 84 in San Diego, California. As an effects animator, his credits included Fantasia, The Reluctant Dragon, the short Pluto Junior, and Alice in Wonderland. Reed also worked on Pinocchio, Bambi, The Three Caballeros, and Fun and Fancy Free. After leaving Disney, Reed worked on the 1954 animated Animal Farm; the first British animated feature to get a formal cinema release.
2021:
Walt Disney World's turn-of-the-century Main Street Confectionery at Magic Kingdom reopens. Hosted by Mars Wrigley, the confectionery now sports a wall of cylinders offering 38 varieties of M&M’s and Skittles that can be mix-and-matched by the pound.
2022:
Disney World Resort's theme parks and water parks remain closed for a second day as Hurricane Ian (now downgraded to a tropical storm) continues to impact Florida.
