Duck family (Disney) strip, Della writes to Donald that the boys had placed a firecracker under their father's chair as a prank and that their father had been sent to the hospital. This was the reason why the boys first showed up at Donald's house. Thereafter the father is generally assumed to have disappeared. In "The Richest Duck in the World", when Scrooge mentions that the few family members he had had disappeared, the boys respond "We know how "that" feels!" Donald's cousin Fethry Duck was created for the Disney Studio Program by Dick Kinney and Al Hubbard and was first used in
Donald Duck directed by Jack King (they had been earlier introduced in the Donald Duck comic strip by Al Taliaferro, see below). By 1938, most polls showed that Donald was more popular than Mickey Mouse. Disney could, however, help Mickey regain popularity by redesigning him, giving him his most appealing design as production for the "Fantasia" segment "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" began in 1938. After his early appearances, he went on to become part of the famed trio Mickey, Donald, and Goofy. He appeared in many of the cartoons, including "Moving Day". Several of Donald's shorts during the war were propaganda films, most