More than probably any other Disney creator including Carl Barks, Don Rosa has told tales from, and given hints (small and big) about the whole history of Duckburg. However, I have never seen this material put together to form a whole. This is an attempt to do so. I have used Don Rosa's stories as my main source for information used in this page. For the years 1947-1967. I have off course also used the great stories of Carl Barks as sources.




Duckburgs is a medium? sized city. It's not a small town or a village nor is it a big metropolis. It is located in the state of Calisota on the American western coast. It's known history started in June 1579 when British colonists and adventurers led by Sir Francis Drake and Malcolm? McDuck landed in a land then called Nova Albian (which has later become known as Calisota).

Duckburg is the home of world famous characters like Donald Duck, Huey, Dewey and Louie (his nephews who play an important role in The Junior Woodchucks organisation), Daisy Duck (his girlfriend), $crooge McDuck (his uncle and the richest duck in the world), Grandma (Elvira) Duck (his grandmother on his father's side), Gyro Gearloose (his inventor-friend) and the Beagle Boys (the bandits who never stop keep trying to steal $crooge's fortune).

The origin of the name Duckburg


First? appearance of the name Duckburg.

The name Duckburg probably first occurred in the last panel of the Barks story (WDC 49) "The tight-wire Artist / High-wire Daredevils" from 1944. Where a sign along the railway says "Duckburg 2096 miles".

The organisation of the chapters

This presentation of the history of Duckburg is divided into seven chapters. The chapters follows the natural shifts of the times in Duckburg like Sir Francis Drake's discovery of the area in 1579, Cornelius Coot's foundation of Duckburg in 1818, $crooge McDuck's arrival to the town in 1902, his return to public life in 1947 and his death in 1967. Based on this central events, the history of Duckburg can be seen to have gone through the following main phases:

In most stories by Carl Barks and Don Rosa the present is within the period 1947-1967. According to that, the following chapters may be divided into three different groups:

Don Rosa on history in the Duck universe

As this presentation will show. Don Rosa has given Duckburg a history far beyond the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s when most of his and Carl Barks' stories take place. Some people may still think that basically, Barks' Duck universe is a world without a history. Don Rosa disagree to that certain point of view, and explains his view this way:

"Then how could Barks do stories or make constant references to $crooge's early days? How could I have constructed a 12 part series, 212 pages, out of those references if they did not exist? And that doesn't even mention the many, many other writers who have told stories about $crooge's (or Donald's) past, but I choose to ignore those...

There must be a history to a universe, even if no one is writing every story about that history. And I can think of no other comic character that reeks of having a past history more than $crooge, who has lived so many adventures in so many times, according to all the past Duck writers. That's one reason the character fascinates me! History doesn't cease to exist simply because every story does not deal with it."

Don Rosa uses a lot of facts from real history in his stories, he says:

"EVERY HISTORIC DETAIL of EVERY STORY I have ever done is absolutely, 100% true, or at least true to the theories of some respectable historian somewhere. This applies to even such stories of mine that contain fantastic seeming historical facts, like "The Crocodile Collector", "The Guardians of the Lost Library", "The Lost Charts of Columbus", and "The Last Lord of Eldorado". I get a BIG thrill out of creating a (hopefully) entertaining adventure story based on 100% authentic facts. That's a challenge! It's simple to make up facts to build a story on. But using REAL history is more fun, and makes the story much, much more interesting (at least for me).

But, why do that when the readers all think I'm making it all up from scratch? Just because I like to do it that way, and my first goal is to entertain myself, the readers hopefully will enjoy what I enjoy, not always, but that's my tough luck. And why use real facts when writing stories about talking ducks? Because I do NOT see them as talking ducks. I literally see them in my mind's eye, in my heart-of-hearts, as human beings. I have been reading/looking at Barks' Ducks literally since birth, thanks to an older sister. And I never realised they were NOT supposed to be people. I thought that's how a cartoonist drew people. Some sort of "style". I didn't think about it. I just knew they were people. I mean, characters like Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, all that crap, those were cute animals, but Barks' characters had personalities and character and yes histories. They were people. My Ducks live in the real world with the real world history. I don't make up silly names for cities or historical characters and insult the readers' intelligence. The only difference in my Duck world and the real world is that the northern third of California is a 51st state called Calisota and people seem to either be depicted (but not to be in actuality) as somewhat resembling waterfowl or having pig or dog noses."