Cinderella Through the Decades

I follow This Day in History, watching for events that relate to my historical novels. Every once in a while, I learn something that finds its way into my novels. The information also provides fodder for blog posts, such as this one.

Most of what I learn has nothing to do with my novels, but I find it interesting, or it triggers a memory. For example, on February 15 I learned that on that date in 1950, Walt Disney’s animated feature Cinderella had its debut in theaters across the U.S. 

That surprised me. I remembered waiting with great excitement for Cinderella to open in my hometown of Richland, Washington, and I wasn’t even born yet in 1950.

Then I read on—the movie was re-released every few years, as the Disney Studios usually did with their films. Re-releases came in 1957, 1965, 1973, 1981, and 1987.

I was still too young for movies in 1957, so it must have been the 1965 release that I anticipated so eagerly. In 1965, I would have been nine years old. By today’s standards, that might be a little old for cartoon fairy tales. But in the mid-1960s in small-town America, I would have been an ideal age to see the movie.

I didn’t have a Cinderella doll like I had a Mary Poppins doll. But I remember coloring in a Cinderella coloring book. I enjoyed coloring Cinderella and the other human characters (even the ugly stepsisters) in their gowns. I didn’t mind coloring the fairy godmother, but I thought the mice were stupid. I wasn’t much into fantasy, even as a child.

Not only do I remember the coloring book, but I remember coloring in it with my mother. Mother rarely sat down to play with her children. But one afternoon she took the time to color with me.

Mother hadn’t seen the Cinderella movie either, and she was probably as eager to see it as I was. While we colored, she recounted her fears upon seeing Snow White when she was a child—she would have been four in 1937 when it was first released, and eleven in 1944 when it was first re-released, so she probably saw it in 1944.

Cinderella was not a scary film, not nearly as scary as Snow White, which I later saw on its re-release in 1967 (coincidentally, I was eleven that year, as my mother had been when she saw the movie).

My sister also had a Cinderella coloring book, and I colored in it with her. She was too young to see the movie with us in 1965, so she most likely saw it in 1973 when she was nine.

And I’m pretty sure my daughter had a Cinderella coloring book as well. Like my mother, I didn’t often color with my kids. I kept their coloring books in my office to occupy my kids while I worked on weekends. When my husband had drilling weekends with the Naval Reserve, I had to take the kids to my office. They hated it, and the coloring books were not much of a treat. They preferred using the copying machine if a secretary was in the office also, or playing Tetris on a computer once PCs were available in the office.

Cinderella VHS tape cover

I don’t recall if my kids went to see Cinderella in 1987 when it was released again. My son would have been five and old enough, but my daughter would only have been two, and she did not like Disney movies. They were too scary for her—she took after my mother in this regard. She made me leave the theater with her during The Little Mermaid, which came out in 1989 when she was four.

But at some point around 1988, Disney released Cinderella on VHS tape. After that, there was less rational for re-releasing the theater version.

Shortly after my daughter was born, we were given a videocassette player. My husband and I made regular trips to Blockbuster to rent movies from that time forward. It was a lot cheaper than a babysitter. At some point in her early years, my daughter received a copy of the Cinderella videotape, so I know she has seen the movie.

What movies has your family enjoyed through the generations?