I know, I know—I already talked about the National Film Registry this week. But, faithful readers, that’s why we’re talking about it some more now. Because it occurred to me that probably the studio with the best record of entries in the list is probably Disney, and that’s even if you don’t include Pixar. (We will, briefly, be talking about “Disneyland Dream,” originally home movies, though.) In fact we aren’t including any of the companies Disney has acquired, just things released with a Disney label on them. Well, and one really notable Touchstone release.

The first Disney movie inducted into the Registry was in the inaugural list, in 1989. If you’re putting together a list of twenty-five American “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant films,” you absolutely need to include Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. These are just facts. In there with Citizen Kane and Modern Times and so forth, you’re going to get what Americans falsely believe to be the first feature-length animated movie ever made. Even though it’s nowhere near as impressive as the actual first feature-length animated movie, it’s still quite a technical feat and culturally important.

In the years since then, an assortment of other properties have followed suit. Not one a year, quite, but very close to it. If you include the other properties, we’re up to enough to be one a year, even if it’s going to include movies made before the other companies were acquired by Disney. Frankly, it would take some doing to untangle the Touchstone/Hollywood Pictures ones, and I don’t plan to do that right now, but even leaving aside the appearance in that initial bunch of Star Wars, “Luxo Jr.” is just one of the Pixar films in there, and that doesn’t even get into Iron Man.

Now, some of the choices are obvious. No one’s going to be shocked that Fantasia makes the list; indeed, you’d probably be more shocked if it hadn’t. “Steamboat Willie” is similar. Sleeping Beauty is Disney’s most beautiful feature, and while not everyone agrees with me on that, Fantasia is probably at least an equally popular choice. As is The Lion King, itself also on the list. None of the Disney animated features that would actually surprise people made the list—no Home on the Range here. Frankly, as the years go by, there are at least a dozen more that will be added, no doubt.

Probably the most actually surprising, however, is “The Story of Menstruation,” the Disney made-for-Kotex short teaching us about our bodies. Honestly there’s no shade there. For one thing, it’s supposedly the first Hollywood script to feature the word “vagina,” and that’s definitely worth noting. I don’t know if it’s the first-ever Feminine Hygiene Short, but it’s probably one of the first few, at least. As I’ve said, it’s not bad for its type, and certainly it gives you a good view of mid-century beliefs on the subject.

There are also, however, a few that people wouldn’t necessarily think of but also wouldn’t be surprised by. Both of Disney’s great films mixing live-action and animation—both Roger Rabbit and Mary Poppins. Yes, Roger’s technically from Touchstone, but he’s also the Touchstone property most closely embraced by Disney. I’m not sure Old Yeller would top anyone’s list, but it is, after all, one of those cultural references everyone gets. And while The Living Desert is more obscure, it’s at least equally important, the greatest of the great True-Life Adventures. There are a couple of shorts on the list, and that’s another one where I wouldn’t be surprised to see more over the years.

And then, there’s “Disneyland Dream.” I haven’t watched it yet—maybe you could pay me to through Patreon or Ko-fi, were you of a mind—but it’s included on the list because of its significance to the history of American culture, particularly the American culture of the mid-century middle class. It’s the family films of Robbins and Meg Barstow and their three children, who won a trip in 1956 to the newly-opened Disneyland in a contest sponsored by Scotch Tape. Two thirds of the way or so through, you can see a ten-year-old Steve Martin selling programs, even. Not his only appearance on the list—he’s in The Muppet Movie, after all—but certainly the earliest we’re going to get.

There’s a belief that Disney is basically a monopolist on American popular culture. This isn’t true, though it’s more true now than it was when the National Film Registry began. However, it is definitely true that Disney and the list are constant companions. I sometimes feel as though I need to remind people that the way Disney ended up in this place in all of our lives is by putting out so much solid entertainment. And in the case of The Living Desert and “The Story of Menstruation,” even a little bit of solid information while they’re at it. I’m less surprised that White Wilderness didn’t make the list yet, though.