February 1 - Jimmy MacDonald

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On this day, in 1991, John James MacDonald passed away in his home in Glendale, California from heart failure. Born on May 19, 1906, Jimmy and his parents emigrated to America when he was one month old. After a fifteen day voyage across the Atlantic (I can only imagine how nerve wracking that was with a newborn) the family settled in Pennsylvania. As a young man, Jimmy showed an aptitude for music, especially the drums. He wound up getting a job as a musician on the Dollar Steamship Line (now known as American President Lines). Through his contacts there, he began performing on the recordings for the cartoons made by the Walt Disney Studio. In 1934, Jimmy became one of two people in Disney's newly formed Sound Effects Department, a job he would hold for the next 42 years.

Jimmy was a master at finding ways to produce the sounds that were needed for any given situation. Sometimes it was something as simple as flopping down in a chair in someone's office, liking the creaking noise the chair produced and commandeering the chair for his department. Other times Jimmy had to create gadgets in his workshop to get the sound he was looking for. He would build thousands of noise makers over the years to give life to everything from Evenrude's unique buzz in The Rescuers to the sound of the forest fire that take's the life of Bambi's mother.

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Early on in his tenure with Disney, Jimmy began providing voices as well as sound effects. As he put it, the studio could save money by not hiring actors since he was already there and getting paid anyways. It started out with some laughter here and a few barks there. Eventually he just kept getting asked if he could voice something particular, he'd say I don't know, they'd have him try it and he was usually great. For instance, during the long production process on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, it was decided at one point to have the dwarfs yodel during their party song. Jimmy was sent into the recording booth to test out a whole bunch of different yodels. Some professional yodelers were brought in for the official soundtrack. When a bunch of changes were made to the scene, rather than bring the professionals in and pay them again, Jimmy was sent back into the booth to record the new stuff. This sort of versatility lead to continuously bigger roles.

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The story of how Jimmy landed his biggest role is just as casual. While production was going on for Mickey and the Beanstalk, a short that eventually became part of Fun and Fancy Free, the crew called Walt in to record Mickey's lines. Walt claimed that he just didn't have time for this sort of thing anymore (although his smoking habit was making it increasingly difficult to produce Mickey's falsetto) and they should just call Jimmy. Someone did and said Walt needed to see him. Jimmy tried to think of what he'd done all the way to Walt's office. When he got there, Walt asked him if he'd ever tried to do Mickey. Jimmy said of course not. Walt said give it a try right now. Jimmy worked up his best Mouse and said "Hi Walt, how are you?" Walt said sounds good, gave him a few pointers and sent him off to the booth. He would be the voice of the Boss until 1977.

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There have been plenty of other times you've heard Jimmy. For features, he did both Jacques and GusGus in Cinderella, the Dormouse in Alice in Wonderland, the wolf in Sword in the Stone and the hyena in Bedknobs and Broomsticks. In shorts, he played all sorts of animals, from Delores the Elephant to Humphrey the Bear. He only appeared twice in live action parts. He was the Circus Band Drummer in 1960's Toby Tyler and he is seen in silhouette as the timpani player in Fantasia. Outside of work he joined Ward Kimball's jazz band, the Firehouse Five Plus Two, as their drummer.

Image copyright Disney

Fans of the Monster Sound Show, the original sound effects show at the Disney-MGM Studios, might remember seeing Jimmy. The pre-show that played in the queue area was a piece he did with David Letterman, showcasing many of the homemade noise makers he'd made over the years. He even did a little bit of Mickey, even though by that point he'd handed those reigns over to Wayne Allwine (who also started out as a sound effect man). Jimmy had officially retired from the company in 1977. And by retired, I mean there was often several weeks in a row when he didn't come into the studio to consult on a project. In fact, when he passed away fourteen years later, he was preparing sounds that would be used in Splash Mountain. In 1993, Jimmy was posthumously declared an official Disney Legend, even though he was truly one of the few people who are widely regarded as such long before their final curtain.