Childhood Interupted

The lives of Walt Disney and J.R.R. Tolkien share some interesting similarities.

Both men's lives took place during the same historical period.  Each served in France during the First World War.    Both were loving parents whose most important ideas came as they tried to entertain their own children.

Tolkien and Disney share one other very interesting similarity.  In fact, both men pointed to it as one of their primary sources of inspiration.

When Tolkien's father died in South Africa, his mother and brother lived for a while in Sarehole.  This English town (now incorporated into Birmingham) had a river mill and expansive countryside.  Tolkien and his brother Hillary spent many idyllic days roaming the countryside.  It was looking back on this period in his life that inspired Middle Earth.

Walt Disney also had a memorable childhood period.  As a young boy, his family moved to Marceline, Missouri.  It was there that he enjoyed the freedom of the countryside and the enchantment of farm animals.  He had a favorite tree on the property which he referred to as the "Wishing Tree."  He delighted in going there to look at the sky and pass the hours.  He would take other members of the family there and regale them with tales of his imagination.

Unfortunately for both men, their Edenic experiences ended abruptly.  Tolkien's Mother's family was angered by her conversion to Catholicism and stopped supporting her, and she was forced to move into the city.  Disney's Father decided that there were better things to be had in Kansas City, and Walt was immediately forced as a young boy to take on the rigors of a paper route to help support the family in their new urban home.

This shared interruption of childhood seems to have forced their imaginations to go into a sort of hibernation.  When their circumstances got better in adulthood and they were stimulated by their children, their sleeping creativity blossomed with the power of maturity.

The rest is a fearless storytelling by adult men that captures the power of a child's imagination.

It was a hard experience for Tolkien and Disney to lose their Eden, but the rest of the world is richer for it.