Document details

A labor of love encompassing 3.5 years, thousands of miles in travel, and dozens of students comes to fruition as Buena Vista University premieres a documentary March 28 in Anderson Auditorium on campus. A second screening in southern California follows on March 30.

“Growing Magic: The Mickey Mouse Cornfield Story” is a 60-minute documentary written and produced by BVU digital media students under the direction of Jerry Johnson, assistant professor of digital media and avowed Walt Disney fanatic.

The 8 p.m. documentary shows how a 520-acre “card” for Mickey Mouse’s 60th birthday generated international news and acclaim for the Walt Disney Company and hundreds of northern Iowa residents that made it happen.

The idea to plant crops in the summer of 1988 in a way in which a silhouette of Mickey Mouse could be seen by airline travelers was the brainchild of Jack Lindquist, then-vice president of publicity for Disneyland. “Jack would fly between Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida, and Disneyland in Anaheim, Calif., and he’d often go over Texas and see oil field circles below. If three circles were grouped together, it would look like Mickey,” Johnson says.

Lindquist asked Disney pilots if they knew what the most flown-over region of the Continental U.S. was at that time. They reported it was over north-central Iowa and southern Minnesota. Lindquist and Mimi Schaaf, special events coordinator for the Walt Disney Company, contacted Dr. Mike Boehlje of Iowa State University Extension in Ames as they inquired about crop lands in north-central Iowa. Boehlje directed them to his uncle, Walter Boehlje, who owned land near tiny Dougherty in Cerro Gordo County.

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