NONFICTION - Sept. 8, 1996

DISNEY A TO Z: THE OFFICIAL ENCYCLOPEDIA By Dave Smith (Hyperion: $29.95, 564 pp.). Disneyophiles will applaud this comprehensive volume by Dave Smith, the director of Walt Disney Archives for 25 years. It has more than 6,500 entries and several hundred black-and-white and color photos, among them a colorful 1937 Mickey Mouse Magazine cover.

Although Walt Disney made zillions with his creation of Mickey Mouse in 1928 with his colleague Ub Iwerks, fans can learn that he almost called him Mortimer but his wife Lillian persuaded her husband to name his about-to-be-famous mouse Mickey. It is hard to find that fact in Disney A to Z, though, unless you already know it. It is not listed under the history of Mickey Mouse, but under Mortimer Mouse.

Interestingly, Disney’s first animated cartoons were not of his star Mickey but of earlier cartoon characters produced by Disney’s first company, Laugh-O-Gram Films in Kansas City. When Laugh-O-Gram failed, Disney and his brother Roy came to California and started the Walt Disney Co. in 1928. The rest, obviously, is history.

Famous actors and actresses are categorized alphabetically in their association with Walt Disney Studios, but it does seem a little strange to see such celebrities as Agnes Moorehead, Paul Newman, Dustin Hoffman, David Niven, Glenn Ford and Jason Robards with only Disney films to their credit.

There’s a mention of Disney’s acquisition of 25% of the California Angels baseball team in 1995 but no note of Disney’s addition of cheerleaders dancing on the dugouts. And certainly no mention of current boycotts of Disney films by religious conservatives and Arab Americans.