Did You Know?
Some film histories erroneously cite this as the first animated cartoon, ignoring not only Humorous Phases of Funny Faces (probably the first true animated cartoon), but even Winsor McCay's own earlier work, Little Nemo (1911) and How a Mosquito Operates.
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This film required Winsor McCay and his assistant John A. Fitzsimmons (who traced the backgrounds) to create 10,000 drawings, which they inked on rice paper and mounted on cardboard. Although later animators created techniques (such as the "slash system" and especially celluloid-over-paper) that would eliminate the need to redraw backgrounds or stable objects, McCay was working without precedents. Consequently, he chose to redraw the entire picture - Gertie and the richly-detailed background - for each frame.
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A counterfeit version of this film has surfaced. It is very similar to the original, except the background is in grey instead of white, and there is a sequence with a monkey climbing a tree.
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In animation historian Jerry Beck's 1994 poll of animators, film historians and directors, this cartoon was rated the sixth greatest cartoon of all time.
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