On This Day - The Baby Einstein Company Launched

 "Hi I'm Julie Clark, Founder of the Baby Einstein Company. For more information about our developmental programs/products for babies and toddlers, visit our website at www.babyeinstein.com. Enjoy the show."
- Julie Aigner Clark, 2000

HAPPY 25TH ANNIVERSARY BABY EINSTEIN!

On this day, 25 YEARS AGO, Disney and Kids II Inc.'s The Baby Einstein Company LLC was first launched to the world. THe franchise originated in a series of episodes released on VHS "board books" that were meant to introduce children to the wonders of classical music, art and literature from 400 years ago.

It all began in the summer of 1996 to the winter of 1997 with the release of the first episode Baby Einstein: Language Nursery - Voices from Many Lands which was originally meant to introduce foreign languages. Since then, over 30 BE titles have been produced and the franchise has expanded into music soundtracks, books, discovery cards, toys, apparel, infant products and party supplies. The puppet characters in the episodes were also available to order for the comfort of your own home courtesy of Legends & Lore, Dakin/Applause, Folkmanis and PlaySoup.com.

The company was originally founded by the great Julie Aigner-Clark with her husband Bill Clark and Mark Burr serving as videographers, Bill Weisbach serving as music & sound design editors and Clive Smith and Tom Nazziola joining him as musicians remixing classical works with synthesizers. Aigner-Clark's own kids Aspen and Sierra have also appeared and contributed to the first 10 episodes among other children.

In 2002, Aigner-Clark resigned from the company after it was acquired by the Mickey Mouse House of The Walt Disney Company, Disney continued to produce the BE titles as well as the TV series Little Einsteins up until 2011. Since 2013, the company has been owned and distributed by Kids II Inc., although many BE fans aren't happy with their new copyright system blocking fanmade content which makes no sense.

Althoguh the company hasnt been perfect in recent years, BE has put in all their effort to educate and entertain a generation of youngsters. Congrats and hats off to the entire team who continue to make the BE success what it is.

I have recently been recruiting a few BE fans to contribute to my upcoming YouTube video special "Silver Einstein" a trilogy of tribute videos chronologicalizing the 25 year history of BE. The first installment will go through the first ten videos, the aformentioned Language Nursery that started it all through Baby Beethoven: Symphony of Fun, the second installment will go through the Disney era Baby Neptune: Discovering Water (2002) through Worlds of Rhythm (2011) and the third and final installment will go through the recent WeeSchool era Puppet Play shorts and Sweet Dreams (2016) through the recent title WeeSea (Thanksgiving 2017)

Thank you to Aigner-Clark for lighting up our childhood hearts to experience a love of the classical works known around the world.