Walt Disney – 1901-1966

An animator by vocation, Walter Elias Disney created the animated character of Mickey Mouse in the 1928 short Steamboat Willie and used its success to build a cartoon and entertainment empire, which came to encompass television and two theme parks, Disneyland, which opened in Anaheim, California, in 1955, and Walt Disney World, in Orlando, Florida, shortly before his death. The company Disney founded and built expanded far beyond cartoons and theme parks to become one of the world’s great entertainment corporations.