Mr. Kamen, a former Omaha boy, happened to meet Walt Disney while at a party in Kansas City, Mo. Walt liked Kay, Kay liked Walt and what do you have? A partnership with Disney at the head as creator, and Kay Kamen as chief of the advertising end.
Kay Kamen began advertising for his nephew, Mickey, in a big way. His campaign now stretches to eighty-eight different countries. Each country packed with admirers of Mickey and his sweetheart Minnie. This is also proof of Mickey’s evergrowing popularity not only in this country but also abroad. Since Kay Kamen started less than seven years ago to advertise Mickey (if there was need of that) Mickey has traveled back and forth across the continent in thousands of different forms.
Mickey is not only a feature of amusement, but he has also turned into an economist. New fields have been opened for him. New acclaim has come to him in the form of sales products, for licenses have been given to the business concerns throughout the world in order for them to give to the public Mickey Mouse in different forms. Mickey Mouse is now obtained by adults and children all over in the form of everything from a collar button to a cake of soap. All this is due to the brilliant advertising and personality of Kay Kamen.
“Yoo hoo, Minnie, it’s Mickey.” Led by this familiar salute of a small black and white figure running across the silver screen, 65,000 adults, men and women together, clap their hands. What greater proof could be given to the public in answer to the questions, “Is Mickey Mouse as popular with the adults as with the children?”
Vehement in his protest against those who say that Mickey Mouse is dying out as a public figure, Kay Kamen, advertising manager for Mickey and his creator Walt Disney, spoke to the representative for the Register while sitting in a dental chair. With his mouth full of cotton, and a towel around his neck, he managed to give his proofs that such a calamity would never happen.
“Mickey will be popular for a long time to come,” said Mr. Kamen, “In fact, he will be popular as long as there are children. The children who are still too young to appreciate him now will be grown up in a few years and will love him as their elders do now. Mickey has grown to be a national figure to the youngsters of this country. To the older ones he is an ever ready source of amusement and to the younger ones he is a pal and confederate. How can anything like this die out?"
