His ambulance was covered from stem to stern, not with stock camouflage, but with Disney cartoons.
Walt Disney tried to enlist in the armed forces in the fall of 1918, but was rejected for being only sixteen.
To get overseas and contribute, he got creative as usual and joined the Red Cross, and was sent to France. Over a period of a year, he ended up driving officials from the Red Cross around, as well as drive an ambulance. It's that ambulance he put his Disney Cartoons on.
Of course his cartoons were whatever was in his head at the time, as what we know as Disney hadn't emerged yet.
The reason I'm bringing this up, is the utter, complete immersion of Walt Disney in who he was and would eventually become. Disney wasn't a manufactured brand, he was the real thing. This is another reason why he continues to influence us decades after his death, and will possibly forever.
What Disney did was take everything he knew of history, his own history and his vision of a future he wanted to create, and brought it all to bear on the company he ended up building.
Disney didn't have to figure out marketing lines to speak or present himself in a light that the public would consider consumable. Disney simply offered himself as he was, through what he created, and put before other creative people to develop.
When Disney (DIS) the company gets in trouble, you can trace it back to the attempt to leave who Walt Disney was, and bring another persona out. It has never worked, and always backfires.
Disney put cartoons on his ambulance not to impress someone or for a hidden agenda, Disney put cartoons on the ambulance because he couldn't help it; it was who he was.
There's nothing more powerful in business than a brand that is built upon the reality of a person. That person brings everything they are and embed it into what is represented and called a brand. In reality, it's just an extension of who they are.
Walt Disney had that ability, honesty, integrity and gift. It's another reason he remains one of the extraordinary people of the 20th century.
Other Walt Disney Sources:
"Walt Disney and the Quest for Community"
The Golden Age of Mickey Mouse
Chronology of the Walt Disney Company
Walt Disney's original plans for EPCOT
Builders and Titans: Walt Disney
Disney the Innovator vs Disney the Conservative
A belated thank you to pioneer Walt Disney
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