The Wonderful World of Disney (1954- )

The Wonderful World of Disney sometimes called "Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color" premiered on ABC on Wednesday, October 27, 1954. The same basic series has since appeared on several major networks. The show is the second longest running prime-time program on American television, behind rival film anthology, the Hallmark Hall of Fame. However, Hallmark Hall of Fameaired as a weekly program during its first five seasons before becoming a bi-monthly program, while Disney remained a weekly program for more than 40 years. Originally hosted by Walt Disney himself, the original format of the Disney anthology series consisted of a balance of theatrical animated cartoons, live-action features, and other informational material (some original, some pre-existing) from the studio's library. For many years, the show also featured edited one-hour versions of such then-recent Disney films as Alice in Wonderland, and in other cases, telecasts of complete Disney films that were split into two or more one-hour episodes. Later original programs consisted of dramatizations of other historical figures and legends along the lines of the Davy Crockett mini-series. These included a miniseries based on Daniel Boone (not the Fess Parker characterization), Texas John Slaughter, Elfego Baca, Francis Marion, the "Swamp Fox", and 1977's Kit Carson and the Mountain Man (with Christopher Connelly as Kit Carson, Robert Reed as John C. Fremont, and Gregg Palmer as mountain man Jim Bridger).