Adolph Hitler Loved Snow White and Mickey Mouse

Strange to put these two in the same title but there is a connection between the two. In 1937, Hitler was in charge of the German government and held a Christmas party for his closest friends. It was at that party that he received seven gifts that had connections to Walt Disney. His comrades knew his affinity for Walt Disney and his cast of characters. It was at this party he received his copy of Snow White. Later it is reported that it became his favorite movie.

I just have to say that a visual of Hitler in Mickey Mouse ears is difficult to conjure up. But he admired Mickey and the many cartoon characters from Walt Disney Productions. We’re talking about one of the evilest people to have ever lived on this earth here. This is kind of a touchy subject, to say the least. So to think that he liked Disney stuff just as much as we do, if not more, may be an uncomfortable subject for some. Perhaps we can be resolute in the fact that Hitler failed as an artist outright. The Vienna Academy of Fine Arts thought that he was just terrible, so they rejected him — twice.

The world could have been a better place if he was a better artist. If the school would have accepted him then World War II would likely have not happened.

William Hakvaag, the director of a war museum in northern Norway, said he found the drawings hidden in a painting signed “A. Hitler” that he bought at an auction in Germany. The colored cartoons included sketches of characters from the 1937 Disney film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which were signed A.H., and an unsigned sketch of Pinocchio from the 1940 Disney film.

Here is an article from the New York Times about some of Hitler’s paintings being sold at auction in 2009.

Three paintings attributed to Hitler sold for a total of $60,000 at Weidler’s auction house in Nuremberg, Germany, on Saturday, Reuters reported. The works, watercolor depictions of cottages, mills and churches nestled in rural landscapes are believed to date from the years around 1910 when Hitler was a struggling artist in Vienna. The auctioneer, Herbert Weidler, described them as “of rather modest quality.” Still, three separate phone bidders bought the paintings. “Weissenkirchen in der Wachau,” below (the name of a town in Austria), sold for about $34,000, “Zerschossene Mühle” (“Bullet-Riddled Mill”) for roughly $15,000, and “Haus mit Brücke am Fluss” (“House With Bridge on a River”) for almost $10,000. Weidler’s sold two other watercolors credited to Hitler this year for $45,530, according The Boston Globe, and in April 13 paintings attributed to him were sold for $143,000 at a British auction house. Though the authenticity of the many works associated with Hitler has been debated, experts estimate that about 720 of his paintings and sketches are in existence.

The opinions in this blog belong to Tom Knuppel