Don Bluth - Early Life and The Disney Years

Early Life and The Disney Years

Bluth was born in El Paso, Texas, the son of Emaline (née Pratt) and Virgil Ronceal Bluth. His great-grandfather was Latter Day Saint leader Helaman Pratt, and 2012 presidential candidate Mitt Romney is his (half) second cousin. He is of English, Scottish and German descent. At the age of six his family moved to Payson, Utah where he lived on a family farm. In 1954 at the age of 17 his family moved to Santa Monica, California, where he attended his final year of high school. Bluth attended Brigham Young University in Utah for one year and after got a job at The Walt Disney Company. He started in 1955 as an assistant to John Lounsbery for Sleeping Beauty. In 1957 Bluth left Disney only two years after being hired. Afterwards Bluth spent two-and-a-half years in Argentina on a mission for the LDS Church. He returned to the United States where he opened the Bluth Brothers Theater along with his younger brother Fred, though he occasionally worked with Disney. Bluth returned to college where he got a degree in English Literature from Brigham Young. Bluth returned to animation business and joined Filmation in 1967 where he worked on layouts for The Archies and other projects. He returned full-time to Disney in 1971 where he worked on Robin Hood, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too, The Rescuers and directing animation on Pete's Dragon. His last involvement with Disney was the 1978 short The Small One. Then he went on to make and produce his first short, Banjo the Woodpile Cat (1979), which takes place in his hometown Payson, Utah during the 1940s as Banjo travels to Salt Lake City to find the urban world.