Mad Tea Party, August 1970
The Mad Tea Party still thrills (and sickens) guests after nearly 70 years! Luckily I am not prone to motion sickness, so I have a fine time whirling around for a few minutes (not necessarily in a teacup). I've never been entirely clear on whether the Disneyland version of this sort of spinning attraction was the first, or if something similar had already existed elsewhere. Does anybody know?
Next is this nice, colorful ground-level view. So many empty teacups! I wonder if music accompanied this ride back then? Now you hear the tootling mad tea party theme on an endless loop, I assume that the cast members mentally tune it out, or else it would drive them... well, you know.
16 comments:
Wow, there are six people in that tan Teacup on the right! And it looks like that solo guy, on the same blue disk, has a prosthetic arm? Whether it is or isn't is neither here nor there, just 'interesting', to be in some random Disneyland pic taken by an unknown photographer floating overhead in a Skyway gondola. And look! The Trap Door! (In its closed position.) I never noticed it before the other day when it was featured here on GDB. Now I see it all the time!
An interesting choice, to use 'NASA guys' as the ride attendants on the Teacups. I wonder what the thinking was on that? One would maybe expect to see a couple of "Alices" doing that job here.
One can't help but feel joy when looking at these colorful, whimsical Teacups. Thank you, Major.
I understand that DUMBO & THE MAD TEA PARTY shared the area music with what came from KING ARTHUR CARROUSEL in the years prior to NEW FANTASYLAND. Interestingly the carrousel recorded music started out with music of a band playing a medley of Disney tunes made to sound like a carousel band-organ . Sometime in the 60’s a real recording of an actual band organ played that featured no Disney tunes. In the early 70’s a band organ was recorded playing custom punched cards to create the sound track recording for Walt Disney World’s CINDERELLA’S GOLDEN CAROUSEL . Eventually that recording was used at Disneyland ( until 1983) and until recently played at Tokyo Disneyland ( their Cinderella’s Golden Carousel was renamed THE CASTLE CAROUSEL and Floridas is now called PRINCE CHARMING’S REGAL CAROUSEL )
When Disneyland’s NEW FANTASYLAND was built, the MAD TEA PARTY turntable was relocated closer to the ALICE attraction and the area Cup music you hear today was added - it is a raw full track of the music recorded for the 1951 Alice In Wonderland film ( its features studio musicians playing gourds!!) Walt Disney World had its own recorded music that features two different tea cups in motion tracks “very merry unbirthday” and “the Caucus Race” and meandering loading music lifted from music from the film.
BTW : that Mad Tea Party turntable is FILTHY!!!
Well, as far as you can trust the internet:
The first spinning tea cup ride at an amusement park was Disneyland’s Mad Tea Party, which was an original ride when Disneyland’s Fantasyland opened in 1955. The ride was based on the chapter entitled “A Mad Tea Party” from Lewis Carroll’s book “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.” From https://www.amusementtechnical.com/top-5-juvenile-rides#:~:text=The%20first%20spinning%20tea%20cup,%E2%80%9CAlice's%20Adventures%20in%20Wonderland.%E2%80%9D
Wow, Budblade brings the goods! Thank you!
Thanks Mike for the music background too. I love the Alice movie music and the teacup ride too. I don’t get motion sick, but I don’t try to spin it extra fast, I just hang out and watch the world go by. The relocated version is really nice with the trees and overhead lights.
I do remember a county fair carnival ride with spinning tubs with a central wheel in the tub just like the teacups. Must have been a knock-off since that memory has to be mid-1960’s at the earliest.
JB, the hatch is closed since the dungeon is full of Lost Boys sweating over the churro extruder.
Thanks Major for the cup of tea.
JG
The Unbirthday Song was used at the Mad Tea Party l-o-n-g before the 1983 “New” Fantasyland (going back at least as far as 1965). The instrumental “international master” (used when creating foreign language versions of the Alice in Wonderland feature) is the same version currently played at the attraction.
@ Mike-
Thanks for all the music info-! Such a crazy quilt of changes over the years.
In the original design for the Tea Cups, there was a single, sectoral horn loudspeaker (specifically an Altec 31A, with a 730B driver attached) "... producing clear, crisp reproduction of middle and high frequencies". This was positioned at the lower edge of the "tent roof" of the RO 'hut'. When the upper lattice work was added between each of the lampposts surrounding the turntable - which appears to be around 1969, seen in today's images - the single, sectoral horn was removed and enclosed linear speakers were hung below the highest point in the arc between [most] every other lamppost.
Thanks, Major.
Tuning out the background music...oh absolutely. Imagine working a shift at the Mansion or on Pirates. Or for that matter, the entire Summer! KS
^ ….or a shift at IASW.
BTW, I just read that Disney added a new verse. Am serious.
We need Melissa, now, to write a new verse!
Yes I should have been more clear - the studios provided the Disneyland sound department with music sources to create the park’s playback media ( loop reels , later audio cartes , 3M tape-a-thons , etc. ) but for the soundtracks of all the 1983 NEW Fantasyland , the original masters were pulled or located … even if they had already been but in “salt mine storage” in New Jersey.
Yes I should have been more clear - the studios provided the Disneyland sound department with music sources to create the park’s playback media ( loop reels , later audio cartes , 3M tape-a-thons , etc. ) but for the soundtracks of all the 1983 NEW Fantasyland , the original masters were pulled or located … even if they had already been but in “salt mine storage” in New Jersey.
There were certainly spinning rides -- I'm thinking of the old-fashioned ones where you'd sit in a big half-shell. The rider-controlled spin may have been new. Recall reading a long-ago interview with, I think, Bob Gurr. He was saying there were mechanical bugs to work out in the rotating discs, which implies there wasn't an existing model to base it on.
JB, I didn’t even notice the teacup with six people in it! Luckily they are all little kids, but still, 12 legs have to go somewhere. I bet they had fun spinning around together - I wonder if they are all siblings? Seems unlikely I guess. Now that we know that Walt had an apartment beneath the Mad Tea Party, it’s intriguing to think of him down there, eating chili (and maybe flicking some beans). Those NASA guys all had engineering degrees, it seems like they were overqualified, but nothing bad ever happened on their watch. The standards are a little lower now!
Mike Cozart, I often wonder about the early Disneyland, and if it was generally a quieter park. We are used to music being heard in many areas, constantly playing over a PA system, but I’m guessing that wasn’t the case, at least up into the 1960s (?). I always like the band organ versions of those Disney songs, it just has that nice “carousel” sound that makes me think of Fantasyland. I wonder what tunes it played before they went to “all Disney”? I’m guessing traditional things like Sousa marches or other marching band tunes. Every time I walk past the Mad Tea Party, I notice that “tea party” music, and would hope that the folks working the ride don’t even hear it anymore! Thanks Mike.
Mike Cozart, I’ve notice that the turntable has been dirty in many photos, you’d think they could spray it down at night and scrub it with a push broom. Or maybe they did that, and the dirt was just too stubborn.
Budblade, thank you for that information. So… I wonder if the teacup-style attraction was developed by Arrow Development? I’ll look it up myself, you don’t have to do my work for me. Unless you really want to! Still, the spinning cup ride has always been such a Disney park staple, and yet they did pop up at many other parks, even Knott’s Berry Farm.
JG, I’m lucky that I don’t get sick from rides, though I have friends who truly can’t go on the teacups. I’m OK with skipping that one, especially when you see how wiped out people who are sensitive can get. I have always loved the “paper” lanterns hanging above the turntable, it looks so beautiful at night. I think I had a photo of a rooftop amusement park in Japan that had a tiny teacup-style ride with only four cups, and that was from the 1960s I believe.
Anonymous, interesting, so now we know that they used that song at least by ’65. I should have said that it was the “Unbirthday Song”, not the “tea party song”. Oh well!
Nanook, I think I’ve seen photos in which we can see the horn-shaped (sort of) speakers that you mentioned. It’s nice that they have such great acoustics for the Mad Tea Party, now all they need to do is figure out how to make the Skippers on the Jungle Cruise more clear, sometimes the amplified voice is so kind of fuzzy that I miss the jokes. Or maybe I need to clean my ears?
KS, YES, I agree with you re: the music at those attractions. I even sympathize with the employees at Target when Christmas is near, playing the same well-worn songs over and over and over. Maddening!
Lou and Sue, a new verse for IASW?? What the heck? Was it one that was at least written by the Shermans years ago?
Just doing a quick Google search, one source said that it was indeed Arrow Development that came up with the teacup-style ride, which makes sense. It also said that the "Fabbri Group" manufactures them (shrug).
Oops, missed a few late additions to the comments.
Mike Cozart, I’m glad that they sourced the original recordings of the music for the MTP (by the way - GOURDS??), it’s a nice link to history.
DBenson, are you thinking of the iconic Tilt-a-Whirl? I do believe that I read that the MTP had many mechanical issues early on, with many breakdowns. They obviously got those bugs ironed out.
Sue I feel after all the time and money spent to restore the Disneyland ITS A SMALL WORLD SOUNDTRACK in 2005 , there is no reason to mess with this now … the song is classic and perfect as it is and changing it is just stroking egos of current employees. Like adding things to the Haunted Mansion original imagineers intentionally left out of the Haunted Mansion ( one-eyed black cats … too much Home Depot garden junk in the gardens … cliche hatchet bride story lines ….) there’s money for this ? And millions and millions to add another verse to ITASM …. But no money to repair a Frontierland baggage depot ? And Tomorrowland is just left to rot away ….
Man I’m a grump !!
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