Friday, September 27, 2013

Two From October 4, 1957

Today's images come from a group of only four slides. Four! Who goes to Disneyland and only takes four pictures? Of course, I go to Disneyland and take NO pictures, but I am normal. Very very normal. Anyway, the slides were hand-dated "October 4, 1957", and I always love it when I can look up the gory details of a specific day (thanks to Jason's Disneyland Almanac). 

October 4 was a Friday. It was a Date Nite; the park opened at 10 am and closed at midnight; the high temperature was a pleasant 75 degrees, but bring your overcoats, because the low was 53. And - my favorite bit of data - the attendance was a mere 6,738. Amazing. And hard to imagine.

Presumably all the kids were in school during the day, so we see a lot of old-timers exploring the park. This is a lovely view of the entrance to Adventureland in its pre-Tiki Room incarnation.


From the poop deck (hee hee!) of the Pirate Ship we get this view of Fantasyland. I like that huge, ornate stern - wonder who wound up with that when the ship was reduced to toothpicks? Skyway buckets glide above the Teacups, with Mr. Toad's Wild Ride and Peter Pan's Flight in the background.


5 comments:

Nanook said...

"Poop Deck"-! Oh, Major, you're such the wordsmith-!.

I see the photographer appeared to plop the camera down alongside one of the wooden trim features of the ship, which was adjacent to (what appears to be) an oversized lantern. It's a great shot.

Thanks, Major.

Irene said...

This phrase comes to mind when viewing these photos - quality vs. quantity :)

Melissa said...

George Washington grimly watched the elderly couple as they crossed the bridge. He had once crossed a river himself, to face the cursed Hessians at Trenton, but he had had nothing but a historically inaccurate boat and flag to carry off the task. If he’d had a paved bridge like this plaid-clad fellow, he might have brought his lady wife himself. But these shores looked less like the chilly banks of the Delaware and more like the cannibal-infested isles of John Cook’s Pacific ordeals.

He hoped that beneath her commodious gray cloak, the Scotsman’s good wife carried enough sour krout, mustard, vinegar, wheat, inspissated orange and lemon juices, saloup, portable soup, sugar, molasses, malt, and wort to stave off the scurvy and scorbutic taint that had carried off many a younger crew venturing to such inhospitable lands. He supposed that after the necessity of firing upon the inhabitants of this Adventure-Land, peaceful relations would be established, and a brisk trade in much-wanted refreshments would be set up.

He entertained the very high sense of the enlightened zeal which had led them so cheerfully to quit their families and homes and the comforts of private life to undertake and thus far to perform a long and fatiguing march and to encounter and endure the hardships and privations of their journey. Their conduct hitherto afforded him a full assurance that their perseverance would be equal to their zeal and that they would continue to perform with alacrity - whatever the full accomplishment of the object of their march should render necessary.

***

The Skyway with old-fashioned round buckets looks like a string of Japanese lanterns festooning the sky over the outdoor fair that is Fantasyland. Or are they ever so many sugar bowls waiting to sweeten the teacups below? I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – the tournament tent look may have been a money-saving backup plan, but boy, did it work in spades. The colors! The shapes! The planes, in all four dimensions! Just like Tomorrowland ’67 and the it’s a small world façade,, it looks like it’s constantly moving even when nothing’s happening at all.


Major Pepperidge said...

Nanook, I sat at the little table next to the Algonquin Round Table. I'm not sure if the photographer rested the camera on the railing, but it does seem sort of low.

Irene, that's nice of you to say!

Melissa, George has nothing to complain about... he got to stand in the boat while everyone else did the work. And the only reason he went was to get that silver dollar that he had thrown years before. I like the analogy of the Skyway buckets and Japanese lanterns... it never occurred to me before, but I think it is apt.

Nanook said...

Major-

Yes - I sensed a bit of Dorothy Parker; or was it Charles MacArthur-?