Two fairy tales for the price of one? Yes, please! Disney often packaged together two stories in one feature length movie during the 1940s, and one of them was the unlikely combo of Mr. Toad and Ichabod Crane.  The first was inspired by Kenneth Grahame's classic The Wind in the Willows and the second was based on Washington Irving's book, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

Narrated with the imposing enunciation of Basil Rathbone, the first story recountsthe adventures of J. Thaddeus Toad, a vain and silly country squire (and amphibian), who has a penchant for all modes of transportation--especially the newly invented motorcars. Toad's friends and neighbors, Mole, Rat and Badger, who always try to rein in Toad's flights of fancy with not much success.

Toad's rabid desire to own a motorcar leaves him vulnerable to a group of weasel thieves who sell him a stolen automobile. When Toad is arrested for grand theft auto, his loyal horse, Cyril Proudbottom (that name just had to be mentioned), stages Toad's daring escape from jail. Mole, Rat and Badger help their gullible friend clear his name and recover his home from the weasely weasels.

The story of Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman are taken from the Washington Irving short story about a cowardly schoolteacher who runs afoul of a specter in colonial upstate New York. Ichabod is a beanpole of a man, awkward in all social situations. Despite that, he sets his cap at the town's richest and most beautiful maiden, Katrina van Tassel. Sadly for Ichabod, Katrina is intended for the local bully, Brom Bones, who delights in tormenting the mild-mannered teacher.

Ichabod finds Katrina's beauty (and wealth, let's not forget the wealth) irresistible, so Brom pulls out the big guns: at the van Tassels' Halloween dance, he terrifies Ichabod with the legend of a headless horseman who rides along a local road in search of his head. Poor Ichabod then ventures into the dark night alone, only to meet up with the headless ghost. Just when Ichabod thinks he's ridden far enough and fast enough to escape the danger, the horseman hurls a flaming jack o' lantern at him and everything fades to black. The smooth, mellow voice of narrator Bing Crosby then tells us that nobody has seen Ichabod since that night. Boo.

This was one of the last package films Disney made, opting to lay out single story narratives instead, starting with Cinderella in 1950. The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad was well received; it's been shown as a whole movie or split up in its two component stories. Ichabod Crane is a particular favorite vignette on TV around Halloween time.