12 Things You Didn't Know About Mickey Mouse
It all started with a mouse.
In 1928 Mickey Mouse burst into pop culture lexicon with his debut on-screen performance in Steamboat Willie and the plucky fella has never looked back, now boasting over 130 film credits to his name.
The brain child of Walt Disney and his animator partner Ub Iwerks, Mickey was supposed to replace Oswald the Lucky Rabbit character after he was lost to Universal.
Apparently inspired by a tame mouse that lived at Disney's Laugh-O-Gram Studios, Mickey Mouse was drawn by Iwerks using only circles to keep the animation as simple as possible.
Star of his own comic strips, merchandise and tv shows Mickey has since become the undeniable face of the Disney corporation, but how much do you actually know about the Mouse that started it all?
12. Mickey Wasn't Always His Name
The world's most famous mouse was never intended to be called Mickey.
When Walt Disney originally came up with the idea for a cartoon mouse, his name was to be Mortimer. Walt's wife Lillian convinced him that Mortimer wasn't the right name for him and eventually they settled on Mickey.
Mickey Rooney claimed that Walt Disney told him that the character was actually named after him. There have been many who have refuted this, including Disney historian Jim Korkis in his book "Who's Afraid of the Song of the South".