Ollie Johnston: A Celebration of Life - 8/19/2008 at the El Capitan Theatre
Page 4 of 10

As the first group made their way off the stage, film clips were run as an introduction to the panel on Ollie�s family life. The lights came back up, and Maltin introduced Jeanette Thomas, wife of Ollie�s life long friend and collaborator Frank Thomas, her son Ted Thomas, Disney publicist Howard Green, and Ollie�s sons Ken and Rick Johnston. The Thomases lived next door to the Johnstons, and Green traveled extensively with both Frank and Ollie for many years.

Maltin�s first question was to the sons. He noted it was unusual to ask them what their dad was like, since they knew him in an entirely different way from others who would share that night. What adjectives would they use to describe him?

Ken and Rick Johnson, pictured in the family�s 1953 Christmas card
Click here for a much larger version of this picture

Rick answered first, choosing �gentle� and �enthusiastic.� He noted that Ollie was as enthusiastic about being a dad as he was an animator. �We never felt slighted,� he said, �We always got our fair share of his time.� He fondly recalled illustrated bedtime stories and hand drawn birthday cards. Ken added that they always felt that they were a big part of his life. In a way, he mused, they felt like characters as well, since their dad was always observing them. They knew that they were characters in other people�s lives, as well.

Maltin next turned to Ted Thomas. As a boy growing up right next door, what were his impressions of Ollie Johnston? Thomas thought for a moment, then recalled weekend mornings when Ollie would steam up his miniature back yard locomotive. The promise of these occasions made him feel like Tom Sawyer, knowing it would be a great day. In later years, Ted got to know Ollie better as they worked on his narrow gauge train engine, the Marie E. Sons Rick and Ted were into sports by this time, so Ted joined �Jolly Ollie� in scraping grease and restoring the 1901 antique that resided for some time in the family�s Flintridge driveway.

Ted�s mother, Jeanette, wife of Frank Thomas, said she actually met Ollie two years before Frank. She was in the Stanford post office, with a mutual friend, when Ollie pulled up in his car. Frank and Ollie were, by this time, animators for Walt Disney down in Hollywood. �I knew about as much about Disney as anyone who didn�t know about Disney!� Jeanette admitted. Jeanette was at Stanford, where Ollie�s father was on the faculty, and where she recalled seeing a framed animation cell on the wall in the Johnston home. Later, she met Frank and Ollie both at a campus party where they played a version of charades that involved drawing. Jeanette chuckled that the girls drew better than the boys.

Pastel drawing of Marie by Ollie
Click here for a much larger version of this picture

At the mention of meetings, Maltin asked Ollie�s sons about their mother, Marie. It was agreed that their relationship was truly a match made in heaven. Rick stated that Ollie and Marie were two names you never heard separately. Ken added that Ollie painted Marie a lot, especially when they were young. When Ollie would tease the boys, their mother warned them not to laugh at his pranks. Otherwise, it just encouraged him to keep it up.

Jeanette recalled that during trips the two families took together, their son Doug was Ollie�s �straight man.� He would laugh until he cried. Marie would scold, saying not to encourage him: �He thinks he�s so funny.� Ken remembered that sometimes Marie would get tired of the endless �Disney� talk in restaurants, so she�d create diversions to change the subject.