Lillian Bounds Disney

LOS ANGELES, December 16, 1997 -- The world said good-bye today to Lillian Bounds Disney, widow of Walt Disney. She died at her home in West Los Angeles. She was 98 years old. Family members say Mrs. Disney died peacefully in her sleep, after suffering a stroke in the early morning of December 15. Ironically, Walt Disney died thirty-one years ago, early in the morning of December 15, 1966. Born in Spalding, Idaho in 1899 as the tenth and last child of Jeanette Short Bounds and Willard Pehall Bounds, Lillian grew up in Lapwai, Idaho on the Nez Perce Indian Reservation.

She moved to Los Angeles in 1923 to join her older sister Hazel. A friend of her sister was working at the studio of Walt Disney, and told Lillian about a job opening there. Approximately two years later, Lillian and Walt were married on July 13, 1925 in Lewiston, Idaho.

She was her husband's primary sounding board. He would run his revolutionary ideas by her for approval, from "Snow White" to Disneyland. On a train ride together from New York to Los Angeles, after a serious business setback, Walt came up with a new character: Mortimer Mouse. "Not Mortimer," said his wife. "It's too formal. How about Mickey?"

For the next 41 years, Lillian was Walt's helpmate, content to quietly remain in the background, raise two daughters (Diane and Sharon), as her husband ventured into full-length animated films, live action movies and theme parks that would make him and his company internationally known.

Following the death of her husband, Lillian became quite active in a variety of charitable programs, with primary emphasis toward the support of children and the arts. In May 1987, Lillian made a landmark gift of $50 million to the Music Center of Los Angeles County to build a world-class concert hall for the city that had done so much for her and her husband. The Walt Disney Concert Hall, set to open in 2001, will be the permanent home to the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the fourth venue of the Music Center.

Lillian is survived by one daughter, Diane, as well as ten grandchildren and thirteen great grandchildren. She was predeceased by her other daughter, Sharon, in 1993.