Chicken of the Sea Pirate Ship, June 1969
Today's slides feature the Chicken of the Sea Pirate Ship, or, as the label on the slide says, "Pirate Ride". I got quite a chuckle out of that one. Maybe even a chortle! Disneyland nerds like me need to latch on to anything we can to feel superior. I wonder if the labeler thought that "Pirates of the Caribbean" was inside this boat?
This first photo is nice, you've got the unfurled sails, which is always a bonus. And the guests are at least 42% of the fun. Look at Junior to the right, checking his Snoopy watch. Does he have someplace better to be? "Father, the stock market will close in New York in half an hour, I need to call my broker". The couple just to the left of that kid is checking their ticket books - all they have left are "A" and "B" coupons, the poor wretches. Well, that's it, there is nothing else to talk about in this photo.
All the guests have vanished, except for that mysterious fellow up on the deck of the ship, talking on his iPhone. When we looked away and then looked back, he was gone too! I don't really recall seeing that "Welcome Aboard!" sign before, but I probably just haven't been paying attention.
12 comments:
Major-
"Well, that's it, there is nothing else to talk about in this photo". Perhaps... except for the Martian space ship landing just out-of-frame-!
Thanks, Major.
And there is that little girl who's standing in the basket of her little sister's stroller. I wonder if those kind of shenanigans were approved by her parents, or if they were just too distracted when she climbed in there.
Major, "I wonder if the labeler thought that "Pirates of the Caribbean" was inside this boat?" That's the first thing I thought of too. Maybe the Pirate Ship is like the TARDIS and is really huge on the inside!
The redhead kid on the left looks like he just stepped out of the 1969 Montgomery Wards catalog with his color coordinated attire. The poor wretches with the 'A' and 'B' coupons: "Maybe we can combine four 'A' coupons to make one 'D' coupon?" "Oh, I'm sure we can! And we can combine these two 'B' coupons to make another 'D' coupon!"
It looks like the mysterious guy on the Pirate Ship has both hands up to his face. So, instead of his iPhone, I'm gonna say that he's adjusting his Google Glasses to get better wi-fi reception.
Tokyo!, the daughter is pretending she is driving a chariot.
Major, I haven't seen that "Welcome Aboard" sign before either... but that's not saying much. Thanks for the pics.
“Pirate Ride…”. I always find it interesting that some people remember less about their vacations than I remember about mine. It just shows that different people’s minds work differently.
I do have an alternate theory…it’s possible that the slide was labeled by someone who wasn’t on the trip, or maybe the party split up and the labeler wasn’t with the photographer. There’s also the possibility that this was labeled long after the trip by someone whose memories were beginning to fade and who had also visited Cedar Point. When Buccaneer was moved from Freedomland to Cedar Point, it was renamed “The Pirate Ride” and a ship’s stern that was accessible to guests was built out front. I can understand someone conflating the two.
Note that all the men have short hair. That will start changing the following year.
If these photos were indeed taken in May 1969, that signage is on borrowed time. Chicken of the Sea jumped ship that year. Odd that they are rolling out the red carpet for a single piece of milled lumber. I wooden have expected that.
Thanks, Major!
Great shot of the sign: it's not an elaborate one: but it's certainly clear. Not surprisingly, MANY guests thought the Pirate Ship was the Pirates of the Caribbean. You had to course correct them over to New Orleans Square: which is like telling someone to walk from 57th and Park to Gold Street Downtown. Lower Manhattan is historic...but roads of "the grid" are like going to NOS from Fantasyland. It's harder when they don't speak your native language. That being said, and I've said before: this ship is sooo very photographed. And it's a good thing, since it's gone forever. Montgomery Ward Kid looks like he's channeling his inner Billy Mumy. There is a lot of "people stuff" going on in this photo: worth a recreation in oils. Kid checking his watch...I remember my first watch: it had an orange face, I think it was a Bulova. I was entranced by the watch and would look at it constantly: like this kid. Where did I have to go? Who knows. Is this kid worried about missing the 2:40 Golden Horseshoe Review? Looks like white shirt dad has him tethered: so all is well. Looks like Robert Conrad and Family are checking out their tickets...or guidebook...at first I thought he was holding the purse. Hope it's before Labor Day: but I see she's wearing yellow Keds...so all is forgiven. Is that a white camera on his waist? Or one of those change making machines? I always wanted one of those machines...not sure what change I would have put into it...but I wanted one nonetheless. Thanks Major for the morning dose of Pirate Ship.
Oh, The Pirate Ship! I love the Pirate Ship. I miss the Pirate Ship so much. The foc’sle door is open a crack for ventilation, Mr. Smee is in there counting the cash.
We can see Captain Hook’s hook holding up the sign. Legend has it that this artifact is now in the Peter Pan queue holding up a lamp, but, like Clairol, no one really knows for sure.
In photo 2, we can see some of the barrel and keg furniture in the rock grotto. This furniture would go on to inspire the Crate and Barrel chain. The search for a picture of the pebble textured paving in the grotto is what led me to GDB over 16 years ago
Will Robinson is searching for the Robot, who got sidetracked in Tomorrowland on the People Mover, where he was shanghaied by space pirates and sold for parts. This is the real reason why Lost in Space was cancelled.
Thanks Major!
JG
What a wonderful "you are here" vibe to today's photos! I'd say that the mental caption for pic #1 is: "We're almost to the Pirate Ride!!" Pic #2: "This is the Pirate Ride??" The confusion is quite understandable considering that Pirates of the Caribbean was not all that obvious an attraction when it first opened. One could walk right past it if they weren't paying attention. My family stumbled into it just after it opened wondering what it was about. Even the ride operators seemed unsure, giving us a uneasy "Here we go.." before they sent our boat out into the lagoon from an almost empty dock.
I think I miss the lava rock benches just as much as the old Pirate Ship. What the world needs is more benches made of extrusive igneous rocks. Thanks Major!
Nanook, yes I forgot to mention the Martian spaceship!
TokyoMagic!, I’m imagining that little girl’s shenanigans resulted in that stroller flipping over backwards. This is how we learn!
JB, this is not the first time I’ve seen photos of the Pirate Ship labeled “Pirate Ride”, I really don’t know what the labeler is thinking. Montomery Ward?? We were a SEARS family! If I recall my US history correctly, this was the conflict behind the Civil War. You’d think that you would be able to combine “lesser” tickets into a better ticket, but I believe that was verboten. I was thinking that the girl standing on the back of the stroller kind of reminded me of the women who used to stand on the back of the trams in the Disneyland parking lot. Maybe she had a job lined up in her future. Put her to work in about two years, I say.
Chuck, yes, all of your theories are possible, but you’ve forgotten the most important one: perhaps the person labeling the slides was NOT OF THIS EARTH! They did not know the ways of hu-mans. Can you believe that they put food matter into their FACES? I wish I had either one of those Chicken of the Sea signs in my collection!
Bu, it makes sense that a first-time visitor might think that the big gaudy pirate ship would be a ride of some sort. I hope the tour guides were allowed to point and laugh at those people for their error! Point with two fingers, of course. It is pretty astonishing to think that the pirate ship was “just” a restaurant - even now, photos of it are evidence of the care and detail that went into much of Walt’s park. I do wonder what that kid with the watch was so worried about - but if his watch was new (maybe that day was his birthday), it was only right and natural that he’d check it every five minutes. That does look like some kind of Kodak camera at the man’s waist, I didn’t think white cameras were fashionable until years later. Those change machines are cool, even now I kind of want one. They can probably be had for cheap, but I never think of it.
JG, the Pirate Ship was such an iconic feature of Fantasyland, that the idea of it going away was probably inconceivable to guests. I still have my doubts about the oft-repeated story that they were going to move the ship elsewhere, only it crumbled. It just doesn’t ring true to me, somehow. Van Eaton has had one or two of those keg seats in auctions, and MAN did I want one. I didn’t even bother to bid, because I knew they would be way out of my range. “Lost in Space”, I sure loved that show when I was a kid, but my brother was watching an episode (maybe on MeTV?), and it was kind of terrible. Maybe it was just one of the clunkers and the rest were good?
Omnispace, I’ve said it before, but sometimes, vintage Disneyland photos are worth looking at for the people more than for the park (though the Pirate Ship does look great). Good point about “Pirates” not being obvious, I think people expected something more obviously “piratey” and not a stately building. Not long ago I went on Pirates in the morning and there was no wait at all, I literally walked through the queue and stepped into a waiting bateaux. I exited the ride and got on again! I miss those lava rock benches and would love to see a detailed description on how they were created.
Very faint memory of ordering a sandwich off the tunacentric menu, then sitting at a table looking at the ship and grotto. One of the brilliant things about Disneyland is that even the most ordinary snacks come with a view. You're almost never staring at a parking lot or generically decorated walls, and that was (and is) a major novelty in California. WDW upped the stakes with themed hotels facing lakes and/or festive architecture.
Have seen pictures here of a genuinely one-legged man playing a pirate. Suspect he switched to a discreet modern prosthetic after work. Wondering how he got hired. Was there an ad ("Theme park needs one-legged performer"), or word passed among cast members? Maybe he applied for an accounting job, and they made an alternate offer. Or he was already a professional pirate type, listed in studio casting directories.
Also, in one of the same photos, there was a cheerfully incongruous vending machine modified to dispense grog. Exactly the sort of thing you'd see in an old animated cartoon, so perhaps kids accepted it as authentic.
DBenson, yes, we’ve seen photos of Captain Guy, the pirate with a genuine wooden leg, I would guess that they probably really did put out some sort of search for a person with a missing leg; or maybe even a missing hand (for a hook?). It seems rather distasteful by today’s standards, but the Captain seemed to take it all in stride. Apparently he devoted a lot of his later life to helping Native Americans. I have a photo of that “grog” vending machine, one of the few places in Disneyland where you could get both Coca Cola and Pepsi!
There's something about Disney construction that is just different than other parks' attempts to make a pirate ship. There's an ideal level of detail combined with the curved shape of the hull that makes it really seem like a cartoon existing in the real world.
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