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a genius in plenty of other respects. In business, his greatest  
skills were his insight and his management ability. After setting himself up in  
Hollywood, he single-handedly pioneered the concepts of branding and  
merchandising — something his company still does brilliantly today.  
  
   But what really distinguished Disney was his ability to identify with his  
audiences. Disney always made sure his films championed the “ little guy ” , and  
made him feel proud to be American. This he achieved by creating characters that  
reflected the hopes and fears of ordinary people. Some celebrated American  
achievements — Disney’s very first cartoon Plane Crazy, featuring a silent  
Mickey Mouse, was inspired by Charles Lindbergh’s flight across the Atlantic.  
Others, like the There Little Pigs and Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, showed  
how, through hard work and helping one’s fellow man, or Americans could survive  
social and economic crises like the Great Depression.  
  
   Disney’s other great virtue was the fact that his company — unlike other big  
corporations — had a human face. His Hollywood studio — the public heard —  
operated just like a democracy, where everyone was on firstname terms and had a  
say in how things should be run. He was also regarded as a great patriot because  
not only did his cartoons celebrate America, but, during World War II, studios  
made training films for American soldiers.  
  
   The reality, of course, was less idyllic. As the public would later learn,  
Disney’s patriotism had an unpleasant side. After a strike by cartoonists in  
1941, he became convinced that Hollywood had been infiltrated by Communists. He  
agreed to work for the FBI as a mole, identifying and spying on;colleagues whom  
he suspected were subversives.  
  
   But, apart from his affiliations with the FBI, Disney was more or less the  
genuine article. A new book, The Magic Kingdom; Walt Disney and the American Way  
of Life, by Steven Watts, confirms that he was very definitely on the side of  
ordinary Americans — in the 30s and 40s he voted for Franklin Roosevelt,  
believing he was a champion of the workers. Also, Disney was not an apologist  
for the FBI, as some have suggested. In fact, he was always suspicious of large,  
bureaucratic organizations, as is evidenced in films like That Darned Cat, in  
which he portrayed FBI agents as bungling incompetents.  
  
   By the time he died in 1966, Walt Disney was an icon like Thomas Edison and  
the Wright Brothers. To business people and filmmakers, he was a role model; to  
the public at large, he was “ Uncle Walt ”— the man who had entertained them all  
their lives, the man who represented them all their lives, the man who  
represented all that was good about America.  
  
86. Walt Disney is believed to possess the followi本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。