New York World's Fair Yet Again

Here's a beautiful view taken in the Transportation Zone! Don't you wish you were there? The Ford pavilion would be behind us, and Avis' Antique Car Ride is just out of frame to the left. You can see the Chrysler pavilion to our right, and the green-cheese moon of the Transportation & Travel pavilion. The US Royal Tire Ferris Wheel is almost dead ahead, and the New York pavilion is just visible to the left of that.


I believe that this was taken from a pedestrian bridge that led to the Amusement Zone; we're looking back towards the massive General Motors building that held "Futurama", while to our right is the sorta-ugly back side of "Bourbon Street" (though it didn't look that great from the front either), part of the State and Federal area.


I love the Fair's AMF Monorail, one of those "loaf of bread" monorails that Bob Gurr referred to once. I'd much rather ride one of these if my other choice was a bus.

Tepeed, August 29 1965

While you were having fun at Disneyland - back in the good old days - you might actually learn something if you weren't careful! I think one can sense Walt's involvement here... part of his genuine enthusiasm regarding the frontier days of our country, and a respectful interest in Indian cultures.

It looks like they went to some lengths to make this tepee as authentic as possible... you can even see the individual "buffalo hides" used in its construction. Say, I wonder what that sign says?


You will be tested on this later, so pay attention! And spit out that gum since you didn't bring enough for the whole class. I put plastic flamingos on my lawn as trophies of war. Just sayin'.


The Woman's Realm... interesting that the women owned the tepees and the property. These are stereo slides, and on this one, the 3-D effect is especially nice!

Florida Fun

Here are a few random images from Walt Disney World...

I think that Disneyland's Main Street Station is pretty grand, and it has to be considerably smaller than the Florida version. It is beautiful, no doubt about it; and I guess it does look like some big-city architecture that I've seen in the USA from the late 19th century. The trains at WDW are beauties as well... no 5/8 scale here! Instead they are authentic, full-size narrow gauge locomotives.


The Fort Wilderness Railroad opened in 1973 (the year this photo was taken), providing transportation around the various campsites at Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort & Campground. Doesn't it look great? Unfortunately it didn't last very long. According to Wikipedia, "Because of issues with track maintenance, pedestrian safety, and noise concerns, the railroad only operated occasionally after 1977, and closed permanently in the early 1980s." Such a shame!


This might be one of the most recent photos I've ever posted on my blog! From November 1989 we get a great shot of "The Land" pavilion from EPCOT Center. Sponsored by Kraft! Mmmmm, cheese slices. It was the home of the extinct attraction, "The Kitchen Cabaret Revue" (why always "r-e-v-u-e"?), "Symbiosis", and "Listen to the Land". I remember seeing lots of photos of the "Listen to the Land" ride in early EPCOT publicity and thinking it sounded pretty neat!

Up In The Air, July 1963

It's "lazy day"!

The old Skyway was not only fun to ride, it was fun to look at from the ground too. The added movement and color contributed just that much more energy to Disneyland. That red bucket is headed towards Tomorrowland, but first it gets to pass through the old, wide-open Matterhorn interior. Notice the wire for Tinker Bell's trip through the sky, faintly visible from the upper left heading to the lower right.


Hey, that person just threw a penny at me! But it was a 1909-S "VDB" penny in mint condition (hello all you coin collectors!), so I forgive them.

More of those Meddling Kids, August 1963

What is it with kids? Why are they always meddling? I hope that they won gold medals, anyway.

We've seen these adorable tykes before (here and here), and this is possibly the last you'll see of them.

Here they are in the pre-show area for the Enchanted Tiki Room; the flaming effigy of Pele looms over them. Forward-thinking adults can show up with a bag of marshmallows and a stick for a great pre-show snack.


Captain Goofy bravely pilots the Chicken of the Sea tuna boat through treacherous waters, but he still has time to entertain the young'uns.

Beautiful Tomorrowland, April 1962

You only get one photo today, my peeps, but it's a doozy. This view of the 1962 Tomorrowland is so swell that I even posted a slightly larger scan of it for you to enjoy. I could point out all of the groovy details, but I'll let you do that yourselves!


For those of you with working time machines, April 1962 would be a good time to go to Disneyland.

Freedomland, June 1960 - Part One

Guess what kids? I have some more Freedomland slides to share with you! These photos were taken the very month that this short-lived (only 4 years) park opened. By law you have to refer to Freedomland as "short-lived", and I ain't no commie law breaker. The slides were faded and grainy, and I have done my best to restore them to a state that won't make your eyes bleed. I'll post 'em 3 at a time in no particular order.

Freedomland had an awful lot of features that already existed at Disneyland, as today's photos demonstrate. Here's the New York version of a Horse-Drawn Streetcar (with a full load of passengers); it looks great, but like almost everything else at that park, it lacks the elegance and detail of Disneyland's version.


They had a Stagecoach too, although those could be found at the many frontier-themed parks all over the country. This one is a peach! Apparently they had problems with their stagecoaches tipping over just like Disneyland. "On June 25, 1960, about a month after the park opened, a stagecoach overturned in the Great Plains section of the park, injuring ten people. Three of the victims were hospitalized, including one with a snapped spine" (sez Wikipedia). Ouch!

That landscaping is a bit rough and artificial in appearance. Their "skyway" towers (for the "Tucson Mining Company Ore Buckets") in the background kind of destroy the "old west" effect; one senses that Walt purposely did not put his Skyway in Frontierland for just that reason.


Please excuse the blur! Yes, there was a "400 passenger sternwheel boat". Well, two of them actually! And they had calliopes on board, strangely. 400 passengers, for reals? Instead of a cruise on the Rivers of America, you took a cruise on the Great Lakes. Name them all and you win a stale cookie. No cheating! Note the two curving staircases in the bow (or "fronty part") of the boat!


Stay tuned for more Freedomland images whenever I get around to them!

Twain and Train

Talk about two extremes... first up is this photo of the beautiful 19th-century style sternwheeler as it rests in Fowler's Harbor. They're scraping the audio-animatronic barnacles off of it, I'm guessing. Either that or this is when they replaced the steam boiler with that atomic job. The Gullywhumper sits behind the Twain, like an anxious relative at the hospital (I'm pretty sure it is reading a copy of "People" magazine).


And now we leap forward to the exciting World of Tomorrow circa 1960 for a look at the equally beautiful 3-car red Mark I Monorail. It's just leaving the station for a trip around the concrete beamway - the spiel referred to it as "the highway in the sky", but nobody else did. By golly, if I was feeling blue, this picture would turn my frown upside-down.

It's a Small World's Fair, August 1965

Even though we're visiting the 1964/65 New York World's Fair today, it's still a "Disney Day" because we're at Pepsi Cola and Unicef's pavilion featuring Walt Disney's "It's a Small World". Maybe you've heard of it!

This first great shot gives us an excellent "you are there" view of the attraction's façade, along with that big marquee that added to the sense of excitement. New Yorkers were not immune to the appeal of a person in a chipmunk costume; I see more than a couple of smiles as Chip makes the scene. I wonder where Dale was? Incidentally, the Disney folks made that queue go up stairs, down stairs, back and forth, which (as it turns out) actually did help to make the long line a bit more interesting. Somehow.


Here's an unusual view, with more signage - this time from inside the queue itself. "Though the mountains are wide and the oceans divide"... those lyrics take me back to the days when I listened to my Storyteller album (narrated by Winston Hibler) and tried to remember the ride in all of its colorful detail.


And finally, a photo from inside the ride itself. There are several portrayals of the Sun in the ride; I did a little research (very little!), and it appears that this particular sun was removed at some point, and then added back during one of the holiday makeovers. Does anybody know if he still smiles upon guests now that the attraction has been redone once again?

The Carnation Truck Lives!

Those of you who haunt this blog (and the other many fine Disneyland blogs out there) have seen lots of pictures of the iconic Carnation truck that was parked outside of Disneyland's "Carnation Corner" for so many years.


A while ago I wondered (in writing) what ever happened to that much-photographed vehicle, and was surprised to receive an email from a gentleman named Elbridge Stuart. Here's what he said:

I ran across your blog mentioning the Carnation truck with the query about what might have happened to it. Designed by Bob Gurr and built by the Carnation Company in 1953-1954 it now lives, fully restored, at the Carnation Farm outside of Seattle. It is where the founder of Carnation and the next four generations of his family lived. It was given to us by the Disney Company which had put it in the back lot and did not know what to do with it.

And here it is!


Doesn't it look fantastic? I'm so glad that it is still around, and being cared for so nicely.


I asked Elbridge if he had any info about when and how the Carnation Farm acquired the truck, and he replied:

My guess is... less than 10 years ago. When they went to retrieve it, the back lot staff insisted that the “Disneyland” name be removed from the vehicle before taking it off the lot. I guess for liability purposes. At any rate at was 11:45 and during the discussions the lunch whistle blew and the Disney staff went to lunch. Dave Owens ( the farm manager ) and his son loaded it on the flat bed truck and went home.


My father, who worked at Carnation and represented the company, worked with Walt during those early Disneyland days. He indicated that Walt used to love to drive the truck around but kept getting the narrow tires stuck in the rails of the main street trolley. He was always a little concerned when Walt would wrench the wheel left or right to get the tires out that Walt might run over someone.

In addition to the truck, we also have the big vertical neon Carnation Ice Cream sign that hung just over the front door of the Main Street store. I am trying to get it relit and hung outside our museum at the farm.


Elbridge also included these scans from the March/April 1956 issue of "Carnation Magazine" (back in the day when many companies published their own magazines). SO fantastic!




Here's a great photo of Elbridge's dad serving a delicious-looking milk shake to Walt (notice the Smoke Tree Ranch logo on Walt's tie). I asked about his father, and he said:

My father's name was E. Hadley Stuart Jr, and was the grandson of the founder of the Carnation Company. He started working at the company after college in about 1940. He worked at a number of milk plants in Washington State and the southern US before working at the new world headquarters in Los Angeles... I believe the new headquarters was opened in 1948. My father continued at Carnation until 1961 when he left the company.

...it was probably my father who had the relationship with Walt. He and probably others at the company negotiated the contract with the Disneyland Park for the exclusive right to provide milk and ice cream products. There is an unsubstantiated urban legend that the company also helped Walt get some financing for the park. The park was a stretch for a bank to take a chance on and Walt was having trouble getting financing. The board of directors of Carnation in the 50s contained some California and Washington State high placed bankers. Some members of the Carnation executives also were placed on the boards of some of the same banks. A very cozy relationship.


And finally, one last photo with the Carnation truck, with Ebridge's father and Walt apparently showing the beautiful vehicle to an admiring crowd. Check out those odd hats on the kids!

I do remember as a child, that every year at Christmas, Walt sent us a big box of Disneyland toys that always a lot of fun getting. We also had a type of pass or card that would get Dad and us into Disneyland just by showing it.


MANY THANKS to Elbridge Stuart for generously sharing so much information and the wonderful photos of the truck in its new home, and the other photos as well!