Ed Parks - Crew

Ed Parks was born to Edwin Rose Parks "the first" and Rosabel Mosley Parks of Waterbury, Connecticut. His father died in the 1919 flu epidemic, leaving Ed to be raised single-handedly by his mother, Rosabel (Rosa). He attended Driggs Grammar School in Waterbury, and developed an early talent for drawing, as well as an interest in aeronautics. He and his mother moved to Watertown when Ed was in Junior High, and he then attended Watertown High School (Connecticut). He was encouraged by his art teacher, H. Louise Johnson, to paint a mural in the High School basement gymnasium. The mural was an idealized history of the world, from the dinosaurs through present civilization. Around this time, he received his first freelance art job--drawing a small concept sketch for the patent papers of the very first Mickey Mouse watch, made by the Ingersoll Watch Company, of Waterbury. After high school, he attended Yale University Art School, with the idea of being a mural painter. During this time, he answered an ad posted on a bulletin board, "Disney Needs Artists." This soon led to his moving to California and a job at Disney, at the original Hyperion studio location, and then at the "new" (present) studio in Burbank. As did many animators, he began as an in-betweener, then as an assistant, and spent many years as an effects animator before moving into character animation on both features and many short subjects.