Les Clark
| Les Clark | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born |
Leslie James Clark November 17, 1907 Ogden, Utah, U.S. |
| Died | September 12, 1979 (aged 71) Santa Barbara, California, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Cancer |
| Occupation | Animator |
| Known for | One of Disney's Nine Old Men |
| Spouse(s) | Miriam Lauritzen (m. ?; div. 1952) Georgia Vester (m. 1967) |
| Children | 2 Richard Boone Clark |
Leslie James "Les" Clark (November 17, 1907 – September 12, 1979) was the first of Disney's Nine Old Men. Joining Disney in 1927, he was the only one to work on the origins of Mickey Mouse with Ub Iwerks.
Walt Disney complimented Les on the lettering he made for the menus on the mirrors at the candy store. Two years later in 1927, about to graduate from Venice High School, Disney hired him.
Clark graduated from high school on a Thursday and reported to work the following Monday, February 23, 1927. By the time he retired in 1975, Les Clark was a senior animator and director, and the "longest continuously employed member of Walt Disney Productions."
For his first six months he operated the animation camera, then spent a subsequent six months as an inker-painter, tracing hundreds of animation drawings onto sheets of clear celluloid acetate ("cels") in ink with a crow-quill pen and painted them on the reverse side with opaque colors (black, white, and gray only, in the pre-Technicolor days). Ub Iwerks, who became Clark's mentor, was the studio's top animator.
Ub Iwerks animated Steamboat Willie at his usual breakneck speed (it was completed in two months), Clark assisted by in-betweening drawings, and Wilfred Jackson animated a brief scene of Minnie Mouse running along a riverbank.
To handle the increased production load, Walt began recruiting experienced New Yorks animators; Ben Sharpsteen, Burt Gillett, Jack King, and Norman Ferguson ("Fergy") who arrived at the studio between March and August 1929.
Les Clark's debut as an animator came in the first Silly Symphony, The Skeleton Dance (delivered on May 10, 1929): a scene of a skeleton playing the ribs of a bony buddy like a xylophone.
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