JAY HORAN: How did you decide to work for the Disney studio and what was the initial series of events that led to your first job here?
CLAUDE COATS: A man named Phil Dike was a very good watercolorist around southern California and he had been hired by Walt to try to inject some more art into the background part of the studio at that time. He knew of my work. I had been exhibiting in art galleries, art shows, watercolors, around, while I was going to USC and afterward. And so, through a mutual acquaintance, why, I came out and interviewed. He had me do several other samples and he gave me some hunches and ideas about what I should aim at. So I did some other backgrounds, I think I still have them around somewhere, that were sort of my idea of what the backgrounds could be for different types of pictures. Finally, an opening came up in the Background Department and I started as an apprentice, just doing overlays and simple things, and then finally got into the background work. [...]
