Les Clark

Leslie James "Les" Clark 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.
==Working with Disney==
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, Clark got up the nerve to ask Walt for a job. "Bring some of your drawings in and let's see what they look like," he recalled Walt saying. At the Hyperion studio in the Silver Lake area east of Hollywood, Clark showed his samples, which he admitted were freehand copies of cartoons in College Humor. Walt admired his "swift, deft" graphic line and hired him.
Clark graduated from high school on a Thursday and jubilantly reported to work the following Monday, February 23, 1927, though Walt warned him "it might just be a temporary job." The "temporary" job lasted nearly half a century.
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."
Disney's job offer changed Clark's life. Throughout his lengthy career he repaid Walt with loyalty and a dogged striving to improve his work. In return, he gained a knowledge of the animation business from the ground up. During Clark's first year at the studio, he happily toiled in the industry's lowest entry-level positions: for his first six months he operated the animation camera, then spent a subsequent six months as an inker-painter. That is, he traced 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 those pre-Technicolor days). Clark entered animation at a pivotal time and participated in events that shaped not only Disney's future but the history of the art form itself. When he arrived, the Alice Comedies were winding down and a series starring a new character named Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was beginning. Ub Iwerks, who became Clark's mentor, was the studio's top animator, capable of turning out large numbers of cleverly animated drawings each day.
===Animation===
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 York 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.
Clark's draftsmanship and versatility as a personality animator developed way beyond what Ub Iwerks was capable of but echoes of the magical, cartoony Iwerks always remained in Clark's work. A charming example is the little train to Baia in The Three Caballeros (1945), chugging and puffing on crayon rails to a bouncy samba beat through stylized jungle landscapes.
==Gallery==
===Character Gallery===
Fantasia-disneyscreencaps.com-3300.jpg|Mickey Mouse
Minnie-kiss.png|link=Minnie Mouse|Minnie Mouse
Snowwhite-disneyscreencaps com-6106.jpg|The Seven Dwarfs
Pinocchio-disneyscreencaps.com-5608.jpg|Pinocchio
Dumbo-disneyscreencaps.com-6864.jpg|Dumbo
Profile - Timothy Q. Mouse.jpg|link=Timothy Mouse|Timothy Mouse
Jhonny Fedora.jpg|link=Johnny Fedora|Johnny Fedora
Golden Harp.png|link=Golden Harp|The Singing Harp
Bumble Boogie - Bumblebee.jpg|Bumble
Cinderella-disneyscreencaps.com-4672.jpg|Cinderella
Alice-in-wonderland-disneyscreencaps.com-8664.jpg|Alice
Littlehouse.jpg|The Little House
Peter-pan-disneyscreencaps.com-1129.jpg|Peter Pan
Peter-pan-disneyscreencaps.com-179.jpg|Wendy Darling
Tink-in-peterpan-5.jpg|Tinker Bell
Tramp-disneyscreencaps com-50.jpg|Lady as a puppy
Jim dear by mileymouse101 dd98eye-pre.jpg|link=Jim Dear|Jim Dear
Paul Bunyan 1.jpg|Paul Bunyan
Sleeping-beauty-disneyscreencaps.com-4287.jpg|Aurora
Clipfairies21.gif|Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather
101dalmatians 150.jpg|Anita Radcliffe
DalmatianPuppies.jpg|Dalmatian Puppies
Rogerpongo3.gif|Pongo and Roger Radcliffe
12largesymposium.jpg|Ludwig Von Drake
Clipwart.gif|link=Arthur Pendragon|Arthur Pendragon
===Miscellaneous===
Silly Symphony unit 1929.jpg
The disney bowling team.jpg|The Disney Bowling Team: Standing, from left: Clark, Ben SharpsteenKneeling, from left: Merle Gilson, Ub Iwerks, Johnny Cannon
Disney staff 1930 (2).jpg|Standing: Cannon, Wilfred Jackson, Clark, Jack CuttingKneeling, from left: Iwerks, Walt Disney, Carl Stalling
Disney staff in January 1930.jpg|Left to Right: W. Disney, Stalling, Sharpsteen, Iwerks, Clark, Burt Gillett, Cannon, Jackson, and (standing) Jack King
Disney staff in January 1930 (2).jpg|Standing, from left: Clark, King, Sharpsteen, Cutting, Gillett, Iwerks, Win Smith, Jackson, William Cottrell, Floyd GottfredsonKneeling, from left, Dick Lundy, Charles Byrne, Carlos Manriquez, Norman Ferguson, Merle Gilson, Chuck Couch, Carl Stalling, Johnny Cannon, W. Disney
Disney staff 1931 (1).jpg|Standing from left: Edmond Seward, Frank Churchill, Otto Englander, Sharpsteen, Bert Lewis, Gilles "Frenchy" de Tremaudan, Clark, Rudy Zamora, Jackson, King, Tom Palmer, Cutting (behind Palmer), Cannon, Ferguson, Webb SmithSeated, from left: David Hand, Ted Sears, Lundy, Gillett, W. Disney
Disney staff 1931 (2).jpg|1931; Standing from left: Smith, Seward, Englander, Zamora, Hand, Palmer, Cutting, W. Disney, Churchill, Cannon, SharpsteenSeated from left: King, Lundy, Sears, Ferguson, de Tremaudan, Jackson, Clark, Gillett, Lewis
Huemer1973.jpg|Left to Right: Dick Huemer with his Mousecar award in February 1973 at the Penthouse Club, Cutting, Bill Cottrell, and Clark
File:SleepingBeauty1959BehindTheScenesPhoto17.jpg|Clark and Grace Bailey examining a color model cel of Briar Rose from Sleeping Beauty.
==External Links==
*
nl:Les Clark
pt-br:Les Clark
Category:Males
Category:1900s births
Category:1970s deaths
Category:Deceased
Category:People from Utah
Category:American people
Category:Animators
Category:Mickey Mouse
Category:Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Category:Pinocchio
Category:Fantasia
Category:Dumbo
Category:Bambi
Category:Saludos Amigos
Category:The Three Caballeros
Category:Song of the South
Category:Make Mine Music
Category:So Dear to My Heart
Category:Melody Time
Category:Fun and Fancy Free
Category:Alice in Wonderland
Category:Peter Pan
Category:Lady and the Tramp
Category:Ben and Me
Category:Paul Bunyan
Category:Sleeping Beauty
Category:101 Dalmatians
Category:The Sword in the Stone
Category:Robin Hood
Category:The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
Category:Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color
Category:Annie Award Winner
Category:Disney Legends
Category:Walt Disney Animation Studios