The Walt Disney Company
In 1928, to recover from the loss of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, Disney came up with the idea of a mouse character named Mortimer while on a train headed to California, drawing up a few simple drawings. The mouse was later renamed Mickey Mouse (Disney's wife, Lillian, disliked the sound of 'Mortimer Mouse') and starred in several Disney produced films. Ub Iwerks refined Disney's initial design of Mickey Mouse. Disney's first sound film "Steamboat Willie", a cartoon starring Mickey, was released on November 18, 1928 through Pat Powers' distribution company. It was the first Mickey Mouse sound cartoon released, but the third to be created, behind "Plane Crazy" and "The Gallopin' Gaucho". "Steamboat Willie" was an immediate smash hit, and its initial success was attributed not just to Mickey's appeal as a character, but to the fact that it was the first cartoon to feature synchronized sound. Disney used Pat Powers' Cinephone system, created by Powers using Lee de Forest's Phonofilm system. "Steamboat Willie" premiered at B. S. Moss's Colony Theater in New York City, now The Broadway Theatre. Disney's "Plane Crazy" and "The Gallopin' Gaucho" were then retrofitted with synchronized sound tracks and re-released successfully in 1929.
Mickey Mouse universe
In animation, Mickey's nephews first appear in the 1933 "Mickey Mouse" film "Giantland", although the film shows Mickey with as many as 14 nephews at the same time. The following year the nephews appear again in "Gulliver Mickey". The following film, "Mickey's Steam Roller", is the first to show Mickey with only two nephews, who can be presumed to be Morty and Ferdie, although they are unnamed in the film itself. This was two years after the twins debuted in the comic strip. Morty and Ferdie also make a cameo towards the end of 1938's "Boat Builders" and appear again in 1983's "Mickey's Christmas Carol" in speaking roles, albeit at different ages as one of the twins took on the role of Tiny Tim. In 1999 they make a cameo in the two part "Mickey Mouse Works" segment "Around the World in Eighty Days", which was used again in "Disney's House of Mouse".