Don Iwerks

Donald Warren Iwerks was born on July 24, 1929, in Dallas, Texas (per Wikipedia and Deadline), the elder of two sons of animator Ub Iwerks and Mildred Sarah (Henderson) Iwerks. His younger brother, David Lee Iwerks, became a portrait photographer. Don grew up in Southern California, first in West Los Angeles, before the family moved to the San Fernando Valley in 1936.

His father, who had co-created Mickey Mouse and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit with Walt Disney and later returned to Disney as a special effects engineer, gave Don his first camera at age 14. "He was absolutely my inspiration because he was technically minded. He made my childhood and formative years one of the greatest times of my life," Don told the Los Angeles Times in 1998. In his family's words, imagination and invention were woven into everyday life.

Iwerks graduated from Van Nuys High School in 1947. High school print, woodworking and metal shops sparked a lifelong fascination with craftsmanship and problem solving. He never received a formal engineering education. He worked as a machinist for a few years after school and became, in the words of his family's obituary, a self-taught engineer with an intuitive understanding of complex mechanical systems. His military service as a U.S. Army Signal Corps photographer in Germany during the Korean War was another practical training ground.

Disney (1950 to 1986). Iwerks joined the Walt Disney Studios Process Lab in 1950 as a special photographic processes laboratory technician. Drafted in 1951, he served about a year and a half in Germany as an Army Signal Corps photographer, then returned to Disney after his 1952 discharge. An allergic reaction to film chemicals led to his transfer to the Studio Machine Shop (Disney dates the move to early January 1953), where he worked alongside his father.

He worked on Walt Disney's miniature Barbershop Quartet, a forerunner of Audio-Animatronics, then moved into the Camera Service Department in 1954 and spent three months in the Bahamas maintaining underwater cameras for 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. He was camera technician on A Tour of the West, the first 360-degree Circarama film, shown when Disneyland opened in 1955, and on America the Beautiful for the 1958 Brussels World's Fair. For Italia '61 in Turin he taught an Italian crew to use the camera. He was lead camera technician on the True-Life Adventures series.

With Ub he refined the sodium vapor traveling matte process and built cameras and optical printers used in films such as The Birds (1963) and Mary Poppins (1964). He built equipment for the 1964 to 1965 New York World's Fair, was promoted to manager of the Machine Shop in 1965, and eventually led the Machine Shop, the Camera Service Department and the Technical Engineering and Manufacturing Division. Projects included the Xerox camera system for animation, a camera for The Hall of Presidents murals, endless loop film systems that ran up to 10,000 performances on one print, the patented ACES camera and model stand for The Black Hole (1979), Circle-Vision and The American Adventure at EPCOT, the 3-D cameras and in-theater effects for Captain EO, and the projection system for Star Tours.

Iwerks Entertainment (1986 to 2001). As Disney reorganized its engineering operations in the mid-1980s, Iwerks co-founded Iwerks Entertainment in 1986 with former Disney executive Stan Kinsey. Under his technical leadership it became a leader in giant-screen 8-perf 70mm cameras and projection, motion simulator rides and 3-D attractions for theme parks, museums, science centers and aquariums, with nearly 300 installations in 38 countries. It built the 3-D projection system for the Terminator attractions at Universal Studios Hollywood and Florida. With Disney Legend Bob Gurr he patented a reversible 70mm projector. SimEx acquired the company in 2001, and after about 15 years at its helm he stepped back from daily leadership.

Iwerks was married to Betty for 54 years. His sons Larry and John are landscape artists associated with the OAK Group of Santa Barbara, and John is married to Chris Chapman. His daughter Leslie Iwerks is an Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker whose work includes The Hand Behind the Mouse: The Ub Iwerks Story and The Imagineering Story. His daughter Tamara died before him. His great-nephew Mike, like Leslie, worked with The Walt Disney Company.

In retirement he travelled the country with Betty, painted landscapes, and kept designing inventions in the machine shop he built at home, often ending the day with a Manhattan. He was a devoted Los Angeles Dodgers fan.

Iwerks credited Walt Disney and his father for his work ethic and their focus on detail and quality. "There was a 'can-do' attitude I learned from Walt and my father," he said. "If you're doing a really first-class job, you don't need to worry about the money. It will come."

He saw technology as a servant of storytelling. Speaking in 1998 about the rise of digital effects, he said, "My view is that technology should support a good story and add to it. Technology for technology's sake? You still need good films." His family described him as humble, endlessly curious and unfailingly optimistic, a man who believed every challenge held the possibility of a solution.

Iwerks helped carry Disney's film and park technology from the 1950s Circarama camera to EPCOT's Circle-Vision theaters, Captain EO and Star Tours, then took immersive large-format and motion simulator entertainment around the world through Iwerks Entertainment. Disney CEO Josh D'Amaro said he "embodied that rare combination of heart, ingenuity, and passion that has always defined Disney."

His hand casts for the Abraham Lincoln figure in Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln became the "Iwerks Hands" used on many Audio-Animatronics figures. From 2007 he restored historic Disney cameras for The Walt Disney Family Museum, including the Multiplane camera, the Circarama rig, the 20,000 Leagues underwater cameras and the Mary Poppins Technicolor camera and optical printer. His 2019 book on his father helped secure Ub Iwerks's place as both the co-creator of Mickey Mouse and a major technical innovator. He was one of the last Disney employees to have worked directly with Walt Disney. He was a member of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers and the Academy's technical committee and an honorary member of the Visual Effects Society.

Gordon E. Sawyer Award, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (voted by the Board of Governors in 1997, presented at the 70th Academy Awards on March 23, 1998), for technological contributions to the motion picture industry.

Academy Scientific and Technical Award (1999) for the Iwerks 8/70 Linear Loop projection system, presented to Iwerks Entertainment.

Themed Entertainment Association Lifetime Achievement Award.

Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

Disney Legend (2009), inducted at the inaugural D23 Expo, with his handprints, beside his father's, at Legends Plaza on the Walt Disney Studios lot in Burbank.

Main Street, U.S.A. window at Magic Kingdom, shared with Ub Iwerks, above the Main Street Bakery: "Iwerks-Iwerks Stereoscopic Cameras. Ub Iwerks, Don Iwerks. Repairs and Modifications. No Two Exactly Alike."

Walt Disney's Ultimate Inventor: The Genius of Ub Iwerks (Disney Editions, 2019), written at age 90, is Don's biography of his father. In 2022 he completed a personal autobiography about his projects and life. He appeared in The Imagineering Story, the six-part Disney+ docuseries directed by his daughter Leslie, and in many interviews and podcasts about his father's legacy, including talks at The Walt Disney Family Museum.

Don Iwerks died peacefully on the evening of July 9, 2026, at the Ojai Community Memorial Care Center in Ojai, California, aged 96 and days before his 97th birthday. Disney announced his death on July 10, 2026. A specific cause of death was not made public. His family said he spent his final days surrounded by family and friends, still sketching inventions, cheering on the Dodgers and watching classic films. Arrangements were handled by Conejo Mountain Funeral Home in Ventura, and a celebration of life was to follow at a later date. In lieu of flowers, the family asked for donations to the Community Memorial Continuing Care Center of Ojai and The Walt Disney Family Museum.