Dreams Versus Dollars

Almost everyone is familiar with the name Walt Disney.  Many fewer have heard of his brother Roy.  But it could be argued that without Roy, Walt would not be known at all.

Walt was the creative imagination behind the studios that bear his name.  It was his artistic vision that guided its work during his lifetime.  He also on more than one occasion nearly spent the entire company into bankruptcy pursuing his ideas.

Walt was a dreamer who was always thinking about the next big thing he was going to accomplish.  He never really spent much time thinking about the cost of his visions only their execution.  He was in the business of thinking big.

This is of course the recipe for greatness and at the same time for destruction.  While Walt was able to execute groundbreaking advances in film and amusement parks, he more than once mortgaged everything he had to produce them.

Thankfully, Walt had his faithful older brother Roy who got him out of any number of scrapes during his life.  Roy was the numbers man in the operation.  He continually urged caution and prudence.  As the chief financial officer of the company, he was the one who had to balance the ledgers and figure out how, and if, Walt's dreams could be afforded.

Without Roy, Walt would have been a huckster riding from town to town promising more than he could deliver.  With Roy, Walt's visions became reality.

There is a lesson in this partnership.  There is a balance between dreams and dollars.  The Disney brothers didn't let Walt's dreams die because of financial constraints nor did they let Walt's dreams destroy the company that they had built.

Roy and Walt's relationship was strained at times as Walt would push beyond Roy's comfort.  In fact, Roy had a peace pipe on the wall of his office that Walt presented him after one protracted feud.  They were brothers and that kept them together and helped them accomplish more than anyone would have expected from the two small town boys who came to Hollywood with little in their pockets other than their own personal strengths.  The dreamer and the doer.  Together they changed everything.