Ron Husband Retires From Disney, Prepares to Direct a Film

Ron Husband retired from the Walt Disney Company on Friday, September 20, after 38 years with the company. Per his own bio:

Beginning as a Trainee in 1975, working my way up through in-betweener, breakdown artist, assistant animator, animator, and then supervising animator and working on such titles as Rescuers, Pete’s Dragon, Small One, Fox and Hound, Black Cauldron, Great Mouse Detective, Oliver & Co., The Little Mermaid, Rescuers Down Under, Aladdin, Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, Hercules, Atlantis, Fantasia 2000 and Treasure Planet before moving on from the animation world into the publishing world and working as a Character Artist for Disney Consumer Products.

Ron isn’t riding off into the sunset though. He’s busier than he’s ever been. His son, Jai, who works in the Atlanta animation scene, announced yesterday on his public Facebook profile that he was working on a film with his father:

That’s not all for Ron. Next week, Focal Press will release his new book Quick Sketching with Ron Husband. He has also started a blog at RonHusband.blogspot.com. If the first few posts are any indication, it will be a fascinating read. Ron, by virtue of being one of the first black artists (if not the first) to achieve the rank of supervising animator at Disney Feature Animation, has an incredible perspective on animation history and surely has plenty of great stories to tell.