HOME |
RSS | 
Fans of Disneyland know that no matter how popular an attraction is, there’s still a chance it won’t be there in ten years. That’s partly because Disney wanted his parks to always be improving, but also because things wear out or become dangerous and there’s no inexpensive fix. While some fan favorites, like Captian EO will eventually return if you wait long enough, others, like America Sings will be readapted to fit into another attraction and will never be seen in their original incarnation again. Here are a handful of attractions that once existed at the park and may or may not be gone for good.
Image Via bearexposed [Flickr]
Most visitors to Disneyland before the mid-nineties will remember this attraction, even if they never rode it. After all, an aerial gondola ride that went through the Matterhorn was something that was pretty easy to remember. The ride was built in 1956 and while plenty of similar rides exist in parks around the country these days, at the time, it was the first aerial ropeway in the U.S. In fact, the Skyway was actually built before the Matterhorn, which had to be built around the pre-existing gondola ride.
While the ride was very popular in that it allowed guests to view the entire park from above, it was closed in 1994 because the Matterhorn battery supports started to show stress cracks. In addition, prior to the closing of the ride, someone jumped out and while he ended up OK, the incident was certainly not something Disney executives wanted to repeat. Fixing the machinery and updating the ride to become ADA compliant and safer would have been outrageously expensive, so the ride was closed all together.
The hole in the Matterhorn is now covered up and the Tomorrowland station has been torn down, but the Fantasyland station is still sitting around empty.
Image Via ATIS547 [Flickr]
I don’t know about you guys, but I’m particularly sad this one is gone. Opened in 1972, the Country Bear Jamboree was a stage show performed by animatronic critters –mostly bears. The attraction was so popular, it even was given a special Christmas show to entertain guests and inspired a movie that was released in 2002. A year before the movie was released though, the attraction was removed to make room for The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh ride.
more …
When you talk about Star Tours nowadays, you have to distinguish between the new and improved version that just opened this year and the classic incarnation, which was first launched in 1987. Personally, I haven’t been on the new version and I’m sure many of you haven’t yet either, which is why it’s so exciting to read about. Of course, the classic ride was something all Disneyland lovers recall with fondness, so I’ll be sure to include plenty of info on that one as well, including the history of the ride itself.
Image via inturnaround [Flickr]
While Star Tours eventually became the first Disney ride based on a film the company had nothing to do with, it didn’t start out that way. Originally the ride was conceived to go along with the 1979 Disney film The Black Hole. The ride was intended to be an interactive simulator that allowed guests the opportunity to choose the car’s route, but because the project was going to be so expensive (ringing in at an estimated $50 million) and the film wasn’t a big success, the idea was quickly shelved.
Fortunately, rather than trashing the idea altogether, the company decided to partner with George Lucas, who was already working with them to produce Captain EO. Once everyone agreed to the idea, the Imagineers started work on the project by buying four military-grade flight simulators that cost $500,000 each and then they started designing the building and ride around their new toys.
While the Imagineers worked on the technical side of the project, Lucas and his team at Industrial Light & Magic worked on the film that would be played inside the simulators. Once the simulators and film were up to speed, a programmer then had to sit inside with a joystick to manually synchronize the vehicle’s movements to the action on screen.
By the time the project was completed in 1987, the ride cost a total of $32 million, which was almost twice the cost Disney paid to build the entire park back in 1955. To celebrate the official opening, and to help promote the new ride, the grand opening of Star Tours coincided with the park being left open for 60 straight hours starting on January 9, 1987 at 10 am.
Image via popculturegeek.com [Flickr]
The Enchanted Tiki Room is kind of like It’s A Small World –people either love it or hate it and no matter how you actually feel about it, you’re guaranteed to have the songs stuck in your head after you leave. Personally, I’m one of those people who loves the show–not least of all because it means getting to sit in a nice air conditioned room while eating pineapple soft serve while the temperature outside exceeds 90 degrees.
Image via CarterHawk [Wikipedia]
When Walt originally started work on the Tiki Room, he envisioned it as a restaurant where guests would be entertained by animatronic birds performing for the diners. It was intended to share a kitchen with the Plaza Pavilion and Tahitian Terrace. Interestingly, now none of these locations operates as a restaurant, the Plaza Pavilion is now used as an Annual Passport processing center and the Tahitian Terrace is now Aladdin’s Oasis, which mostly serves as a meet and greet area for those looking to take pictures with Aladdin and Jasmine.
Image via Loren Javier [Flickr]
There are still aspects of the building that give away its original nature. For one, it is the only attraction to include its own restrooms. Another mark of the planned restaurant, the magic fountain in the center of the room was originally planned to be a coffee station –which is why there is a storage compartment build into the base.
Of course, Walt and his crew soon realized the property would be too popular and was too small to seat all of the people who would want to see the show. Rather than scrapping the idea, the design was altered to accommodate rows of benches for guests to sit and watch the show.
The Tiki Room was the first Disney attraction to feature Audio-Animatronics and since it required the use of computers (the operations room is located under the attraction), this also meant that it was the first ride to offer air conditioning –a factor that has continued to add to its popularity during hot Southern California summers.
more …
I know, I know, the song is an infectious earwig and you’re going to spend the rest of the day cursing me for even bringing it into your realm of thought. But bear with me.
photo by Stacy Conradt
The ride is currently under major renovations at Disneyland, and while I admit it’s not one of my favorite rides, I was disappointed that my sister-in-law didn’t get to experience it on her first-ever Disney trip last month. And now, she may never get to experience the original World’s Fair version that has resided in Fantasyland for the past 40 years.
Disney says that the main change is a change of boats, but according to insiders in the know, it’s actually going to be much more. We’ll get to that in a second.
The original IASW is based on the idea of world peace. No, really. Walt Disney attended a conference held by President Eisenhower in 1956 about promoting world peace and cultural understanding through world travel. Inspired, Disney recruited Mary Blair to design the attraction, Marc and Alice Davis to design the scenes and the doll outfits respectively, and Joyce Carlson to design the dolls. At first, the ride included the national anthems of all of the different nations represented, but Disney decided he needed one uniting song. Robert and Richard Sherman wrote the now-famous tune and that was that.
photo from feministJulie on Flickr
A couple of quick facts:
• The attraction debuted at the 1964-65 World’s Fair in New York.
• Major themes of the boat ride include Europe, Asia, Africa, Central/South America, South Pacific Islands, the Finale and the Good-bye Scene.
• Throughout your 10.5 minute boat ride, you’ll hear the repetitive song in Spanish, French, and Japanese, to name a few.
And now the changes: The changes are going to see the rainforest scene – a really detailed, colorful and innovative representation of Mary Blair’s artwork – replaced with a massive “Hooray for the U.S.A.” scene. Right now, the only American characters represented are a cowboy and an Eskimo. This might seem like the U.S. isn’t very well represented, but when you consider that the point of the ride is to explore other cultures, it makes sense.
Another big change is that Disney is going to stick its characters in scenes where they “belong”. So you might see the Hunchback of Notre Dame in the France section, Simba and Rafiki in the African section and Ariel with the gurgling mermaids at the beginning of the ride (at Disneyland, not Disneyworld). Commercialism at its worst, I guess. I get that it’s Disney and its bread and butter is its characters, but the original IASW was not designed to sell Disney product. Walt himself commissioned it with the idea of promoting global understanding, not global marketing.
photo from Re-Imagineering
I guess I’m torn – I can understand the need to update and improve the ride, but maybe not to the lengths they are going. Can’t they up the America factor by adding a few more characters instead of destroying an entire classic scene? And what about subtly putting Disney character references into the ride instead of the actual characters themselves, which won’t match the dolls in the rest of the ride? For instance, make one of the French dolls wear the simplistic blue-and-white Belle dress and carry a book. Give one of the mermaids red hair. I think it can be done in a way that doesn’t rip the integrity of the original design away.
What do you guys think? Horrible updates, or is Small World long overdue for some modernization?
I’m going to Disneyland in two weeks! I’ve been there before; my husband hasn’t. We’re both Disney freaks – especially anything Haunted Mansion-related.
Some Disneyland attractions are classics and have been around forever – Dumbo, for instance, has been around almost since the beginning (the park opened on July 17, 1955 and Dumbo followed about a month later). Peter Pan’s Flight has been around since the beginning, and so has the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party (the teacups!) and Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride.
Other rides haven’t really stood up to the test of time, unfortunately, and those are the ones we’re going to take a look at.
Holidayland
photo from A History of Disney Theme Parks
You’re probably familiar with the different sections of Disneyland these days – Tomorrowland, Frontierland and Fantasyland, to name a few. But Holidayland? Yep. It opened on June 16, 1957, and was a nine-acre picnic area that was for… well… frolicking, basically. There were playgrounds, horseshoes, a baseball field, volleyball and the “world’s largest candy-striped circus tent” which stood where the Haunted Mansion is today. Pirates of the Caribbean takes up the spot where the baseball field used to be. It only lasted a few years – Holidayland closed in 1961 because it just didn’t fit in with the rest of the park (among other things like lack of shade).
The Viewliner
This miniature train has the dubious honor of being one of the shortest-lived rides to ever exist at Disneyland. It opened in June of 1957 and promptly closed in September 1958 when construction started on the Matterhorn and Submarine Voyage. There were two trains – one for Fantasyland and one for Tomorrowland – and the track ran a figure-eight through both of those areas. The tiny, sleek (for that time) train was supposed to represent the future of train travel. Eventually the monorail filled the void left by the Viewliner.
Monsanto House of the Future
picture from Apartment Therapy
I love those old ads from the 1950s that show “futuristic” kitchens cooking the meals all by themselves with “space-age” technology. That’s kind of what the Monsanto House of the Future was like. It was in operation from 1957 to 1967 and was a tour of a house in the year 1986. It’s laughable now, but the MIT-built house featured technology such as microwaves, which obviously did end up being invented. Just about everything about the house – including the exterior – was made out of plastic. You can still see the support pillars of Monsanto’s House of the Future in Neptune’s Grotto – they were rated for earthquakes and proved to be so sturdy that they were just about impossible to remove. Monsanto, by the way, is an agricultural biotechnology company (meaning they make herbicides and pesticides and the like).
Captain EO
picture from AlteredDreams
In the more recent past, we have Captain EO, which I vaguely remember from EPCOT. Captain EO was a 3-D movie starring, of course, Michael Jackson. And if you’re looking for more credentials than that (keep in mind MJ was HUGE at this point in time), it was directed by Francis Ford Coppola and executive produced by George Lucas. They also co-wrote the script with Rusty Lemorande.
Here’s the plot: Captain EO and his team are piloting a spaceship to deliver a gift to the evil Supreme Leader (Anjelica Huston). One of his shipmates is named Hooter, which seems like a huge oversight to me. Hooter is an elephant, not an owl as you might suspect. Well, the Supreme Leader isn’t exactly thrilled with the crew and orders them to be tortured. EO charms the Queen by singing her a song, but as soon as the music stops the spell breaks and she orders the crew to be captured again. EO uses his music to transform the evil guards into dancers who line up to dance behind him Thriller-zombie-style. EO eventually uses his powers to turn the Supreme Leader and her entire planet into things of beauty.
The 17-minute film cost somewhere between $17 and $30 million to make. Sounds like a lot, but when you consider than it ran for more than 10 years at Disneyland (1986 to 1997), maybe it’s not so bad. Then MJ went weird and Disney decided to pull the attraction and replace it with “Honey, I Shrunk the Audience”.
America Sings!
picture from Yesterland
Looking for a collection of animatronic swamp critters singing old Dixieland favorites and old folk tunes? Too bad you missed America Sings! Had you been at Disneyland sometime between June of 1974 and April of 1988, you could have witnessed geese singing “Camptown Races”, a dog singing “Home on the Range” a pink singing “Won’t You Come Home Bill Bailey?” and a crane and a rooster singing “Shake, Rattle and Roll”. A decent number of the characters appeared to be either quite intoxicated or at least trying their hardest to get there. It’s one of the few Disney attractions with characters actually drinking alcohol (Pirates of the Caribbean also comes to mind… rum anyone?). The building was used for offices for a while and eventually became home to Innoventions, which I believe is still there today. The swamp creatures, however, befriended Brer Rabbit, Brer Fox and Brer Bear and now reside happily at Splash Mountain.
Flying Saucers
Picture from Yesterland
High school physics students who participated in Hovercraft competitions, this one is for you. Basically, the Flying Saucers ride was Disney’s answer to bumper cars. When the ride starts, air would shoot up under the saucer and lift it up off the floor (just a little… we’re not talking feet here). Riders would have to tilt their bodies the way they wanted the saucer to go and were encouraged to bump into other guests. Alas, the saucers only lasted about five years in the mid 60s.
Those are just a few of the rides that are now defunct – things at all of the Disney parks are always changing. Even the old favorites get little updates every now and then. Do you have a favorite ride that is no longer in operation? I know a lot of people were upset when the Magic Kingdom’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea met its maker.
