The supply of vintage Frontierland scans from our Mysterious Benefactor is not infinite, but there are still plenty left! Here's a batch, all from 1977.
We'll start with this scarce shot taken inside the canteen in Fort Wilderness. You could get sodas, and probably some snacks; there's a barrel that has dill pickles, assuming that it isn't a prop. Maybe you'd like to gnaw on a dried ham hanging from the rafters. Mmmmm, salty. The CM dressed very much the way I do on a daily basis.
The next three are from the towers of the fort, with bloodthirsty children aiming rifles at clueless passers-by. Hey kid, get a haircut! Who do you think you are, Peter Frampton?
Frampton doesn't care what I think about his hair, he just wants to aim at another guest. I assume that the box below the rifle played realistic gunshot sounds?
Oh no, if you thought little boys were terrors, wait until you see little girls! These two are working in tandem. "A little to the left... be sure you hit a large muscle...". Gruesome.
Let us move to something a little more peaceful. Like a family of deer down by the river. There's a buck, several does, and even a spotted fawn. Awwww!
Major-
ReplyDeleteThe canteen inside the fort-! Now we're talking. I can almost remember the smell inside it. These are all great shots; even without the pun.
Another round of applause for the M. B.-! Thanks, Major.
I miss that Tom Sawyer Island! Once I remember a friend a I got apple cider and buffalo Jerky at the Fort Wilderness Canteen -I also remember another time getting a Hostess Apple Fruit Pie at “Fishin’ Pier Snacks. This is odd because while I’d always want to go to Tom Sawyer Island, after about an hour of exploring I’d get anxious and want to head back to the mainland to go on attractions!!
ReplyDeleteI know from research that Tom Sawyer Island cast member costume in the Canteen is NOT the actual Canteen costume - this might be a photo set-up. And what’s that white stick with smoke coming out of it between the man in the blue shirt’s fingers!???.....how stupid he looks!
I have many versions of the Disneyland Tom Sawyer Island map and three versions from Tokyo Disneyland; but has anyone ever seen a souvenir Tom Sawyer Island map for Walt Disney World?? I have not - but who knows . I speculate the answer is NO as Florida featured several billboard like signs featuring a map of the island ....how cool if such a souvenir map did exist!
Thank you Major and Generous Benefactor!!
I love the rare shot of the F.W. Canteen interior. It looks like there are some figs or some other kind of fruits or vegetables in jars on the shelf behind the cast member's head. And looking into that storage room, I see what looks like a silver canister/tank of soft drink syrup. That is how our Pepsi, Root Beer and Sprite came, when I was working at Knott's. It would get hooked up to a CO2 line and then the two were mixed with water at the soda fountain on the serving counter. Next to that tank, there are two stacked cardboard boxes. The boxes are labeled, "4 1-GAL." of something. This is how the boysenberry punch came at Knott's. There would be four, one gallon plastic containers of concentrate. They would get poured into a large tank and then mixed with water at the soda fountains. I see a punch "bubble-ator" (or whatever those dispensers are called), on the other side of that short wall behind the napkin holder. I wonder if the Canteen sold some kind of punch that was unique to the island or unique to Frontierland? After all, Tomorrowland had it's "Space Mist," Adventureland had it's "Jungle Juleps," and New Orleans Square had it's "Mint Juleps." I forget what Fantasyland had. Wasn't it "Tinkerbell Tonic" or something like that? Maybe the Canteen was serving Fort Wilderness Frappe?
ReplyDeleteTOKYOMAGIC: in regards to a special drink in Frontierland : yes there was!! It was called a FRONTIER FREEZE!!
ReplyDeleteMike, oh yeah! Thanks! What was the Fantasyland drink called? Was it Tinkerbell's something or other?
ReplyDeleteNow pickle barrels... that's something they need to bring back! I can just imagine after all that tiresome exploring on the island, kids would really be hankering for that sweet, vinegary taste of a dill cucumber!
ReplyDeleteAnother thing kids everywhere loved was causing MASS DESTRUCTION with the rifles of the fort. It's sad that children of today will never get that experience. (unless they go to Florida!)
I remember going to the Fort wilderness Snack Bar quite a bit to get some lemonade and a brownie after running a round the island.
ReplyDeleteI also remember getting the Frontier Freeze over at the Delta Banjo or one of those food concessions in between Golden Horseshoe and River Belle Terrace. I really liked those.
Speaking of guns, my uncle down in Culver City used to always take me to the indoor shooting range in L.A. where he'd teach me how to use his hand gun and let me practice shooting with it when I was only 13 years old. I enjoyed it, but it didn't make me a gun enthusiast. It was either that or go to my aunt's church for a "tent revival" style outing. It was either God or guns in that family.
Thanks, M.B. and Major.
I will admit that even as an adult I have taken a few pot shots at Big Thunder Mountain Railroad from the fort at WDW. The trains swooping by make great moving targets! Long live WDW's fort!
ReplyDeleteMajor, I always suspected you were straw hat kinda guy. Now I can picture you sitting at your computer, typing feverishly, straw flying everywhere. Just like I imagine Nanook always wearing a parka. When Fort Wilderness closed to guests, the first thing I thought of was, what were they thinking? I am a sucker for all things Frontierland, and these pics don't disappoint. Thanks Major.
ReplyDeleteOh this is great stuff. Amazing pictures of things long-missed.
ReplyDeleteThanks Major and MB.
@Tokyo, those cardboard boxes are undoubtedly drink syrup of some kind. I've designed several fast-food/convenience store-type service areas and that system was called "bag and box". The drink syrup is in a plastic bag in the cardboard box, the plain soda water comes in the silver tank cylinder and the boxes are hooked to it with hoses. The soda pop is mixed in the dispenser nozzle when the handle is pressed. I have also seen the soda pop pre-mixed in the silver tanks, but the bag-and-box method has a much higher capacity and can do multiple flavors with fewer tanks. I don't know if this is still used or not.
Maybe this was the Frontierland Freeze? I never had one of those. Mint Julep or Space Mist for me.
I'm sure that the effort of schlepping the supplies over and the garbage back again might have been part of the equation to close the canteen on the island. This had to be a lot of work, but it's sad to not have food on the island any more.
I had a straw hat much like the CM, very trendy and stylish. I think it was won at a carnival. Also had a slick blue shirt like the customer, in short-sleeve, but did not wear it with the straw hat.
Also digging the wood-grain painted cash register. I wish we could read the menu whose corner is visible upper left.
Peter Frampton is aiming for center-mass. Yes, Major, the wood-grained boxes produced the gunfire sounds, but some were always broken. The guns were free, no coins required to shoot. The wood post in the foreground is the stair railing post. These seemed to be real wood, not fiberglass or plastic as they would be today. There was a little bench or curb in front of the guns so shorter kids could play too.
Those deer are relatively inexpensive, you can see just a couple of bucks.
Thanks everyone. A great GDB day.
JG
I'll take the old TSI over Pirate's Lair, thank you. Seems to me that the current theme is becoming passe. KS
ReplyDeleteTOKYOMAGIC:
ReplyDeleteI’m sure there must have been a Fantasyland specific punch but I can’t recall one - I only remember the Welch’s Grape Juice.
These were all I could remember :
ADVENTURELAND : Jungle Julep ( available now again at Bengal BBQ)
FRONTIERLAND: Frontier Freeze and Huck’s Punch
NEW ORLEANS SQUARE: Mint Julep and Mardi Grais Punch
TOMORROWLAND: Space Mist Punch
With the exception of Mint Julep ( later called New Orleans Mint Julep) all the specialty freezes/punches seem to disappear around 1983-1984. They seem to have been replaced with MORE Coca-Cola offerings and flavors like Fanta, Cherry Coke etc.
If you get a chance to order the limited re-introduction of the Jungle Julep do! It seems to taste exactly the way I remember it or expected it to taste - maybe sweeter however.
CORRECTION: Huck’s Punch should be HUCK FINN FREEZE
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorites at Disneyland was getting a pickle from the Fort's canteen when I was a kid! They had the most sour pickles I'd ever had! I think the barrel was real and held the pickles, but my memory could be wrong.
ReplyDeleteNanook, cool that you have an olfactory memory of the canteen. I didn’t even realize that it existed until other people told me.
ReplyDeleteMike Cozart, Hostess Fruit Pies! My favorites. Or at least they were at one time. Cherry, thank you very much. “Fishin’ Pier Snacks”, another place I was unaware of. You are probably right about the photo being a setup, since these images were taken for publicity purposes. I’ve seen an old black and white photo in which the person behind the counter was a young woman in “Indian Maiden” attire. I guess I just assumed that WDW’s Tom Sawyer Island had souvenir maps like Disneyland - interesting that they didn’t make them (apparently) for the Florida version.
TokyoMagic!, yes, I was trying to make out what some of the other stuff was on the shelves, but didn’t have much luck. Thank you for pointing out the soft drunk paraphernalia! I wonder if Knotts’ boysenberry punch was always from concentrate? The last time I was there, it seemed very watery and weak to me, maybe they added too much water. My memories of it when I was a kid is that it was intense, sweet, tart, and delicious! I still remember the little hard plastic cups it was served in. The Fantasyland drink was called “Toad Tonic”. Now with more toad! ;-)
Mike Cozart, whoa, that’s a new one for me.
TokyoMagic!, I had NO IDEA that each land had its own unique drink!!
Penna. Andrew, I remember a Jean Shepard story in which the family goes to a county fair, and one of the many things they ate was a dill pickle the size of a baby. Of course it all ended messily on one of the carnival rides!
K. Martinez, lemonade and a brownie, the snack that has everything a growing boy needs! I used to have a roommate who was into guns, and went with him to a nearby indoor shooting range. The thing that made a big impression on me was that the little booths where each shooter stood often had bullet holes in the booth. ou could just imagine some newbie holding a loaded pistol the wrong way and pulling the trigger accidentally. Yikes! I hope nobody got hurt.
stu29573, I guarantee that every boy, girl, man, and woman who looked down the scope of one of the fort’s guns aimed at something naughty!
Jonathan, straw hats are handy because you can feed them to your horse. You DO have a trusty horse as a sidekick, don’t you? The loss of Fort Wilderness is a real bummer, especially since it is primarily used for “Fantasmic!”, a show that takes place for maybe an hour in the evenings. Never mind the other 12 hours of the day!
JG, I have learned more about soda syrup and soda pop systems today than I have in the previous years of my life! “Frontierland Freeze” tasted like a beef jerky Slurpee. Your theory about why the canteen was closed might be right, but I would think that on a hot day, they could sell a ton of soda for a tidy profit. I used to wear a straw hat when I went hiking, but now I prefer a floppy cloth hat. I still think the whole accident with the girl losing a finger is the strangest thing; I’m sorry she lost her finger, but… how in the world did it happen?
KS, the Pirates Lair theme seems kind of anemic, maybe if they had gone for it more; I’ve heard about a cool scene inside the caves, other than that, there’s not much to it.
Mike Cozart, so the “Jungle Julep” is different than the mint julep?
Mike Cozart, aw, I liked “Huck’s Punch” better.
Anon, I believe that I have read other people’s recollections of a real barrel full of pickles. I didn’t know they were so sour though.
These are some cool shots of a rarely photographed area. Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDelete77' was pretty much a Frampton fest year wasn't it. So popular they threw him into an episode of Baa Baa Black Sheep on NBC. He played an Australian who spotted enemy activity on small islands and conditioned his flowing locks.
http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/black-sheep-squadron/images/31377349/title/peter-frampston-black-sheep-squadron-wallpaper
Great memories, made more bitersweet by the fact that we can never, ever experience them again.
ReplyDelete"Nostalgia is the feeling when you're happy that you're sad." - JG
I have that quote written on my whiteboard at work.
Alonzo, I remember watching that episode when it first aired. Didn't he live on an island he called "England," with "France" just across the channel? I remember, oh, what's-his-name - the guy who later played Corky on Tales of the Gold Monkey - getting shot down and being overjoyed to find his parachute had landed him on "France" and a rescue by Peter Frampton, Coastwatcher.
I don't think anyone uses those 5-gallon steel kegs (called Corny kegs for their manufacturer - Cornelius) for soda any more, the bag-in-box has totally replaced it in places with soda fountains.
ReplyDeleteThe kegs are mostly used by homebrewers now. I have several in my basement right now, though only one of them has beer in it at this moment.
You can still buy pickles from a barrel in several places in WDW these days. Though the barrel is more of a barrel-shaped cooler, and the pickles are individually wrapped to keep them sanitary.
ReplyDeleteThey're good on a hot day, which is pretty much any day in Orlando.
Mike, thanks for all that additional info on the drinks of the "lands."
ReplyDeleteKen, if you remember buying lemonade at the Canteen, then I bet the 4 one gallon containers in those cardboard boxes, were lemonade concentrate. Now the question is, was the lemonade pink or regular? Oh! I just remembered that the Original Berry Stand at Knott's, also sold pink lemonade, which came in plastic bottles, just like the boysenberry punch concentrate. It was also mixed with water, but it was poured into a rectangular dispenser that sat on the counter top. I don't remember it "spewing" or "bubbling" within the dispenser like the Disneyland ones did. When the dispenser ran out of lemonade, it was kind of gross to see all the pink "pulp" stuck on the bottom. It was just a reminder of all the food coloring that must have been added to make it pink.
Major, the last time that I had the "Berry" Punch at Knott's, I also thought it tasted watered down, compared to how it tasted when I worked there. They do sell small bottles of the berry punch concentrate at the park, so you can take it home and make it as strong you want!
@Major, I am a veritable well of useless information. Just holding up the GDB tradition here. Now I want a beef jerky slurpee.
ReplyDelete@Dean Finder, yes, home brew seems to be the top use for those cylinders now, my neighbor had several. I'm out of the food service design business now, and have no idea what is current otherwise.
@Chuck, deeply moved that you would remember that. I'm going to write it down here too.
@Mike and Tokyo, yes indeed, thanks for the detailed drink menu information. Fun stuff.
JG
Dean Finder, that's awesome about the pickles!
ReplyDeleteOne of my favorite books when I was a kid was about a girl who went to live with her cousins on the farm. When she went to the county fair, her cousin told her not to drink the pink lemonade because the vendors probably washed their hands and dishes in it, and "Lord knows what else."
ReplyDelete