Disney icon made magic for kids of all generations
Judianne Atencio appreciates that her childhood was unusual. Unique, even.
“We knew it very, very early on,” she said from Denver last week. “My father worked at Disney for his whole career, and we always say our family history and Disney history are so intertwined.”
For the Atencio family, that history included all-access visits to Disneyland attractions, where the family often wound up after church on Sunday mornings.
“We knew we grew up privileged,” she said. “The big treat was to get the Disney classics my
father worked on as big reels of celluloid film. He’d come home on the weekends in the 1960s with a studio projector, long before VHS or DVDS, and we’d watch them together.”
Judianne Atencio happily relived some of those memories last week after her father, Francis Xavier Atencio, died on Sept. 10 at the age of 98 at his home in Los Angeles.
Despite having retired from Disney in 1984, Atencio’s death lit up national media outlets and Disney’s own PR machine, leading to an outpouring of appreciation for the man simply known as “X” to his friends and former colleagues.
No cause of death has been determined, but Judianne said her Colorado-born father needed 98 years “just to squeeze it all in.”
Atencio’s professional rèsumè includes a number of influential films, some of which he cut his artistic teeth on as a young Disney animator: “Pinocchio,” “Fantasia” and “Mary Poppins,” all of which Atencio contributed to over a decades-long tenure that culminated with his induction into the Disney Legend program in 1996.
Atencio wrote the lyrics to songs that countless children can sing by heart, such as “Yo Ho (A Pirate’s Life),” on the original Pirates of the Caribbean attraction at Disneyland (with music by George Bruns), and “Grim Grinning Ghosts” for the Haunted Mansion (with music by Buddy Baker), which was also featured in Pixar’s Oscar-winning 2015 film “Inside Out.”
Born Sept. 4, 1919, in Walsenburg, Atencio came from a long line of southern Colorado and New Mexico descendants that stretches back 500 years, according to Judianne, who researched the Atencio family tree. Its branches included Spanish pioneers, but also French Canadian fur trappers who made their way down the Santa Fe Trail.
“As papa said, ‘If they tell American history from west to east, we’d all be having tamales for Thanksgiving, because there was a lot going on over here while all those pilgrims were getting all the ink,’ ” Judianne said.
Atencio moved to Los Angeles in 1937 to attend the Chouinard Art Institute and, a year later, was working at Disney’s original Hyperion Avenue studio — but only after reluctantly submitting his portfolio at an instructor’s prodding, according to a Disney blog post.
He was, as a few of his obituaries have pointed out, still a teenager, but nonetheless older than Walt Disney Co. as a whole (even if only by four years).
Atencio worked as an animator on the 1940 classic “Pinocchio,” in which he was able to first see his work on the big screen, and became assistant animator on “Fantasia” before leaving to join the Army Air Corps during World War II. There he earned the rank of major and served in Britain analyzing aerial surveillance for military intelligence.
“It’s crazy because that generation didn’t talk a lot about what they did,” Judianne said. “He didn’t storm Normandy, but he did serve in Britain. He didn’t tell us that until it was grandparent’s day (at school) for my sister’s daughter.”
Atencio returned to the U.S. when the war ended in 1945 and continued working on animated shorts for eight years, some of which won or were nominated for Oscars (including 1953’s “Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom”), sequences for the original Mickey Mouse Club and stop-motion sequences for early-1960s Disney features such as “The Parent Trap,” “Babes in Toyland” and “Mary Poppins.”
Sensing his potential in a new role at the company, Walt Disney transferred Atencio to what’s now known as Walt Disney Imagineering (then WED Enterprises) in 1965 to work on the Primeval World diorama for Disneyland. The Anaheim, Calif.-based theme park had been open for a mere decade at that point.
“I went over there reluctantly because I didn’t know what I was getting into, and nobody there knew what I was supposed to do either,” Atencio said at the time, according to Disney archives. “About a month later, I got a phone call from Walt. He told me ‘I want you to do the script for the Pirates of the Caribbean.’ ”
Atencio’s work extended to Space Mountain at the Magic Kingdom and Spaceship Earth, World of Motion and the Mexico pavilion at Epcot.
Many of the rides Atencio worked on were later modified or updated, but his voice can still be heard in several places, especially in Disneyland, according to The Huffington Post.
While Atencio retired in 1984 and was named a Disney Legend a dozen years later, he would continue to consult on projects for years to come — including the “Pirates of the Caribbean” film series.
“There’s a great picture my sister took of X and Johnny (Depp) on the set of the first ‘Pirates,’ and when my father got there the whole production was waiting for Johnny,” Judianne said. “But Johnny didn’t want to come out and meet my father until he was fully in his Jack Sparrow costume, because he wanted the full effect for my father. … His song ‘Yo Ho’ also worked its way into more than one of those movies.”
“X was an enormous talent who helped define so many of our best experiences around the world,” Bob Weis, president of Walt Disney Imagineering, said in a statement.
“The thing that he enjoyed the most and up to his last visits to Disneyland was always watching peoples’ reactions,” Judianne added. “That was where he could really still see the audience and how much they loved it. They’d always come out singing his song.”
Atencio is survived by his wife, Maureen; his children Tori Mccullough, Judianne, and Joe; his stepchildren Brian Sheedy, Kevin Sheedy and Eileen Haubeil; sonsin-law Mike Mccullough and Chris Haubeil; and daughters-inlaw Kathy Atencio, Trish Sheedy and Beth Sheedy.
He was predeceased by his wife, Mary, and his son Jerry, and leaves behind nine grandchildren — all of whom will no doubt become familiar with his work one day, whether they realize it or not.
“The thing that he enjoyed the most and up to his last visits to Disneyland was always watching peoples’ reactions. That was where he could really still see the audience and how much they loved it. They’d always come out singing his song.”
Judianne Atencio, daughter