Joel Chandler Harris of his published Uncle Remus stories, including "" (1880), "Nights with Uncle Remus" (1883), "Uncle Remus and His Friends" (1892), "The Tar Baby and Other Rhymes of Uncle Remus" (1904), "" (1905), "Uncle Remus and Brer Rabbit" (1907). The last three books written by Joel Chandler Harris were published after his death which included "Uncle Remus and the Little Boy" (1910), "Uncle Remus Returns" (1918), and "Seven Tales of Uncle Remus" (1948). The tales, 185 in sum, became immensely popular among both black and white readers in the North and South. Few people outside of the South had heard accents
Song of the South scope and fidelity. "I always felt that Uncle Remus should be played by a living person", Disney commented, "as should also the young boy to whom Harris' old Negro philosopher relates his vivid stories of the Briar Patch. Several tests in previous pictures, especially in "The Three Caballeros", were encouraging in the way living action and animation could be dovetailed. Finally, months ago, we 'took our foot in hand,' in the words of Uncle Remus, and jumped into our most venturesome but also more pleasurable undertaking." Disney first began to negotiate with Harris' family for the rights in 1939, and