Big Thunder Details
Today's scans are dated "August 1979", and come to us courtesy of the Mysterious Benefactor. These are three unusual detailed views of the props seen from the queue of "Big Thunder Mountain Railroad", which opened on September 2, 1979. So... just a matter of days or weeks after these photos were taken. Big Thunder is a fine example of the queue containing hundreds of tiny details, which an observant guest can enjoy while waiting for their ride.
If you're going to mine for gold, you're going to need shovels. Two shovels, to be exact. They've seen a lot of use, but how about some naval jelly for that rust? And treat those wooden handles with some linseed oil. Proper care of tools greatly extends their usefulness! The buck saw is used for mine timbers, and tough beefsteaks.
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When you have your own gold mine, don't leave the boss's kid in charge of the ore carts. He was too busy combing bear fat into his hair (you know how teenagers are), and lost control. Now look at this mess! That is some grade-A ore too, and the gold has probably been bruised. We'll have to throw the whole load out and start fresh.
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Tony Baxter says that he went to "Ore Carts 'R Us" for some of the props, and it's a good thing he did. Here's another example, looking appropriately antique, as if it had been rusting out in the elements for a hundred and fifty years. It looks haunted to me. I can just tell!
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THANK YOU, Mysterious Benefactor!
14 comments:
Looks like one of the shovels we've had forever. It was old when I was a little kid... now it's really old!
Oh man, ain't nuthin' worse than bruised gold! And the danged stuff bruises so easily, too. And of course, once its been bruised, it's totally useless. Gold is overrated.
The tracks look awfully thin and narrow. Was that common practice for ore carts?
Major, I think you're right about that ore cart being haunted. Look, they even had to chain it up to keep it from doing harm to the miners.
I'm not sure what's being depicted in this scene. Why is the cart hooked up to a block and tackle?
Continued thanks to the Mysterious Benefactor and to the Mysterious Major.
I suppose an imagineer wouldn't dream of going to Ore House.
Nice details! Are those shovels still as shiny at the business end today?
JB, mine rails in the period depicted by Big Thunder would have been very lightweight and portable, particularly rails used to support the small ore carts on display. No need for heavy rail in that application, and much easier to move into a different tunnel or shaft (or completely new mine) once a particular area has been mined out. The ore cart is probably hooked up to a block and tackle to keep it under control as it’s lowered down or pulled up a grade entering and exiting the mine. A runaway mine cart could be catastrophic, and they definitely don’t want something like that happening around these parts.
DBenson, that’s too bad, because there was an Ore House conveniently located over in Buena Park at the corner of Main Street and Stage Road.
Thanks, Major and MB!
Chuck is correct regarding mine car rails. In fact more common in the 19th Century were temporary wooden rails. Simple “kick-switches” were used to direct a track spur into another tunnel or exit. All grades were removed out of mines in the small ore carts …
Few mines had smelters on site so the ore would be dumped into stamp mills for crushing … low grade ore would be loaded into opening railroad gondolas or wagons (later trucks) for delivery to a smelter for ore processing. High grade ore was usually shipped in sacks (after stamp mill crushing ) and loaded into box cars that could be locked and sent to smelters. A actually section of a stamp mill crusher is visible in the first section of thee we entry que of big thunder … it was from the Queen Ester mine in Arizona …but here it is labeled “big thunder mine 1880” … it is located to appear that ore is brought to the depot in the big thunder trains and dumped out into the crusher stamp then carried away - probably in wagons when the big thunder mine was active.
The scene shown in these images is as you enter the “earthquake-avalanche “ tunnel ( today it’s the exploding tunnel) the one ore car has toppled over because an earthquake is starting …. Another ore car not seen in these images had a mine tunnel collapsing and crushing an ore car …because guests pass this scene so quickly it’s hard to see the signs that a earthquake has occurred or is occurring now. There was an audio track in the early days of the attraction that played in the area before the earthquake tunnel called “rockslide” and its to set up the earthquake action in the tunnel .. at sone point the audio was shut off as it wasn’t really audible with the sounds of train and brakes as it slows to enter the tunnel lift. The original concept for this scene was going to feature an assayers shack and ore cars “sinking” into a collapsing area with boulder crushing the ore car in front of us . Because of cost … no actual earthquake motion occurs before entering the tunnel…. But it’s implied with the collapsed mine car tunnel and another ore car that has toppled over from the “earthquake” shaking that is suppose to be occurring.
The devil is in the details...why the devil? (need to look that up...) Seems like Martha Stewart or that organizational person...forget her name...should be in charge of details...but the devil? Makes no sense. Anyway: Big Thunder has loads of devilish details, if you stop to look. I have shovels exactly like that in my backyard that are at least 150 years old and I still use them. Left over from the farm I used to be. They all have initials on them, to get back to the rightful owners, I suppose. I can tell those shovels are new to look old due to how patty perfect the shovel part of the shovel is: but a good rendition nonetheless. I rather fancy the romanticism around mining, and tunnels, and mining towns...and I think it was actually and probably kind of not such a fun time. Visiting old mining towns reminded me of Disneyland, and not the other way around. I remember reading an article in the Disneyland Line about how they scoured the US looking for old mining equipment. House of Ore? I like House of Pies myself. Still there on Vermont and Franklin in Los Feliz, LA and few blocks from the original Disney Bros Studio on Kingswell. Another actor and myself always joked about when our careers went south we would get jobs as waiters at House of Pies and celebrated what a simple life that would be...Thanks to MB and Major for the trip to Rustopia!
These remind me of the real-life Inyo Mine in the Funeral Mountains east of Death Valley. Gold was mined there up through the 1940’s and it is a picturesque ruin in the National Park, accessible only by 4WD. It’s easy to follow the progress of the mine up the slope with periodic vertical shafts between. Just don’t go deep into the tunnels because the signs tell you not to do that, so I definitely did not do that at all, No Siree not me, uh uh.
BTRR is a great attraction, I just wish the old original Mine Train was woven into it so there were two attractions using the same landscape.
I’ve found that bruised gold ore can be somewhat revived by sprinkling a little water on it and then microwaving for 30 seconds on medium. Or was that stale bread? too early today to be sure.
Thank Major, MB and Tony Baxter.
JG
Today's captions are even better than the pictures.
I love BTMRR! I only with that the earthquake/ explosion/ catastrophie of the week was more obvious. I had to read about it to know what the heck was going on, lol!
JB, we’ve owned some rusty shovels in our day, especially since my brother took over the little storage shed (for his boxes and boxes of useless junk) and all the tools now live out in the elements. But I’m not bitter! I once had 20 ounces of gold, but it was bruised, so I threw it in the garbage. I have my standards. We will need somebody else to chime in about the ore cart tracks, I am more of a brain surgery expert. The haunted ore cart is like an early version of Stephen King’s “Christine”!
DBenson, OOF
Chuck, each shovel is carefully polished and cared for by European craftsmen who spent a lifetime learning their trade. It’s inspirational! I had no idea that you were not only an expert in buses, but also mine car tracks. It’s probably on your resume. My resume mentions that I make great french toast. Indiana Jones can tell you all about runaway ore carts, in fact, don’t get him started.
Mike Cozart, I guess the wood for the tracks would be thin enough to be bent into curves? Just thinking about working in a mine gives me the heebie-jeebies. Wow, we got a lot of info about what happens to ore! I always wondered if the equipment seen in the queue for Big Thunder was authentic, or if they just built it for the ride. Interesting to know that it was from a real mine. I rode Big Thunder about five months ago, but as you said, guests pass scenes so quickly that it’s hard to take in any details. And at night? Forget about it! Unless it happens to be a scene along a lift hill, then of course you get a little more time to take it in. Thanks Mike!
Bu, I don’t know much about Martha Stewart’s organizational person, but I’ll bet she makes amazing cookies with royal icing. The icing of kings and queens! You have shovels that are more than a century old?? They must not see daily use? Or maybe they do, but they were built to last. Steel 1/4” thick! I’m sure that those shovels were bought at the local home center and aged. Blow torches, ammonia, steel wool, all the tools of the patina artist. I’ve been to a few genuine ghost towns, and whenever I see the twisted wreckage of the mining equipment, I’m very glad that I never had to do that backbreaking work. I’ve driven past the famous House of Pies, but am always “going somewhere” and have never stopped to try the food. I really should do it, before the property is bought by some developer.
JG, the Funeral Mountains in Death Valley, what a place to party. I would never go into an abandoned mine, there are folks on YouTube who do that and I always get uneasy. It’s fascinating, but… nope. I’ve heard from a friend of a friend about two people who went into an abandoned mine, the explorers were overcome by some sort of poisonous gas and… well it was bad. I feel the same way about Big Thunder, I really do like it, but miss the never-to-be-duplicated Mine Train Through Nature’s Wonderland. Imagine if they’d done a version of the MTTNW for Tokyo Disneyland! They would have done it right, too.
Melissa, high praise indeed!
Anonymous, I had no idea about the earthquake/explosion until Mike Cozart said something about it. I just assumed it was all a result of time and the elements.
Chuck and Mike, thanks for the mining and ore cart info.
Mike, like Anonymous said, it occurs to me that if we need someone (you) to tell us what a scene is 'supposed' to represent, then the Imagineers didn't do their job well enough. Or maybe they did but the penny-pinchers thought otherwise.
Major, you should have tried to revive your gold using JG's microwave method. Also, spreading a little butter and raspberry jam on it does wonders.
Stu again...Sigh...
Well I think it was from an earlier form of Imagineering … the basic set up is there …. But it’s not like your are watching a movie over and over. I think today guests imagination is curbed by having to have everything explained in great detail … or “canon” all the ditz fans wants a 500 page pre story on every character and detail in a attraction or film … then they need to have every park attraction have to relate to each other …. Sometimes the less you know of an attraction character the better… the haunted mansion bride is a perfect example : when guests knew nothing about her and she was a total mystery , it was a better show element …,was she good? Was she bad … why is she there ? What had kept her here in the afterlife … ??
I think the same goes with the big thunder main shaft tunnel …. The one crushed ore car in the collapsed tunnel and another fallen over filled with heavy ore …. Isn’t normal ….something is or has happened to caused this … the other ore cars remained upright - for now … oh now there is a shattering earthquake in the shaft …. Now an avalanche caused by the quake is sealing up the tunnel…. Etc etc… maybe the next riders will see the tumbled ore cars and get a different impression …. Crumbling mine structures from the abandoned mining camp are collapsing…. Maybe an earthquake long ago caused this … wait … there’s an earthquake happening again right now!!
But guests don’t need to know what iron works designed and built the ore cars or who in Disneyland used to be employed at the big thunder mining co. Or the Nick names each ore car was given by the miners or the name of the GREAT QUAKE that knocked over ore car #7…..
Or the name of the inventor whose drilling machine saved the caved in miners from the cursed cave in that shut the big thunder mine down in 1883 and caused its abandonment …. ( it was Jason Chandler BTW … the founder of Discovery Bay) lol!
Most Disneyland attractions are a series of situations than can be experienced differently at various visits … too much backstory or a heavy storyline confuses guests and doesn’t invite repeating .
I think the origin of the backstories made sense - to help the people working on the attraction decide if something made sense to include in it or not, or how to sequence things to make a vague story of the show elements. But it has gone way to far with a literal stories for things like restaurants, and way to many Disneyphiles demanding "canon"
I don't mind having names show up quite as much. I thought the Society of Explorers and Adventurers creating conspiracy theory-like links between attractions was vague and subtle enough not to bog rides down with more literal narratives.
ANEN, Mike C! Figment would be so disappointed that people no longer seem to want to use their imagination.
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