A Berth of One’s Own

As legend has it, a downcast young man boarded a train in New York City on March 13, 1928. An animator, he was bound for his place in Los Angeles, having just lost control of his one-year-old cartoon character, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. Several days later, he stepped onto a platform in California with sketches in hand for a new personality, one that he would call Mortimer. The twenty-six-year-old’s wife, Lillian, objected to the pompous-sounding name and insisted on something more relatable. Ultimately, she prevailed.

Walt Disney told many stories of how Mickey Mouse came to be, but his transcontinental train trip featured in most of them. Two months after he disembarked in Tinseltown, he and his business partner Ub Iwerks screened Plane Crazy, a zany tribute to the aviator Charles Lindbergh, starring what would become the world’s most famous rodent. (The six-minute silent short was given sound and wide distribution only after the success, in November 1928...