Discover how Disney toys shaped the company, the industry, and the world through behind-the-scenes stories and over 500 enchanting photos and rare artwork. The Walt Disney Company has enjoyed a unique and creative relationship with the toy industry for nearly a century. Disney and toys have gone together since the very beginning, back to the 1930s when Walt's love for toy trains inspired a dream for a life-size train to carry guests around a theme park.
Walt Disney's sense of play as a young boy led to his theme park creations, which would come to provide a much-needed boost to America's flailing manufacturing sector at the height of the Great Depression. In the decades that followed, toys became a catalyst for many future innovations, inside and outside the toy manufacturing arena, and established the importance of toys in marketing and merchandising. Walt's passion for model trains ultimately expanded the horizons of entertainment, giving birth to the modern theme park. Toys also played a key role in funding his theme park construction and provided inspiration for future enhancements like Audio-Animatronics figures.
In
The Art and History of Disney Toys, Disney employee and author Alex Miller takes us through the decades and into the modern era, to highlight the best, the most innovative, and even the most unusual Disney toys in this beautiful, photo-filled, full-color book that will delight Disney fans and toy collectors and anyone looking to add childlike joy into their lives.
