Cartoonist. Born in Omaha, Nebraska, as Arthur Harold Babitsky. After his fathers accident, Art decided to move to New York so he could send money home. Art began his career in New York City working for Paul Terry’s Terrytoons Studio. But in the early 1930s he moved to Los Angeles followed by his fellow Terrytoon colleague Bill Tytla, and secured a job animating for the Walt Disney Studio, which was expanding at the time. He began his career with Disney as a assistant animator, his talent noticed he was promoted to animator. His first important work was a drunken mouse in the short “The Country Cousin” in 1936, which won an Academy award for the studio. The Disney Studio gave the tough job of the animated the Wicked Queen in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, to Art. Gepetto from the film of  Pinocchio was his next project,  and became a directing animator. Of all Disney’s films, “Pinocchio” was the feature which Art most admired, and which he regarded as the finest achievement of the studio during the “Golden Age” of animation. Art also animated the characters of Zeus, Vulcan, and the dancing mushrooms in Fantasia. On the feature film Dumbo, he was again made a directing animator, and animated the character of the stork. When animating the stork, he made him resemble his voice actor, Sterling Holloway. Art is also credited with creating the character of Goofy, a character which he later described in the 1987 documentary film “Animating Art”. During the Great Depression Art rose to become one of Disney’s highest paid artists. After serving with the Marines in the Pacific in World War II, Art returned to Disney for a time, he was fired more than once from Disney but was re-instated, taking his case successfully all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States, and winning a handsome settlement. All of this stemming from Art being sympathetic to the cause of lower echelon Disney artists seeking to form a union.  In the 1950s he was part owner of Quartet Films, where he worked on television commercials, including the Cleo winning “John & Marsha” spot for Parkay Margarine. Later he was part of Hanna & Barbera’s commercial wing. Art married three times his first wife was Marjorie Belcher, a dance model in Snow White and the Seven Dwarf. His second wife was Dina Babbitt, a Holocaust survivor. His third wife, who survives him, is actress Barbara Perry.  In the late 1980s, a British television documentary titled “Animating Art” was broadcast, celebrating Art’s life and work. Art was posthumously named a Disney Legend in 2007. He died of Kidney Failure at the age of 84. (bio by: Shock)  Family links:  Spouses:  Dina Gottliebova-Babbitt (1923 – 2009)  Anne Marie Dinah Gottliebova Babbitt (1923 – 2009)* *Calculated relationship