Monday, September 05, 2022

Canoe Guys!

It's time for another selection of photos, shared with us by GDB friend Ken S. ("KS" in the comments)! This time we are focusing on Canoe CMs. Ken kindly provided some personal recollections, which of course makes looking at the photos a much richer experience (his comments are in orange).

I like this series of shots.  47-48 years between them to be sure.  No ducks were harmed.  The first two shots are so typical of a day on the dock.  I almost feel I'm in the shot and can hear the conversations and laughter.


The west end of the dock was the congregation point...a shady and, as best we could, secluded area to sit down for a moment or two on a large 'dock box' which would contain our personal items or jackets as the sun warmed and cooled the temperatures.

Management did not want us to spend much break time "on stage" but it was also the place where our foreman would hang out checking schedules and...well...commanding the ship so to speak.  Not to mention that he would also be an instigator of such behavior until it reached a point that he would get us back to work.  But before the days of posting pictures on a social media platform in real time, there was a certain amount of freedom.  Today...we'd likely be fired.


Having the opportunity to clown around, take pictures and wait for them to be developed in a week or so gave us the latitude to deny all knowledge.  LOL  As I mentioned being all male...a lot of testosterone was present. And we got pretty good catching ducks to share with our guests and to demonstrate our hunting prowess.  The group shot with the ducks...pretty rare but that's what you get when somebody brings a camera!


The last shot was taken at a reunion party last year. Worked with all of them, 3 of which were on the canoes among other attractions. From left to right, 1) a retired commercial airline pilot, 2) successful real estate broker in Santa Fe (also pictured in the duck shot), 3) a former "rookie" CM which turned into a 40+ year career in the Disney Corporation...whom I believe is pictured in the first shot instructing guests about canoe etiquette, and selecting a paddle, while they are still in line.  Lastly, a well regarded architect working and living in Sydney, Australia.


As I get older in age, I get more reflective looking back.  And again, so many of us developed a strong camaraderie that social media brought us back together again in large numbers.  Seeing pictures of Disney marriages, many of us became a Best Man or Groom for each other.

So fun! THANK YOU to Ken S. for sharing these photos and memories of this cherished time. I for one am jealous.

There are more photos from Ken to come!

20 comments:

TokyoMagic! said...

I love vintage photos of cast members. Thank you so much, K.S., for sharing these with us! I'm looking forward to seeing more!

JB said...

Great shots of the Canoe guys. Not quite on-stage, not quite off-stage. I see that they are all wearing the summer version of their coonskin caps; the topless ones, mentioned here a while back. I love that the guys caught ducks on their trips around the Rivers of America. KS, you say that you "share" them with the guests. You hand the ducks to the guests in the canoe? Do they just release them back into the River?
Hmmm, these must not be the Animatronic Exploding Ducks that we talk a lot about here. I guess some real ducks fly in from time to time and mingle with the AEDs. You don't wanna grab the wrong ones!

Thank you very much for the Cast Member photos, KS! Looking forward to seeing what else you have to share with us. And thanks also to you, Major.

MIKE COZART said...

Ken these are great! The color quality of them film feels like they were taken recently rather than almost 50 years ago! I have question: regarding the costume shirt: were the sleeves pre-rolled up by costuming ( or permanently rolled up) or did you all roll them up yourself? I’m not 100% sure offhand but I think this costume was replaced around 1976/77.

I often want wonder what the social climate is today with park employees …. They definitely do not stay long anymore …. And it’s pretty much unheard of having castmembers work their way up thru management now. They pretty much have to leave and return later before that kind of promotion is considered.

I’m am closer to people I work with over the years with at Disney than I am with people I went to high school and college with ( some college friends were also Disney friends however) .

Good to know you are in contact with many of your Disneyland co-workers …. I imagine there are sone pretty harsh discussion about Disneyland today …. And the glory of Disneyland a 1/2 Century ago…….

Bu said...

These are awesome shots! When men were men and women were over in Storybook Land. I am all for non-traditional casting, but there...I've said it. My Storybook Land guide last week was about my age, and honestly, it was kind of creepy hearing him talk about fairy princesses. I suppose I could say the same of myself, I was one of five guys in a department of over 100 females. I was also not popular back then with some traditionalists. Males were only hired/cast/et al. because some guest cultures/security situations demanded it. These are not the guys who I saw on Canoes last week, although I was expecting a rough approximation. These are the West Side version of NASA over in Tomorrowland, or working at Retlaw on the Monorail. I would say that the Canoe guys, visibly, had more fun that the rest of us "normies". Everything seemed chill, and the leads (formerly foreman in my day) were always stern and "follow the rules!"...well: people do fall in the water, and the jocks can be unruly, so I suppose there needs to be some law and order. The photos exemplify the camaraderie and the joie-de-vie of the times. So wonderfully carefree, posing with the little duckies...lots of Pepsodent. These guys may have been around in the 80's one of the guys in the duck photo at the bottom looks like someone who married one of my co-workers...and shortly thereafter divorced...but I suppose all the guys at this time looked kind of alike. During the age of ticket books, when our Summer Canoe Team (the "Why Be Normals") would take some mornings in the Park and practice. The guys pretended to take our "D" tickets, but let us go for free. The guys ON the canoe (I think)were grateful for the muscle. I think the guests got the fastest ride EVER...we were BOOKING around that island- shouting and grunting. I think most of them were saying "stop splashing me!"...well...we tried, but we were also caught up in our own testosterone. We played to win, but only made it to the semi finals that year...which in some cases was OK as you went back to your normal course of sleep- no more 4am wake up calls! Alas, I went to the Park to see just a hint or moment of this...and unfortunately, you do not see this. I did not see anything like this. This is gone, and there is a new "this", and I'm not sure what that this is. Perhaps on a "round two", if I look more diligently (without a security detail) I might find a snippet of this. There has got to be this somewhere. Thanks Ken for sharing the photos and the memories- the Canoe guys were too cool for school.

JG said...

This is top GDB right here. Great pictures of Disneyland and the people who made it go, complete with stories and anecdotes.

I sure remember those hats, brilliant design to get the look with seasonal adjustment.

I wonder if there was duck for dinner some nights?

Thank you, KS and Major for a brief moment of what it was like.

JG

Stu29573 said...

These are great! Ah to be a teen again and working in a wonderful environment. Since I'm coming up on the ol' "6-0" in a week or so, I've been mourning my youth (a lot more than I did with the not so ol' "5-0.")
Anyway, those are NOT the AEDs. I'm sure experienced Rivermen learned to tell the difference very quickly...or their employment was cut short, as it were...
Bu, I've workes as an elementary school counselor for 24 years now, so I know what it's like to work in a traditionally female environment. Do I recommend it? No comment. Still, I think boys need men around, so I've stuck with it (although retirement nears).

Melissa said...

Huge thanks to both Ken and the Major. I was having a bit of a rough day, and these happy young men of yesterday and their reunited older selves made the world a little bit brighter.

It does indeed take people, and if the TRE crowd doesn't start remembering that and doing what it takes to hire and retain enough good people to make the parks run smoothly, they're going to regret it eventually. There's my Labor Day rant.

Major Pepperidge said...

Nanook, it’s too bad that the management seems to no longer value treating the CMs as the important part of the equation; one of my best friends, who’d never been to Disneyland until recently, was so put off my rude cast members that she never wants to go back. Pretty disappointing!

TokyoMagic!, I’m glad you liked these!

JB, if you don’t put a top on your coonskin cap, you save big money! The amount of coonskin that would ordinarily be used would circle the earth six times. Yes, I did the math. How do you catch a duck? Those things must be super tame. The ducks at our local park won’t let you get within 10 feet of them. And with Disneyland’s ducks being explosive, it was a bigger risk than it appears.

Mike Cozart, hmmm, I never even thought about the rolled-up sleeves, I’ll be curious to hear if individual CMs could decide to roll or not to roll. Or if it was done in costuming, of course. You’d think that the park would want folks who’ve had lots of experience working on rides or in a particular land, rather than hiring some USC grad who knows nothing about amusement parks, but does know how to cut live music (or whatever) to increase profits.

Bu, gee, what department had five guys but 100 females?? Also, your Storybook Land guide was 29? ;-) I would imagine that all that physical exertion for hours and hours would make even a rowdy canoe guy fairly mellow. “I just need to relax in this shade here, and maybe pet a duck”. I’m still not sure how it worked as far as getting on to a ride like the canoes. Did you have to request it? Did some person size you up and decide that you looked like you could handle a canoe paddle? I also wonder if they still do the canoe races? Growing up I always wished I lived close enough to Disneyland to work there, but it never happened. I think it would have been a great experience!

JG, I want to wear one of those crown-less coonskin caps, it would look good with my hi-top fade haircut (like “Kid” from Kid ’n Play). As for the ducks, I prefer to think that they were treated TO dinner, not eaten FOR dinner!

Stu29573, what are the “AEDs”? Antelopes, Elephants, and, er… some animal that starts with “D”? I’ve worked in jobs where I had many female coworkers, and in general it was nice, though (just like guys) there were some real jerks, occasionally.

Melissa, aw, I’m sorry you were having a rough day. Watch “The Compleat Tennessee Tuxedo” on Blu-Ray and you’ll cheer right up. It seems like the philosophy these days is that anybody is easily replaceable, no matter how hard they work or how much they care. But… i don’t want to get too negative!

K. Martinez said...

These are really great photos! Love this kind of stuff. Especially when shared with personal recollections.

What I always liked about the Davy crocket Explorer Canoes is the interaction between CM and guest. Thanks, KS. Looking forward to more.

Anonymous said...

So cool guys, thanks.

Over their shoulders the first shot, I see some of that calm awesome that Disneyland could really deliver, in this case that big lazy believable river you could take a true little journey upon. Being actually in the splashing water was always a favorite way. You would touch and smell Disneyland like no other attraction. … especially around the roaring waterfalls of Cascade Peak (sob) - shoot the rapids, pass the flaming cabin, sometimes hot enough to feel. Yell back at the kids shooting at you from Fort Wilderness, before disappearing beyond that mysteriously inaccessible far end of Tom Sawyer Island for a short while.
The canoe guys brought a wonderful bit of live acting too as real guides, besides legit oarsmen.

Some sweet sweet summer days. Happy Labor Day.

-MS

Melissa said...

The conversation about rolled-up sleeves reminded me of a play I was in a few years back where we all wore men's shirts with rolled-up sleeves. The sleeves were ABSOLUTELY stitched into the rolled-up position, because the last thing you wanted to have to do was fuss around with your sleeves onstage to keep them from unrolling.

Anonymous said...

Hi folks. Glad to see you enjoy these as much as I do today. And thanks for all the comments. Love reading all of them and wish we could just sit around a fire and have a discussion.

As for the caps, there was no other choice. This was the year around costume. If it was cold, we wore pea coats and maybe a tee shirt. But the canoes were a daytime attraction that only ran during good weather conditions. The shirts were long sleeved, but it was more comfortable and cooler to roll them up when we felt it appropriate. I can think of a fellow who couldn't roll them up high enough because of the size of his biceps...so he might rip the sleeve to get it higher. As I mentioned we had some football jocks with us...one that became a starting QB for the Seahawks...another played in the Rose Bowl. So sorry to hear of the disappointment with rude CMs. For the money paid today, a guest should expect excellence....not the lowest common denominator.

JB...we held on to the ducks and released them back into the river. We never handed them over to guests but they could pet them.

Major, I was just assigned to the canoes. I didn't ask for it. Part of the rotational enrichment for permanent employees. Lucky me. Some casuals were directly put there for a season. A couple of summers and it was time to do something different for a summer...so I asked for nights on Pirates.

MS...you just gave me a refresher course in traveling the river with the sights and sounds...and cold water...of yesteryear.

Mike, I agree that the bonds with the Disney folks are tighter...and more numerous...than my school days.

BU...I feel better that you agree some attractions were better suited being one sex or the other. I never had a desire to be on Storybook...it was unthinkable at the time. I can think of one of my canoe buddies being openly gay back then. But that's another story...we all laughed and chided each other. Now that's camaraderie my friends. All the best. KS

JB said...


Bu, I agree, the Canal Boats should have a female guide. It just feels right. For example, the guy on the right in the first or second photos, as a Storybook Land guide: "Yeah, over there, somewhere, that's where the rat lives... I don't know which rat... just a rat.... I ate a rat once. Wanna hear the story?"
Thanks for more canoe race and CM reminiscences.
Newsflash: DUCKS USE PEPSODENT!

JG, I have to admit that I too, wondered about "duck for dinner". But I decided not to mention it. Thanks for being 'that guy' and saying it out loud. ;-)

Major, "How do you catch a duck?" Reminds me of- Q: How do you get down from an elephant? A: You don't. You get down from a duck." (I thought that was a stupid joke even when I was 12 years old.)
Not sure if you were joking when you asked Stu what AEDs are. Just for the record: Animatronic Exploding Ducks.
Also, animals that start with "D": Dog, dingo, dugong, and donkey. Those are the ones that came to mind without 'cheating' by asking Google.

MS, (Is this your first-time posting here?) thanks for your comment. You paint a very vivid, and likable, picture of the Canoe experience, and Frontierland in general.

KS, ah! So the caps (in this version of the costume) were always topless, and the sleeves weren't pre-stitched in the rolled up position.
Thanks for the duck info. Makes sense to not hand them over to the guests. Letting the guests pet the ducks would definitely add to their Disneyland memories. Thanks again for these photos.

DBenson said...

A memory from the 70s: Maybe it was just late in the day, but the teenaged guide at the front of the canoe had the demeanor of a drill sergeant. It went roughly like this:

"Ladies and gentlemen, this is a REAL CANOE. No tracks, no motor. You have to paddle or we don't move. Put it in the water, pull BACK, then lift it up and repeat. Got that? Okay, we're shoving off ... As we begin our tour of -- YOU'RE PADDLING BACKWARDS, LADY! -- tour of the Rivers of America, take a look at --HEY! YOU KIDS STOP SPLASHING! -- at the old mill on Tom Sawyer's Island. Up ahead we see -- I SAID NO SPLASHING! -- we see the majestic ... EVERYBODY HAS TO PADDLE! ..."

For the whole ride he keep bouncing between folksy spiel and barked commands. There was some laughter, but the overall mood was nervously deferential to the captain. I think we were afraid he'd order us to do it over again.

Nanook said...

@ DBenson-
That's a perfect story. Just as things should be on The Rivers of America.

Major Pepperidge said...

K. Martinez, I feel the same way, these photos give a nice sense of what it was like to be a part of that crew back then!

MS, I have always loved the river, for all the reasons you mention. And you’re right, splashing water has a smell, especially from the waterfalls. Frontierland satisfies something deep inside us, a desire for nature, for adventure, for beauty, and even though the Disneyland frontier is not “real”, it is a pretty amazing simulation for families.

Melissa, I would think that rolling up your sleeves could be a good bit of “business” for an actor!

KS, you could always put a duck on top of the open-lidded coonskin caps when the weather was cold! I was very sad for my friend who had a bad experience at Disneyland, naturally I wanted her to have fun so that I could nerd out about the park with her. But she doesn’t want to hear it! However, she likes the Berry Festival at Knott’s. So that’s something. I have this nightmare that I would apply for a job at Disneyland, and then would be assigned to food service instead of working on a ride, which (I think) is what most people would prefer to do. There is nothing wrong with food service, it’s honest (and hard) work, it’s just not what I would want as a job at Disneyland!

JB, I admit that there is just something about a female CM on Storybook Land… it’s like having a story read to you by your mom, ha ha. Meanwhile I’m sure that rats are tasty. Yum yum! I thought ducks used “Gleem”. Is that “down from a duck” joke from Groucho? Maybe not. Thanks for the “Animated Exploding Ducks”. I was trying to think of famous African animals that started with “D”, and all I could think of was the Dik-dik, which is naughty. MS has commented before, though he’s usually anonymous.

DBenson, man, I’m amazed at your recall of that canoe spiel, it rings very true. Maybe you used to do that attraction a lot? Very fun. I’m sure that you have to have a certain command of people, or they just won’t listen or obey.

Nanook, YES!

JB said...

Major, just an elephant joke from "101 Elephant Jokes" (Scholastic). p.s. Dik-dik, Dik-dik, Dik-dik. ;-D

Melissa said...

"Melissa, I would think that rolling up your sleeves could be a good bit of “business” for an actor!"

Not in the middle of a swordfight!

I enjoy tradition as much as the next weirdo, but I've got to say, the best Jungle Cruise Skipper I ever sailed with was a woman. She had a Southern drawl as thick as molasses and a deadpan like Buster Keaton. Even the old grumps and tired kids were laughing.

"Lou and Sue" said...

What a fun canoe ride I'm imagining now...with MS's river ride description, and DBenson's canoe CM spiel, and KS's and Bu's hijinks experiences. Let's go!

Ken S., please invite your fellow-CM buddies to join us and share more stories. I really loved your photos and personal stories, and everyone else's comments, today. Thanks to you, and Major, too!

Anonymous said...

Well.."If you don't paddle for us...we will paddle you!" was the basic story line. A lot of the spiel was tongue-in-cheek. But sometimes we were up for the challenge of showing folks just how much we could pull without their assistance. I mentioned before, one could do it all on his own and the canoe would just surge with every stroke he took. KS