Free Republic

Actor Eddie Carroll, the official voice of classic Disney character Jiminy Cricket, died Tuesday morning, the International Jack Benny Fan Club reported. He was 76. Carroll had portrayed Jiminy since 1973, two years after the death of Cliff Edwards, who originally voiced the famous cricket. The Canadian-born actor assumed the role of Jiminy for all manner of Disney media, including the Kingdom Hearts video game series (2002's "Kingdom Hearts" and 2005's "Kingdom Hearts II") and the 1999 video game "Disney's Villains' Revenge."

Entrepreneur who became icon of family values shied away from religious imagery, and none of his company's theme parks contains a church. Disney may have colonised the imagination of the world's children for the best part of 80 years, but - remarkably in one of the world's most ostentatiously Christian countries - the entertainment company has done so without the aid of God, a new book points out. The Gospel According to Disney: Faith, Trust and Pixie Dust, by Mark Pinsky, an American journalist and best-selling author of a similar book about The Simpsons, shows that the film industry's most...

OBITUARY Ward Kimball, 88 Reuters News Agency Los Angeles — Pioneering animator Ward Kimball, who helped modernize Mickey Mouse's look in 1938 and created the character Jiminy Cricket for the Disney classic Pinocchio, died Monday at age 88. Mr. Kimball, a member of Walt Disney's trusted cadre of cartoon artists known as the "nine old men," died of natural causes at at a hospital in Arcadia, a suburb northeast of Los Angeles, the Walt Disney Co. said in a statement. During a Disney career that stretched from 1934 until his retirement in 1973, Mr. Kimball animated or served as directing...