Honoring Walt Disney: Kansas City studio museum closer to reality
KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - The dream of restoring Walt Disney’s Laugh-O-Gram studio is closer to becoming a reality.
That dream began 20 years ago for the studio located a block east of 31st and Troost. It’s the same studio that helped kickstart the Hollywood legend’s career.
Today, the minds behind the reimagining celebrated an important milestone and released conceptual images. The eventual plan is for immersive exhibits in Disney’s original office space to be ed by a theater and lecture hall.
“This is no Mickey Mouse town,” joked U.S. Representative Emanuel Cleaver during a ceremony Thursday during which he signed the construction contract to restore the facade.
A $2 million federal grant and roughly $500,000 in private donations have the project nearing the halfway point of its fundraising goal. You could even say the decades-long effort is finally building steam.
“It is a demonstration that 31st and Troost has produced some of the great people from our city, and will continue to do so in the future, instead of all the things I hear about dividing lines and, ‘Oh, it’s not good, it’s not great,’” said Butch Rigby. “You know what it is? It’s a fantastic part of our city and this is going to be one of the anchors.”
Rigby is the founder of the non-profit that’s spent decades pushing to preserve the building where Disney made the first movie mixing live actors with animation. He left the studio -- and Kansas City -- 101 years ago after running out of money.
The building was falling apart and about to be torn down about 20 years ago, back when Congressman Cleaver was Mayor Cleaver. At Rigby’s request, he put a halt to the demolition and Rigby raised the money needed to keep it from collapsing.
Cleaver lived just a few blocks away at the time and didn’t know the significance of the building until Rigby told him.
“I grew up looking at his cartoon,” Cleaver said Thursday, “and the biggest day of the week for me was Saturday morning, because that’s when we looked at the Walt Disney cartoons.”
In 2012, when Rigby had a two-year timeline to make the museum and education center happen, he said they would “have a little animation lab and studio,” when pitching the project.
But good things can take time.
“Let me tell you something. Walt Disney tried many, many times before he actually succeeded,” Rigby said. “And as he said, it’s the struggles that make you a success.”
In all, the development needs just over $4 million more to complete the project. Donations of $5,000 or more will get you a 50% tax credit on your Missouri income tax. Donations can be made at ThankYouWaltDisney.org.
Correction: A previous version of this report, based on a presentation from the organization’s founder, incorrectly indicated a 50% Missouri sales tax credit applies to donations of $10,000. The credit, in fact, applies to donations of $5,000 or more.
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