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10 million coonskin caps in 1955
Davy Crockett was a real frontiersman who died at the Alamo, and Disney fictionalized him heavily. Nobody at the studio planned the merchandise frenzy. The theme song, The Ballad of Davy Crockett, reached number one on the Billboard charts and sold 7 million records.
Disney went on to roughly $300 million in gross sales of Davy Crockett merchandise. Kay Kamen, who had run Disney's licensing, died in a plane crash in 1949, and the studio had brought consumer products in-house. At a 5 percent royalty on wholesale prices, with wholesale at about half of retail, that sales figure works out to an estimated $7.5 million for Disney, more than any single film had earned the company at that point.
By 1957, all of Disney's first-release features together had earned a little over $7 million in cumulative profit. The caps and records sold while Disneyland's budget was climbing from $5 million toward $17 million, a few months before the park opened.
How did a TV miniseries become a movie?
Disney edited the episodes into a theatrical feature, Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier, released in 1955. Fess Parker played Crockett on television and in the film. The episodes had already aired, so the movie went out to audiences who knew the song. The feature added to the craze rather than starting it.
Why did raccoon fur suddenly sell out?
Demand for coonskin caps pushed raccoon pelt prices up sharply in 1955. Some makers turned to other furs and fake tails to keep up. Retailers ran short as families bought the caps for children. Few toy fads had grown that fast before television.
How was Crockett famous before Disney?
Crockett served three terms in Congress for Tennessee and became a public figure in his lifetime. A 1831 play, The Lion of the West, featured a character modeled on him. Almanacs printed tall tales under his name for years after his death at the Alamo in 1836. Disney inherited a legend that already had many versions.
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