J.B. Kaufman is an author and film historian who has published extensively on topics including Disney animation and American silent film. He is coauthor, with Russell Merritt, of two essential reference works on Disney animation history: Walt in Wonderland: The Silent Films of Walt Disney (1992; winner of the Kraszna-Krausz Award and the Society for Animation Studies' Norman McLaren-Evelyn Lambart Award, and chosen by The New York Times as a Notable Book of the Year), and Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies: A Companion to the Classic Cartoon Series (2006). Kaufman was also a regular contributor to the Griffith Project at Le Giornate del Cinema Muto, the distinguished annual silent-film festival in Pordenone, Italy.Photo: Rob McHenry