Walt Disney - Ben And Me (1/2) - 1953

[prchecker]

i enjoyed this vid

[jjclassjj]

you have some great stuff here

[Multimediet]

Sterling Holloway would have been 107 years old today. He was the best voice actor ever. I do understand why Walt Disney and Woolie Reitherman were such a big fans of him. I am too. I would love to animate a character he did the voice for.

[nrrork]

Heh, I just kinda stumbled across this while looking up Ben Franklin stuff, but I think I'll give it a watch.

My class read the book this was based on when I was in 4th grade, and I remember my dad telling me it was also a cartoon, and 1953, he would've been a little kid at the time.

[ethansloan]

What happened to the bit where Amos goes over his family history? That has some of my favorite jokes in the whole short.

[samoa49662]

i had this on vhs if anyone still remembers tht..haha and im 19 yrs old. lol

[B0SSBITCH510]

THE NARRAT0R IS P00HS V0ICE :)

[LiannaRodriguez]

I love you forever for this !! Youtube is so amazingggggggg.

[sonicandjamesfan619]

At 2:12, that yell reminds me of Tom Kenny's yell.

[dweiner2]

You forgot about the part about Amos Mouse's family records!! That was when the book was first opened.

[TPrower]

I KNEW Ben's voice was familiar! Charles Ruggles, Aesop from Rocky and Bullwinkle! And good old Sterling Holloway. May your memory never fade. =)

[ashcatash5]

One of my favorite videos when I was a kid

[frankydman]

They have some nerve poking fun at Poor Richard's Almanac...

In terms of sales, it was the SECOND MOST SUCCESSFUL piece of literature in the history of the written word!

[awm21awm21]

I couldn't help but wonder if today's youth would know or care about BF.

[smartamateur]

Lesson from this cartoon -

Benjamin Franklin was an idiot. A mouse was responsible for all his inventions and success.

[faerie16]

i remember reading this story when i was younger. and pooh bear is the voice of the mouse! <3 ben franklin is one of my favorite historical figures as well!!

[StephiGereRothThyne]

Ratatouille anyone? xD

[MrAwsomeRhettman]

I love this book

[ajbrooksman]

Anyone notice he's setting the paper in Caslon? :) 8:06

[MsDisneylandlover]

@ajbrooksman did u notice the part abt god behind is bed that was on the wall .

[faerie16]

@MsDisneylandlover yeah they were scraps from ben's book, poor richard's almanac

[ajbrooksman]

@MsDisneylandlover Yeah - classic Poor Richard's sayings!

[714a13x909]

I would watch this daily when i was 4, had it onVHS!

[Dragonstorm787]

You know, Ben Franklin seems to be taking the fact that there's a talking mouse in his house rather well...

[ColorMeDevon]

No one can ever voice a mouse better then Sterling Holloway.

[XxxkenzaxxX]

WINNIE THE POOH'S VOICE! OH I INSTANTLY LOVE THIS!

[cridantis]

This taught me more about early American history than any history class I ever had in high school.I don't know which is worse; that education standards were so low or that Disney ha sunk as low as it has over the years.

[DuchessAliana]

OMG Disney did a cartoon of this too?! I loved this book! lol

[dinoloverist]

Smoke comes all over LOL!

[BramGroatFilms]

We've own a TV special featuring Ben and Me and Peter and the Wolf, but it didn't have the beginning. It did however have something that this doesn't; before Amos says where he was born, he says "Ben and Me, a title which I'm sure explains itself!"

[shanest22]

poor mouse

[ilovegnomeland]

I'm SO happy that you put this up! I had the vhs when I was little and I miss it. Thanks for posting this.

[yorgod123]

this is a truncated version :-(

my old vhs copy has an extra few minutes at the beginning where amos recounts the exploits of his family. still a great little film but i miss the prologue.

[bhnub]

see disney used to do ANIMATIONS at one point. not this new junk/trash!

[dellotti]

You think you have watched all vintage Disney, and still there is so much more to explore. ...and I never even heard of this one.

[keepoffgrass]

I agree. Disney needs to get rid of most of that crap they're producing now and get back to this good stuff. That Hanna Montana garbage really sucks. Walt's got to be turning over in his grave watching the Disney Channel.

[erminiab]

Can you broadcast the italian version??

[StarDr0ps]

Aimes's (SP?) voice sounds very familiar. Anyone know who voiced him?

[PixarShark]

@StarDr0ps Sterling Holloway. AKA Winnie the Pooh. :)

[StarDr0ps]

@PixarShark: Oh yeah! I think he also did Kaa the snake in Jungle Book. :)

[Rylosalex]

oh, it's been years years i tell you! since I saw or thought of this cartoon, but I saw the book "ben and me" at the library and i began remembering bits and pieces of this classic.

I think today's generation would simple love these cartoons, too bad it's now filled with live action fluff.

[happymimi16]

This would be a cool Disneyland ride.

[BeyondChange]

The narrator sounds like winnie the pooh

[bamaslamma1003]

@BeyondChange He is. Actually the narrator is Sterling Holloway, who did Winnie the Pooh's voice.

[BradJamesRocks]

This is a great cartoon, Benjamin Franklin is one of my favorite historical figures along with George Washington and William Bradford, well because my name IS Bradford!

[simpleman2423]

Who narrated these old toons? This and "Peter and the Wolf" specifically.

[Procrastimaster]

@simpleman2423 The narrator for "Ben and Me" and "Peter and the Wolf" is Sterling Holloway, a wonderful actor who performed live-action roles as well as providing the voices for several Disney characters. He also narrated "Goliath II", and did voice work in movies like "Dumbo," "Alice in Wonderland," and several "Winnie-the-Pooh" films.

[simpleman2423]

@Procrastimaster Thank you very much. I want to do some research on the guy.

[juan19878]

i really like so much

[HumbertTheHuntsman]

The paper's missing an "s" in Pennsylvania.

[Procrastimaster]

@HumbertTheHuntsman The "s" isn't missing--back then it was written differently and looked more like a lowercase "f".

[lfo88]

bellissimooooo i remember i saw alwayss!!!!hehehe thanks froam italy!!

[Tadicuslegion78]

i find it so od that Ben can make a stove without any welding equipment or amos a pair of glasses that keep together after breaking but its a cartoon and cartoon physics are never supposed to be explained

[CrimsonNineTail]

Wolfgang Reitherman and Ollie Johnston, two names I recongnize. Oh and Sterling Holloway.

Ha Ha Cinderella's Mice. I read the original story this was based off of in elementary school.

I don't know about the early Bifocals in this short but it started something later right?

Stupid question, but is it safe to asumme the Gazzette is still printing? or did it just help start the newsprint?

[LuckyxNumberxSlevin]

obviously influenced by the Mary Blair era, Cinderella, Peter Pan

[SenshiMizaka]

This is probably one of the more nostalgic Disney shorts for me, because I had the tape when I was a kid, and would watch it to death. Seriously, I'm wearing a grin that could make The Joker green with envy now.

This was actually how I learned about Benjamin Franklin, and was my first exposure to American history.

[Rickz]

Animators back then really had skill

[WorldNews92]

I'm listening to the letters he's putting in the press, and they spell out:

tSAtS ROEe Er.

[haddieman]

Oh man, I can't believe this! So much nostalgia!!!

[Forysan]

Also, slavery had been going on for centuries, Africans weren't the only victims of it, and compared to like Brazil, and Barbados Amwerica was a lot closeer to ending slavery alot faster.

[Forysan]

However, they were thinking longterm. If they didn't have the south the War and what followed would be lost and there 'd be no point in going on. As far as they knew England certainly wasn't going to stop the slave trade. It's called prioritising. Slavery happened one law at a time. So they felt it must end the same way. They were trying to prevent the kind of centuries long ethnic conflicts they'd seen in Europe and that still go on today. In the longterm they were right.

[Forysan]

For one, by-in-large, they were products of the Reformation. Thus, they understood God's plan as being that society would get better and better, then Jesus would come back to rule and reign in justice and mercy. God would ultimately resolve the issue of slavery not them. Its a view that's not completely Biblically accurate. But nobody's perfect. Washington, Jefferson, and Franklin all opposed slavery.

[Forysan]

no disrespect intended armccoy, but what historical record are you reading? The majority of our founding fathers-most of whom people know nothing about-didn't even own slaves. Its very easy for us to sit in judgment of them when we don't live in their world and experience the things they did.

[jwalker627]

YESSS! Thank you!

[liveontheclassics]

Gosh I remembered watching this when I was 6 years old! :D I loved this movie <3 Such good classic

[armccoy]

art oft he problem with American History is that it's not accurate and it tends to put our "Founding Fathers" on a pedestal that they don't necessarily deserve. Our "Founding Fathers" owned slaves, impregnated them, fought for power equal to the king, and some had no desire to go to war with England.

[armccoy]

Something to keep in mind was that Franklin wasn't a particularly "chaste" founding father. While this is just a cartoon, his own personal history is one of various trists in France, a hatred of the British so much that he wanted our national language to be German. He was a very cunning business man and that made him a very good politician.

[Bloodbirdy]

Bah, stupid mouse propaganda.

[johndian]

Good old Charlie Ruggles, the perfect voice for Ben Franklin

[Bowmaj21]

This is a charming little cartoon, but there seems to be a dark undertone!

I mean, Amos is clearly the brains here, and Franklin is portrayed as a bumbling failure who takes all the credit and constanly treats Amos like crap!

For being one of America's most famous Founding Fathers, you'd think they'd treat Ben Franklin with a little more respect!

[DisneyMagicDreamer85]

Well, that's the way Ben was depicted in the book version! But if you think about it, it's really a symbiotic relationship; Amos could never have actually built say... the Franklin stove, without a human around to lift the heavy iron. And though Amos got the news for The Pennslvania Gazzette, Ben already had the paper, the press and the means to sell the paper already.

btw I love this cartoon!

[Bowmaj21]

I guess you're right, I never thought of it that way!

[pytko3]

@Bowmaj21 Don't read so deep into this. It's just a show. So relax.

[mfde7]

@Bowmaj21 it's the view of the mouse-world, so it's taken with a bit of irony.

[ARP7777777]

@Bowmaj21 It is based on Robert Lawsons book of the same name. Read it, and you might see why. . .

[bartsimpson83]

@Bowmaj21 Well, Ben Franklin was known for being eccentric. I always thought that his characterization here reflected that quite well.

[toiletwaterisgood]

the book is awesome!!

[fandelchavo2]

ay no sta en español?????

[TrainzSuckCarzRule]

gay

[penelope1416]

is this the movie of the girl and the mouse??

i can't find it^^^

TITTLE: BEN

theres a song in this..

ben the two of us.......

[TheElmoShow1]

Yeah by MJ. love that song. I am trying to find the movie too.

[0Rox0]

OMG thank you! I had this movie when i was a kid but the VHS got destroyed :(

[DisneyMagicDreamer85]

Aww, this cuts out the first part of the movie, where Amos is describing his family history, an English mouse, a mouse painter and a pilgim mouse fleeing from the oppression of Cats. And then he began his own life story.

I miss this cartoon so much!

[tintinlover123]

Does this bring back memories of childhood or what?

[Suggi1985]

does anybody knows the german titel of this cartoon???

[H4LHitout]

To Suggi1985:

Probably Something Like

"Ben Und Ich"

[wordswings]

lol that's what i figured too :-D

but then again it might be Ich und Ben.

tricky, veeeery tricky. :-P

[Suggi1985]

I love this movie....I love disneys classic cartoons and movies...great job :-)

[Jaya1Lakshmi]

I loved this book as a kid- I hope this is just as good. LOL Amos's statue on top of Ben's.

Definitely read the book if you get the chance; it's hilarious!

[Jaya1Lakshmi]

This was based on a book of the same title. I hope it's as good.

[kyusama347]

I wached this all the time when i was little!!! YES thank you!!

[Mandie000304]

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!! I remember watching this in school. I'm home-schooling and my eldest is getting ready to go into American History next year in third grade. This will be a cute tongue-in-cheek addition to our school year ;).

[bluestingerborg]

I watched this in 5th grade.

[jernme03]

I loved this cartoon!!

[Abracamoron]

That mouse looks a little like the one in Cinderella

[johntheechidna1]

Winnie the Pooh, too. ^^

[MTabla]

Many thanks to those who post cartoon classics like this on YouTube for parents to revisit with their children. Quality children's programming so artfully rendered with a positive message has long since been eradicated from network television but at last has found new life on the internet.

This outlet has come to replace Saturday morning cartoons on television in our household as i'm sure it has for countless other households.

I wonder if the networks even notice...

[theotherther1]

Hope not! I am glad to see these cartoons too. I've never seen many of them, and modern stuff looks like caveman feces smeared on a wall in comparison.

The DVDs of material like this often feature censors and oversaturated caveman-candy colors ("remastering").

[Tempest0Lavalle]

GASP!!! I REMEMBER this wonderful little cartoon!! Thank you SO much for posting this! It was cartoons like this that gave me my love of animation and desire to become an animator!

[littleNorwegians]

I see Benjamin was a very open minded person considering he talks to a mouse without commenting on it's anthropomorphization.

[chickygirl34]

thanks i have seeing this since i was 5 i used to watch it all the time on the disney channel

[CrustyZombie]

One of the guys at 7:30 is captain hook!!!!!!

[CherBear609]

Oh my god! I remember watching this all the time when I was a tot. Like 3-4 years old. Thanks for posting. This really took me back :)

[PhoenixPrincess10]

Amos' voice was the voice actor who played Kaa of the Jungle Book, and Pooh Bear! Sterling Halloway was his name.

[DJ4010]

Amos sure did come up with great things that helped Ben a lot,Amos sure was positive. Being positive always gets rid of the doubts and negatives,No Doubt!

[classicrock1988]

Bye George, bifocals!

[Truthiness231]

Brings back memories...

[fargo2499]

Thank you for post this video.I wached this 20 year ago.

[openmindedaussie]

My God, I bawled when I found this video.. I tried to tell my husband what I had found and I burst into happy tears.. This brings back such fond memories of me at about 6-8 years old.. And I'm Australian!!! Ridiculous as it may be. This kind of Disney is the best...I still love the new stuff, but come on, this is THE classic...

[DJ4010]

I remember this one greatly. It is one of the best classics ever. To be honest I do miss the way The Disney Channel used to be back in the 80's and early 90's.

[captainsrc23]

i love this, i remember watching this when i was little!

[IOWABOY1000]

Now this is disney at it's best and now they got all that new age bullshit, they should stick to their roots

[MsDisneylandlover]

@IOWABOY1000 i knw that make me so freaking sick old disney is da best new disney can kiss my azz lol

[hornean]

This doesn't have a prologue that has scenes such as a mouse gathering flour before encountering a cat then blowing the flour onto the cat before the cat gave chase.

[hornean]

Amos explained that he's the oldest of his siblings

[tigerlily86]

thank you so much for posting this! i love this cartoon! i used to have it on vhs and was heartbroken when i lost it.

[smthcmnl]

Ben Franklin was a satanist..

[tigerlily86]

omg i love this cartoon! i had it on vhs when i was younger. i am so happy to have found it on youtube.

[palmercomm]

This is what Disney should be today! But they have that "Hanna Montana" trash now.

[BenJabituya]

A great cartoon, directed by Ham Luske. BTW, does Amos look like Jaq from "Cinderella" and are they related?

[KeybladeKH]

I love this cartoon. I used to watch it all the time when I was little, and I missed watching it.

[0rionBTL]

I used to watch this cartoon all the time when I was a kid. It's great to see this silly cartoon again.

[jamaicanlager]

Ben Franklin was a douche.

[realar]

I wonder why they chose the same design of mouse from Cinderella, same animator of Jaq perhaps?

[specialkalpha]

Mostly style, notice later that Jefferson has the same voice and mannerisms as Capt Hook. Alot of stuff from that time period had a unified look to it, not like today where every feature is made to have its own distinct look.

[realar]

it's kinda cutting corners, reitherman tends to do that in other films.

[specialkalpha]

Yes but it didn't get really obvious until Aristacats and Robin Hood (one borrows a dance animation cycle from the other). But I kind of like that everything coming out had a similar look because of the core stable of cartoonists. No even Disney shops out it work to lots of different studios. Its not better or worse but just differences in scale of opperation.

[realar]

well yes but hey had to have some sort of influence in terms of look because Abraham Delacey Guiseppe Casey Thomas O Malley the Alley Cat isn't the same as Baloo the bear although they share the same voice actor.

[Smythtown94]

Wow. Thanks so much for posting this! One of the best Disney featurettes ever! It was "Ben and Me" that first got me interested in American History.

I live in Philadelphia now and always look for Amos on top of all the Franklin statues.:)

[realar]

I'm a descendant of Ben Franklin and an animation major, this film brings back memories, interestingly Franklin is connected to me through by my grandfather who you can hear in the beginning sequence of Paul Bunyan he's the man who takes care of him as a baby.

[Jamiedreams]

I'm one of his decentests as well. So that makes us related? :D Ben is my 9th or 10 gen great grandfather :D

[realar]

i wonder do u have the ben franklin family tree about? i wanna see where i fit into this equation, i hope i'm related that its not a coincedence that my ancestors bear the last name franklin. if it's able to be found, look in the tree for mckennon.

[Jamiedreams]

I'm sorry, but I don't have it.

[realar]

that's a shame.

oh well.

[lvanciel]

i heard Captain Hook

[DisneyMagicDreamer85]

That was the voice of Thomas Jefferson here: Disney re-used several voice actors, Alice in Wonderland was the same girl that did Wendy from Peter Pan.

Amos was voiced by Sterling Holloway, who also did Winnie the Pooh, Stork from Dumbo, the Chesire Cat, and narrated a few other shorts, but his best was voicing Kaa from Jungle book.

[kingsize127]

The dude who plays Thomas Jefferson is the man who played George Darling and Captain Hook in Peter Pan. Hans Conried.

[DisneyMagicDreamer85]

I always wondered why the voice of mean ole Captain Hook was also the voice of grumpy, practical Mr. Darling.

Almost gets you to thinking how Wendy could've dreamed the whole thing!

Except, Wendy wouldn't have dreamed that the mermaids tried to drown her. LoL

[TheScorpio84]

Sterling also did the voice of the mouse Roqueford in Aristocats.

[ZoloLover]

Amos sounds like Pooh Bear.

[lvanciel]

he is

[bvcesar]

yes

[Doozersb82]

Thats because it is Sterling Holloway did the voice for many disney characters

[bassman5588]

including pooh.

[Doozersb82]

Yes Pooh is what he is best known for

[realar]

uh not Kaa too or the stork from Dumbo?

[Doozersb82]

yes he did the voice for both thats right

[bvcesar]

that is pooh bear

[ECG3485]

Sterling Holloway, same voice actor for Winnie-the-Pooh.

[HurQlez03]

Oh man! I saw this when I was five. This was the first time I learned my special power of memorization. I was five and yet I remembered every line of this show!

[brassdog89]

I have been waiting for someone to post this for a long time.

Thanks very much!

[ryustuh]

wow...saw this when i was 3 years old.

[TboneLegend]

Thank you for this. Classic stuff!

[XxLilBellXx]

Made me feel young again, I haven't seen this since the 4th grade. Awesome...Brought back great memories

[BrooklynMouse]

This was one of the first and only Disney animated short that clocked in at 21 minutes in length. The character Amos looked almost similar to Jaques from "Cinderella".

[RyougaLolakie]

W0000t!! ALRIGHT!!!! :D

Ben and Me is DEFINATELY ONE OF MY ALL-TIME FAVORITE DISNEY ANIMATED SHORTS and I approve this message. :)

[Jezeroth]

OMGOMG! I haven't seen this since Nursery School!! Wow!

[capitalc21]

I love this! Thanks for uploading!

[HenriekeKiki]

Wow, great! I've been looking for this for a long time... same counts for quite a few other shorts you uploaded. Thanks!

*starts watching*

[ragemanchoo82]

Wow :D Havent seen this since like 1993 or so. :D :D :D