Thursday, January 15, 2009

Tomorrowland, August 1958

It's time to spend a few moments in the Tomorrow of yesterday. A tomorrow in which the American flag has 48 stars (count 'em... I'll wait!). 1958, to be precise!

If I was standing in the hub, it would be pretty difficult for me to resist heading straight into Tomorrowland. Just look at it! As much as I love the rest of Disneyland, vintage Tomorrowland is the place I'd most want to see. Besides the Rocket to the Moon, the Autopia, the 20,000 Leagues attraction, and America the Beautiful, I would like to see all of those obscure sponsored exhibits in person. Wouldn't you??


From the same lot comes this very nice portait of the TWA rocket, while down below a crowd is gathered around the futuristic chain-link fence to watch model airplanes and boats being put through their paces.

6 comments:

Katella Gate said...

That first photo is beautiful... Just goes to show what great shots you can get when you stand in the flower beds.

Nancy said...

oh, you know i love Tomorrowland! the only thing missing in your first offering is a pair a white cat-eye sunglasses! we have the metal stroller, the paper hat on the little girl and the appropriate attire, from the black pedal pushers on the lady to the right of our plaid Beaver Cleaver's mom dress on our featured model...

of course, the lovely Disneyland posters are great, only better if we could actually SEE THEM!

too bad they got rid of those cool lights...they remind me of alien ships for some reason

Caroline said...

You know ... I think I know where that TWA spaceship ended up. My company Christmas party was held at an airline history mueseum in Kansas City, and there is a TWA space ship that looks EXACTLY like the one in the bottom picture. I even wondered about it while we were there (Boyfriend, of course, thought I was being completely weird).

Check out the website: http://www.airlinehistorymuseum.com/

I will have to go and take a picture for comparison ...

Caroline said...

Oh second thought ... maybe it's just a smaller version. It looks like the one in the bottom picture is giant sized. The one I saw was able to fit into an airplane hanger.

Major Pepperidge said...

I believe that the TWA rocket that is currently on top of the museum in Kansas City (and IS smaller than the one at Disneyland) is a reproduction of the one that stood on top of TWA headquarters from 1956 to 1962. I received some emails from the owner of that original one, he said that the museum wanted to buy his but he didn't want to part with it... so he helped them in building a new one!

The Viewliner Limited said...

What an awesome picture of TL. What more can you ask for than the moonliner and of course my favorite clock in the whole world. Great pictures Major. Appreciated.