Thank You Walt Disney, Inc. has received a $2 million grant to help bring what was once Walt Disney’s Laugh-O-Gram Studio back to life. The grant was announced by U.S. House Rep. Emanuel Cleaver.
Cleaver, the former mayor of Kansas City said that the city has to do everything it can to honor one of its most famous former residents.
“I think it would be malfeasant if Kansas City did not have some visible tribute to one of its most significant citizens,” Cleaver said.
Walt Disney originally opened the Laugh-O-Gram cartoon studio at 31stand Troost on June 28, 1921. The studio would remain in business there until November 20, 1923.
Eventually Walt Disney moved on to California and would found what became The Walt Disney Company, which is now celebrating its 100th anniversary.
Thank You Walt Disney, Inc has said it has the following plans for the building:
It’s time for the next chapter of the Disney Laugh-O-gram story. It is time to completely restore the building and equip it for its new purpose: to tell the story of Walt’s Kansas City animation legacy and as an inspirational center for innovation in digital media entrepreneurship and education.
The Board of Directors of Thank You Walt Disney believes this project can be transformational by:
• providing a state-of-the-art teaching facility for the K.C. metropolitan digital media industry in cooperation with digiSTORY KC (see: https://vimeo.com/193707406 and fifteen Kansas and Missouri colleges and universities,
• recreating Laugh-O-gram’s offices and exhibits to honor Walt Disney and his fellow animators
• unlocking economic growth with entrepreneur-driven economic development via a partnership with Plexpod
• offering a theatre and lecture hall for the appreciation of animation and the attraction of national and international expertise in cooperation with Kansas City’s Screenland Theatres,
• stimulating hope, training and redevelopment to a historically distressed community that has recently made major strides in redevelopment
• drawing on the power of Disney to cement our reputation as a fountain for global entrepreneurship and an inspiration to future Kansas City artists and entrepreneurs.
Our culture has enjoyed the fruits of Walt Disney’s imagination in so many ways. It’s time for Laugh-Ogram to be the home for imagination and innovation once again. Please help us restore Walt’s Kansas City dream and allow Laugh-O-gram Studio to become the Midwest region’s digital media hub.
What do you think about this $2 million grant for Thank You Walt Disney, Inc.? Are you excited to see what becomes of it? Share your thoughts and opinions in the comments below!
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