8 great Walt Disney quotes about Mickey Mouse

When Walt Disney spoke about Mickey Mouse it was often like a parent talking about their child.

Mickey made his debut on Nov. 18, 1928, but his birth, as many know, took place when Walt was on a train returning to California. 

Disney has often explained Mickey’s personality as one created to help people laugh.

Here are eight quotes and stories about Mickey from Walt:

1. “Mickey Mouse is to me, a symbol of independence. He was a means to an end. He popped out of Manhattan to Hollywood at a time when business fortunes of my brother Roy and myself were at lowest ebb and disaster seemed right around the corner. Born of necessity, the little fellow literally freed us of immediate worry. He provided the means for extending our organization to its present dimensions and for extending the medium of cartoon animation to new entertainment levels. He spelled production liberation for us.”  – Walt Disney

2.  “All we ever intended for him or expected of him was that he should continue to make people everywhere chuckle with him and at him. We didn’t burden him with any social symbolism, we made him no mouthpiece for frustrations or harsh satire. Mickey was simply a little personality assigned to the purposes of laughter.” – Walt Disney

3. “The life and ventures of Mickey Mouse have been closely bound up with my own personal and professional life.” – Walt Disney

4. “It is understandable that I should have sentimental attachment for the little personage who played so big a part in the course of Disney Productions and has been so happily accepted as an amusing friend wherever films are shown around the world. He sill speaks for me and I still speak for him.” – Walt Disney

5. “When people laugh at Mickey Mouse it’s because he’s so human; and that is the secret of his popularity.” – Walt Disney

6. “We felt that the public, and especially the children, like animals that are cute and little. I think we are rather indebted to Charlie Chaplin for the idea. We wanted something appealing, and we thought a tiny bit of a mouse that would have something of the wistfulness of Chaplin- a little fellow trying to do the best he could.” – Walt Disney

7. “Mickey Mouse popped out of my mind onto a drawing pad 20 years ago on a train ride from Manhattan to Hollywood at a time when business fortunes of my brother Roy and myself were at lowest ebb and disaster seemed right around the corner.” – Walt Disney

8. “I often find myself surprised at what has been said about our redoubtable little Mickey, who was never really a mouse not yet wholly a man – although always recognizably human.

Psycho-analysts have probed him. Wise men have pondered him. Columnists have kidded him. Admirers have saluted him. The League of Nations gave him a special medal as a symbol of international good will. Hitler was infuriated by him and thunderingly forbade his people to wear the then popular Mickey Mouse lapel button in place of the Swastika.

But all we ever intended for him was that he should make people everywhere chuckle with him and at him. ” -Walt Disney