Who were Disney's Nine Old Men? I run down the careers of the influential animators. This installment honours John Lounsbery.

Walt Disney called his inner circle of animators his "Nine Old Men." These were the best of the best, the ones he trusted the most. Although there were many brilliant artists at Disney, such as Tom Oreb and Eyvind Earle, the Nine Old Men were the animators that Walt trusted implicitly to get the job done, and do it even better than he could.

John Lounsbery (March 9, 1911 - February 13, 1976) developed a loose, organic style that epitomized the animator's technique of "squash and stretch." His work can best be seen in the dancing alligator for the "Dance of the Hours" sequence in Fantasia, the militaristic elephants in The Jungle Book, and Sgt. Tibs the cat in 101 Dalmations. He co-directed Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too!, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and The Rescuers.

John Lounsbery: Master of "squash and stretch"

John Mitchell Lounsbery was born on March 9, 1911 in Cincinnati, Ohio, the youngest of three sons. Shortly after he was born, the family moved to Colorado, where John first started drawing.

After graduating high school, Lounsbery attended the Art Institute of Denver. Moving to California, he started working as a commercial artist while attending classes at the Art Center School of Design. It was there that one of his instructors noticed Lounsbery's talented draughtsmanship, and told him that Walt Disney Studios was hiring.

Lounsbery joined Disney in July 2, 1935. He first started working on various "Pluto" shorts, and helped Norm Ferguson animate the Witch in 1937's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. By 1940, Lounsbery was a full animator, creating J. Worthington Foulfellow and Gideon on Pinocchio, and Ben Ali Gator in the "Dance of the Hours" segment for Fantasia.

He jumped to animation director for 1941's Dumbo, the movie that literally saved Disney after the financial disaster that was Fantasia. He also animated Timothy the faithful mouse during the flick.

Lounsbery continued working on various shorts during World War II, including "Springtime for Pluto," "Private Pluto" and the the infamous "Chicken Little" short, with its downbeat ending. He continued to be a directing animator on 1946's Song of the South and 1947's Fun and Fancy Free, animating Willie the giant for the latter flick.

Other memorable John Lounsbery characters were George Darling and the Indians for 1953's Peter Pan, Joe and Tony the singing chefs in 1955's Lady and the Tramp, Sgt. Tibs and Horace Badun in 1961's 101 Dalmations, and Col. Hathi and the other elephants in 1967's The Jungle Book. He was directing animator for all those movies, as well as 1951's Alice in Wonderland and 1959's Sleeping Beauty.

In 1974, Lounsbery graduated to director, assisting Wolfgang Reitherman on Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too!, following that up with 1977's The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.

John Lounsbery was midway through his third directorial project, The Rescuers, when he died on February 13, 1976, of heart failure during surgery.

John Lounsbery the man and animator

Lounsbery was a master of the animated technique known as "squash and stretch." As detailed in Johnston and Thomas' 1981 book The Illusion of Life, "squash and stretch" refers to maintaining an object or character's volume while it's manipulated in space. "Squash and stretch" gives an animated object dimension and volume, and makes it feel more lifelike. It's also an invaluable resource in adding comedy to a character.

A recent example can be found in Disney/Pixar's Ratatouille, which marked the first use of squash and stretch in CGI animation. When Remy the rat runs or ducks, he is stretched out. When he sits on his hind legs, he is squashed.

Lounsbery used the technique to great effect in Fantasia, using it to give Ben Ali the dancing alligator the same volume, whether he was menacing a dancing ostrich or getting crushed under an airborne hippo. Another classic moment is when the elephants in The Jungle Book accordion into each other.

Although Lounsbery was a shy man, his characters were not.

"Hardly subtle," Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas wrote about him in their book The Illusion of Life, "(but) John's characters were always fun to watch."

Part of Lounsbery's value to Disney was that he could always be counted on keep his perspective, even during the worst disasters. According to Johnston and Thomas, no matter how bad things got, Lounsbery would add "some funny observation to lighten the situation."

Next Up: Wolfgang Reitherman, who took over as director after Walt's passing.

(Thanks to IMDb, and the Disney website for research material for this article)