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INFOGRAPHIC: America and Canada's favorite Disney classics

(Image: DanChaos1 at deviantart.com)

With so many incredible Disney films over the years, it can be hard to choose a favorite. Would you go for a Golden Age film like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs or a Disney Renaissance flick like Hercules? While we might not know your personal Disney favorite (or maybe we do—we’re pretty mysterious), the team of analysts at CableTV.com discovered which Disney classic each US state prefers above the rest. Check it out!

America's Favorite Disney Classics

What It All Means

With all these fascinating results, we couldn’t help but find reasons why each state might love its top Disney movie. Some of our discoveries caught us off guard:

  • We love animals—38 states favored a film with an animal protagonist.
  • With the support of 17 states, The Lion King (1994) is America’s favorite Disney classic, hands down.
  • Dumbo (1941) is beloved by New York, which was known for the elephant walk through Manhattan, a tradition that lasted over thirty years. While the event garnered mixed feelings from residents and tourists, it certainly left its mark in NYC.
  • Nearly 71 percent of Vermont households own a pet, so it makes sense that Vermont loves 101 Dalmatians (1961). But funnily enough, Vermont has more cat-owning households than dog-owning households.
  • With the most wilderness of any state, Alaska’s respect for wildlife reflects in its favorite movie Bambi (1942).
  • The trippy Alice in Wonderland (1951) is a big deal in New Mexico, which happens to be the only state where you can legally grow magic mushrooms (psilocybin-containing mushrooms).
  • Over 57% of Hawaiian residents identify as Asian American, so it’s no surprise that Mulan (1998) is a favorite for the Aloha State.
  • The Beehive State, with the youngest average population in the US, had a fourteen-way tie for its top Disney classic. No other state but Utah had a tie for its favorite movie.

Canada’s Favorite Disney Classics

Canada loves Disney movies too! Bambi (1942), Beauty and the Beast (1991), The Lion King(1994), and The Little Mermaid (1989) were among its top favorites.

How We Got Our Results

First, our team of analysts made a list of the twenty-five most popular Disney classic films. To do this, we cross-referenced all the Disney movies through the end of the Disney Renaissance (1999), starting with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. We used title familiarity, popularity, and cultural relevance within Disney theme parks to whittle it down to the top twenty-five.

After settling on the twenty-five most popular titles, we used Google Trends data to discover which films US states and Canadian territories and provinces showed the most interest in over the past five years.


Top 25 Disney Classics by Era

  • Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs(1937)
  • Pinocchio (1940)
  • Fantasia (1940)
  • Dumbo (1941)
  • Bambi (1942)
  • Cinderella (1950)
  • Alice in Wonderland (1951)
  • Peter Pan (1953)
  • Lady and the Tramp (1955)
  • Sleeping Beauty (1959)
  • 101 Dalmatians (1961)
  • The Jungle Book (1967)
  • The Aristocats (1970)
  • Robin Hood (1973)
  • The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (1977)
  • The Fox and the Hound (1981)
  • The Little Mermaid (1989)
  • Beauty and the Beast (1991)
  • Aladdin (1992)
  • The Lion King (1994)
  • Pocahontas (1995)
  • The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
  • Hercules (1997)
  • Mulan (1998)
  • Tarzan (1999)

How did we do?

How does your state’s favorite movie match up with yours? Is it from the same era or hardly related at all? Let us know in the comments below!

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