Donald's True Debut? & Donald's Birthday

[Scrooge MacDuck]

So I was reading through old Journals de Mickey, and stumbled onto Issue #1206 from July of 1975, which was about the 40th anniversary of Donald Duck (I know, I know). And among other features, there was the following page:



Two of the articles feature very interesting information. Most importantly, the big blue one (“DONALD EST NÉ À LA RADIO”) claims that "Donald the Duck", played by Clarence Nash, was first used in a Disney context on the Mickey Mouse radio show, before he made the jump to the big screen in The Wise Little Hen. Is therea any truth to this? Information about the Mickey Mouse Theater of the Air online is scarce (I assume that's the only radio show they could be talking about?), so it's just about plausible that we could have all missed this all these years. 

The second thing is from the yellow article on the right, “Ses 67 anniversaires”, which gives a fun little in-universe explanation for Donald's varying birthdays: at some point Donald apparently decided to always celebrate his birthday on Friday the 13th, which gets him more cake than anybody else due to their sometimes being two Fridays the 13th in a single year. 

[Scroogerello]

The commonly told story is that Walt Disney heard Nash do some of his animal impressions on the radio, and that's how he first learnt about Nash's "duck voice" (which was actually an impression of a baby goat, if I remember correctly). I think that's what the article is referring to. The "Mickey Mouse Theatre Of the Air" is from 1938 (created to promote the release of Snow White that year) and very short-lived.

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Oct 9, 2019 18:18:49 GMT Scroogerello said:

The commonly told story is that Walt Disney heard Nash do some of his animal impressions on the radio, and that's how he first learnt about Nash's "duck voice" (which was actually an impression of a baby goat, if I remember correctly).

No, no, the article speaks of that as well but clearly separates between the two. It claims that Walt heard Nash on the radio doing a random duck (or goat, as it were), then hired him to join a radio show that already featured Mickey in the role of "a duck called Donald", and then they decided to put that same Donald Duck in their Wise Little Hen cartoon. 

[deb]

Donald Duck appeared on the radio in the Hall of Fame radio show in December of 1934, but The Wise Little Hen was released in June of that year. retro-otr.com/2015/12/the-hall-of-fame-the-christmas-stocking-walt-disney-and-friends-341223/

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Ah, that'll likely be it. Thanks, deb!

[Deleted]

Oct 9, 2019 17:31:50 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

So I was reading through old Journals de Mickey, and stumbled onto Issue #1206 from July of 1975, which was about the 20th anniversary of Donald Duck (I know, I know). And among other features, there was the following page:



Two of the articles feature very interesting information. Most importantly, the big blue one (“DONALD EST NÉ À LA RADIO”) claims that "Donald the Duck", played by Clarence Nash, was first used in a Disney context on the Mickey Mouse radio show, before he made the jump to the big screen in The Wise Little Hen. Is therea any truth to this? Information about the Mickey Mouse Theater of the Air online is scarce (I assume that's the only radio show they could be talking about?), so it's just about plausible that we could have all missed this all these years. 

The second thing is from the yellow article on the right, “Ses 67 anniversaires”, which gives a fun little in-universe explanation for Donald's varying birthdays: at some point Donald apparently decided to always celebrate his birthday on Friday the 13th, which gets him more cake than anybody else due to their sometimes being two Fridays the 13th in a single year. 

I'm confused. The article says that Donald debuted in The Wise Little Hen (1934), but also states that he was created in 1955? I dont know french, so i can't really read what it says

[Ramapith]

Oct 9, 2019 20:11:18 GMT deb said:

Donald Duck appeared on the radio in the Hall of Fame radio show in December of 1934, but The Wise Little Hen was released in June of that year. retro-otr.com/2015/12/the-hall-of-fame-the-christmas-stocking-walt-disney-and-friends-341223/

But Donald's first appearance on Hall of Fame came earlier—in March 1934; and for Donald's first two years of "life," that broadcast, and not THE WISE LITTLE HEN, was cited as being Donald's public debut.

As knowledge of the show receded (today, a recording of that episode either doesn't survive or isn't generally available to the public), THE WISE LITTLE HEN took precedence. But there was a time when Disney perceived Donald as having been a radio character first.

[deb]

Oct 10, 2019 3:41:45 GMT Ramapith said:

Oct 9, 2019 20:11:18 GMT deb said:

Donald Duck appeared on the radio in the Hall of Fame radio show in December of 1934, but The Wise Little Hen was released in June of that year. retro-otr.com/2015/12/the-hall-of-fame-the-christmas-stocking-walt-disney-and-friends-341223/

But Donald's first appearance on Hall of Fame came earlier—in March 1934; and for Donald's first two years of "life," that broadcast, and not THE WISE LITTLE HEN, was cited as being Donald's public debut.

As knowledge of the show receded (today, a recording of that episode either doesn't survive or isn't generally available to the public), THE WISE LITTLE HEN took precedence. But there was a time when Disney perceived Donald as having been a radio character first.

WAK! I didn’t know that! It’s a shame that this radio show is unavailable. It would also add to the reason why the Duck was one of the most verbose characters in the Disney shorts early on. Not just because he had a gimmicky voice, but because he was a radio personality even before he was a cartoon (and comic strip) star!

[Scrooge MacDuck]

Oct 10, 2019 3:41:45 GMT Ramapith said:

Oct 9, 2019 20:11:18 GMT deb said:

Donald Duck appeared on the radio in the Hall of Fame radio show in December of 1934, but The Wise Little Hen was released in June of that year. retro-otr.com/2015/12/the-hall-of-fame-the-christmas-stocking-walt-disney-and-friends-341223/

But Donald's first appearance on Hall of Fame came earlier—in March 1934; and for Donald's first two years of "life," that broadcast, and not THE WISE LITTLE HEN, was cited as being Donald's public debut.

As knowledge of the show receded (today, a recording of that episode either doesn't survive or isn't generally available to the public), THE WISE LITTLE HEN took precedence. But there was a time when Disney perceived Donald as having been a radio character first.

I was hoping you might weigh in. Fascinating stuff. Do we know anything more about the contents of the radio show episode in question? Title? Plot?  

Oct 9, 2019 22:21:56 GMT @titusmcduck said:

I'm confused. The article says that Donald debuted in The Wise Little Hen (1934), but also states that he was created in 1955? I dont know french, so i can't really read what it says

Sorry, "20th" was a typo; that should obviously be "40th". What the article does is correctly state Donald's debut was overall in March of 1934, but decide to celebrate Donald's anniversary as July 1935, as that was when he was introduced in France.

[TheMidgetMoose]

Oct 10, 2019 3:41:45 GMT Ramapith said:

Oct 9, 2019 20:11:18 GMT deb said:

Donald Duck appeared on the radio in the Hall of Fame radio show in December of 1934, but The Wise Little Hen was released in June of that year. retro-otr.com/2015/12/the-hall-of-fame-the-christmas-stocking-walt-disney-and-friends-341223/

But Donald's first appearance on Hall of Fame came earlier—in March 1934; and for Donald's first two years of "life," that broadcast, and not THE WISE LITTLE HEN, was cited as being Donald's public debut.

As knowledge of the show receded (today, a recording of that episode either doesn't survive or isn't generally available to the public), THE WISE LITTLE HEN took precedence. But there was a time when Disney perceived Donald as having been a radio character first.

Is that the reason why March 13 was given as Donald's birthday in Donald's Happy Birthday, then?

[Ramapith]

Not specifically.

In early 1936, the Disney studio simply decided it would be a fun ongoing publicity stunt to pretend that the ever-unlucky Donald was born on Friday the 13th.

And in 1936, the first available Friday the 13th was in March, so March 13 ended up being celebrated as Donald's birthday from that point onward for years—up to and including 1949, when DONALD'S HAPPY BIRTHDAY was released.

Choosing March 13 made it sort of close to commemorating the 1934 Hall of Fame show introducing Donald, but not quite: that show was broadcast March 4.

In United States dating parlance, March 13 is abbreviated 3/13. I've always suspected (but never confirmed!) that that's why Karp and Taliaferro gave Donald's car its 313 license plate.

Oct 10, 2019 10:43:48 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

I was hoping you might weigh in. Fascinating stuff. Do we know anything more about the contents of the radio show episode in question? Title? Plot?

We don't know if the episode had a special title, but Donald's introduction appears to have been a mixture of gimmicks from his early shorts ORPHANS' BENEFIT (in which Donald recited "Mary Had a Little Lamb") and THE BAND CONCERT (in which Donald kept trying to upstage Mickey on the bandstand). Here's Walt Disney in a 1935 interview, as quoted by JB Kaufman in the recent Mickey history that he and I released through Taschen:

"Mickey and his gang had been asked to broadcast... it meant a lot of extra work for the Mouse, but he decided to oblige. Well, Mickey was up there at the mike doing his stuff, when this duck came along and butted in... He kept crowding up to the mike and trying to recite 'Mary Had a Little Lamb.' Well, you know how Mickey is. Always ready to give a guy a break. But he was afraid that Donald would spoil his broadcast, so he shoved him away, and the duck kept coming back and squawking 'Mary Had a Little Lamb' into the mike..."

[Mesterius]

Oct 11, 2019 0:48:59 GMT Ramapith said:

Not specifically.

In early 1936, the Disney studio simply decided it would be a fun ongoing publicity stunt to pretend that the ever-unlucky Donald was born on Friday the 13th.

And in 1936, the first available Friday the 13th was in March, so March 13 ended up being celebrated as Donald's birthday from that point onward for years—up to and including 1949, when DONALD'S HAPPY BIRTHDAY was released.

Choosing March 13 made it sort of close to commemorating the 1934 Hall of Fame show introducing Donald, but not quite: that show was broadcast March 4.

In United States dating parlance, March 13 is abbreviated 3/13. I've always suspected (but never confirmed!) that that's why Karp and Taliaferro gave Donald's car its 313 license plate.

This is fascinating -- thanks for all the info. I recently watched The Three Caballeros and noticed that Donald's birthday card in the start reads, "Felicitations to Donald Duck on his birthday, Friday 13, from his friends in Latin America". They didn't even bother specifying the month. Then I heard about the date being March 13 in Donald's Happy Birthday. Very interesting to learn that it goes so far back in time... right back to the beginning, in fact.

[LP]

Hello. A duck going by the name of Donald appears in More 'HooZoo' as well as The Adventures of Mickey Mouse. Both seem to be from 1931, meaning that they predate both The Wise Little Hen and the radio show from 1934. However, which one of those came out first? Which one is Donald's true debut?

Here's Donald in More 'Hoozoo':


And here he is in The Adventures of Mickey Mouse:

[TheMidgetMoose]

Jun 5, 2020 11:54:59 GMT LP said:

Hello. A duck going by the name of Donald appears in More 'HooZoo' as well as The Adventures of Mickey Mouse. Both seem to be from 1931, meaning that they predate both The Wise Little Hen and the radio show from 1934. However, which one of those came out first? Which one is Donald's true debut?

Here's Donald in More 'Hoozoo':


And here he is in The Adventures of Mickey Mouse:

I think The Adventures of Mickey Mouse came first. Most sources I've seen say that Mickey's 'Hoozoo' Witswitch, And Wotswot
was published in 1932, not 1931. See INDUCKS and the Disneyville blog, for example. Mickey's Hoozoo derives several elements from The Adventures of Mickey Mouse, such as the character of Claws the Cat, who originated in The Adventures of Mickey Mouse as far as I know. What I would be interested in knowing is if the Donald Duck of radio and cartoon was created with the other Donald Duck in mind. When they decided to hire Clarence Nash to voice a duck character, did they use the name "Donald Duck" for this character because it had been used before, or was it a coincidence that the ducks ended up with the same name?

[LP]

Jun 5, 2020 20:55:54 GMT TheMidgetMoose said:

I think The Adventures of Mickey Mouse came first. Most sources I've seen say that Mickey's 'Hoozoo' Witswitch, And Wotswot
was published in 1932, not 1931. See INDUCKS and the Disneyville blog, for example. Mickey's Hoozoo derives several elements from The Adventures of Mickey Mouse, such as the character of Claws the Cat, who originated in The Adventures of Mickey Mouse as far as I know. What I would be interested in knowing is if the Donald Duck of radio and cartoon was created with the other Donald Duck in mind. When they decided to hire Clarence Nash to voice a duck character, did they use the name "Donald Duck" for this character because it had been used before, or was it a coincidence that the ducks ended up with the same name?

I see! The Disney Wiki page for Dennis the Duck said that More 'HooZoo' was from 1931, so I believed it. 
Since the "Donald Duck" name was repeated at least once before Clarence Nash became involved, I would assume that the name "Donald" was at least semi-established for any potential duck character Disney was about to use. Worth noting is of course that neither The Adventures of Mickey Mouse nor More 'HooZoo' portray Donald as an aggressive and angry duck, which would become some of his defining character traits once Nash started voicing him.

But, hey, if The Adventures of Mickey Mouse is truly Donald's real debut, wouldn't there be some sort of value in finding out when that was first published? The date, I mean. Because that would be Donald's true "birth date". Does anybody know that?