Trivia for
Balto (1995)

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• Brendan Fraser was originally hired to provide the voice of Steele, the evil dog. He did record his part but his voice-over was subsequently discarded and the role went to Jim Cummings.
  
  
• The last feature by Amblimation, the animation studio run by Steven Spielberg in the early 1990s. The studio closed after Spielberg co-founded Dreamworks with David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg, and most of the Amblimation staff relocated to Dreamworks Animation.
  
  
• The full cast of 'The Complete Works of William Shakespeare - Abridged' do various other voice acting parts in the film.
  
  

• After the serum run, Gunnar Kasaan, the musher, sold Balto on a nationwide tour. Afterward, the real Balto and his team were sold to a movie producer named Sol Lesser, who made a movie called Balto's Race to Nome (1925), eulogizing Balto. After that, the team was sold again and put on exhibit as a kind of curiosity show. The dogs were abused, neglected, and forgotten until a Cleveland businessman named George Kimbal, with the help of Cleveland school children, bought the six remaining dogs for the then astounding sum of $2,000, which they raised in two weeks. The dogs were brought to the Cleveland Zoo and lived out their lives in peace. When Balto died in 1933, he was stuffed and put on display in the Cleveland Museum of Natural History.
  
  
• The real Balto was named after the Sámi explorer Samuel Balto.
  
  
• Steele is named after North-West Mounted Police Superintendent Samuel B. Steele; one of the famous contingent of Mounted Police charged with keeping order during the chaos of the 1896-1899 Klondike Gold Rush.
  
  
• Today, the 1925 serum run is commemorated by the dog sled race known as the Iditarod.
  
  
• After the mission's success, Balto and Gunnar Kasaan became celebrities. A statue of Balto, sculpted by Frederick Roth, was erected in New York City's Central Park on December 17, 1925, just 10 months after Balto's arrival in Nome. Balto himself was present for the monument's unveiling. The statue is located on the main path leading north from the Tisch Children's Zoo. In front of the statue a low-relief slate plaque depicts Balto's sled team, and bears the following inscription: "Dedicated to the indomitable spirit of the sled dogs that relayed antitoxin six hundred miles over rough ice, across treacherous waters, through Arctic blizzards from Nenana to the relief of stricken Nome in the Winter of 1925. Endurance • Fidelity • Intelligence"
  
  
• There are many differences between the movie and what really happened, such as: *The sled run to get the medicine was actually a relay, and Balto was only the leader of the last team to carry the medicine to Nome. The longest and most hazardous distance was traveled by the team led by Togo. *This film portrays Balto as a wolf hybrid. Balto was actually a purebred Siberian Husky. *Balto was never an outcast as shown by the film, but was instead born in a kennel owned by the famous musher Leonhard Seppala, where he grew up until he was deemed fit for pulling a sled, Seppala was also the owner of Togo, whom he personally used during the relay, Balto was instead used by one of his workers, Gunnar Kasaan. *The real Balto was neutered by Seppala when he was only a few months old, meaning the puppies he has in the sequels never came to be.
  
  
• The real Balto was a Siberian Husky, but was made part wolf to make Balto a more interesting character.
  
  
• The real Balto died on March 14, 1933.
  
  
• The real hero of the 1925 serum run was Togo. The 12-year-old husky led his sled dog team through 260 miles of blowing Alaskan blizzard to deliver emergency diphtheria serum to Nome. Balto received most of the fame because he led the final 55 miles.
  
  
• Unlike the movie, the real Balto had bad press as "just a freight dog."
  
  
• The real Balto was not part wolf. He was a Siberian Husky.
  
  
• Jenna is a Siberian Husky.
  
  
• In 1925, after the serum run, the real Balto and his team starred in a movie called "Balto's Race to Nome".
  
  
• The race was actually a relay and consisted of around 20 sleds.
  
  
• Steele is a Siberian Husky.
  
  
• Born in 1923 in the small town of Nome, Alaska, Balto spent the first two years of his existence to carry food for the minors. He was considered rather slow and very little suited for this work.
  
  
• Kaltag is named after the Alaskan town of Kaltag.
  
  
• When Jenna, Sylvie, and Dixie are walking in the street, a Balto look-alike can be seen behind them being pulled by its owner. This dog is Balto's old design.
  
  
• The steam engine waiting at the Nenana depot is from the Alaska RR. Because of a storm, the Alaska RR was only able to send the serum from Anchorage to Nenana.
  
  
• Balto's mother, the white wolf, is named Aniu. "Aniu" is the Inuit word for snow.
  
  
• In the race to see which dog is the fastest for the team, Steele calls Balto "Lobo", which is Spanish for wolf.
  
  
• Boris is a Russian snow goose.
  
  
• Jenna's character design was based on Audrey Hepburn.
  
  
• Kaltag's character design is based on a Chinook.
  
  
• Nikki is a chow-chow.
  
  
• Sylvie is an Afghan.
  
  
• Luk was named for Luc Desmarchelier, a background artist.
  
  
• Star is an Alaskan Klee Kai.
  
  

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