News
 

• I rode Tiana’s Bayou Adventure

• Downtime continues to be an issue. Media event is … today! In the Magic Kingdom. Hopefully it’s working itself out.

• Universal’s new nighttime show Cinesational begins this week - June 14. I’ll try to catch that the week of June 17.
  

• Movies: Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts films, Jurassic World, Jaws, Shrek, Ghostbusters, Trolls, Back to the Future, Universal Monsters, Transformers, How to Train Your Dragon, E.T., Fast and Furious, The Super Mario Bros. Movie, Minions, The Mummy and King Kong

• UOR’s new daytime parade, Universal Mega Movie Parade, opens July 3. Features a 16-foot-tall Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
  
• We’re within a few weeks - maybe less - of the Epic Universe Preview Center opening as well.
  

• Jollywood Nights returns to Hollywood Studios

• No dates or prices yet, but we know it’s “select nights in November”
  

• Disney’s released a tentative opening date and concept art for “Island Tower” rooms at the new Poly DVC

• Opens December 17, 2024

Surveys

Listener Emails

A whole bunch of you had suggestions after we read Universal’s survey last week on musical acts for Halloween Horror Nights:

• Andy suggested the Finnish heavy metal band Lordi, whose song won the Eurovision contest in 2006
• Lots of suggestions for Ozzy and Sabbath
• Rob Zombie

A follow-up to last week’s email from Jen, who asked about the history of Rope Drop:

From Jason Schultz,

• The Disneyland Line, a Disneyland publication, mentions “rope drop” in a June 16, 1983 article, noting the rope itself was over 20 years old. So the concept of a “rope” for “rope drop” goes back to at least the early 1960’s. The article notes that a new rope was put in place on Wednesday, March 25, 1983.
• Jason also mentioned the old “Disneyland Forever” digital on-demand CDs from the early 2000s

• Search for “Disneyland Forever Kiosks” on YouTube to hear all of them. The one you’re interested in is “1956 Main Entrance Announcements.”

• Did not mention anything about opening, walking to first ride,
• So sometime between 1956 and 1963?

A question from Martha Diggins:

I’m heading to Disneyland this July with my family. Is there any content that you would recommend on Disney+ that would be interesting / informative to watch before a trip to Disneyland?

Len says:

• The Imagineering Story
• The Pre-Opening Report from Disneyland
• Behind The Attraction

• Jungle Cruise S1 E1
• Haunted Mansion S1 E2
• Disneyland Hotel S1 E7
• S2 E1 Pirates of the Caribbean

• YouTube:

• Defunctland’s History of Tomorrowland 1955

From Catherine Deneke:

This August (19-22), we're visiting Disneyland for the first time in 10 years. I know the left side of the park is going to be significantly shut down in July for Tiana-related construction. Do you have any insights as to whether it will be open by that week of August? If you were betting, would you put money on it being open or not? And do you think parts will open up before Tiana?

Len says: I think Haunted Mansion will have re-opened by then, and it’ll be in its Nightmare Before Christmas overlay.

Brian from DCLDuo writes in with this:

Someone was trying to convince me that Splash Mountain was the most popular ride at the Magic Kingdom based on its throughputs and wait times. I’m curious - how would you go about determining the most popular attraction at the park, and do you think Splash Mountain would have come out on top? Don’t get me wrong, I’m guessing it hit in the Top 10. But most popular seemed like a stretch and this strikes me as a fairly complex problem. Would love your thoughts. 

Len says: I mean, we know from Disney that it’s not Splash Mountain. In 2001, Disney put out a multimedia CD called “WDW Explorer”, which was an interactive map of Walt Disney World, with tons of short audio clips about the attractions. And if you have this CD, look for a file named USEX0030.WAV, which says this:

“More people pass through Spaceship Earth than any other attraction in Walt Disney World.”

And I’m going to ask our producer, Eric, to insert that audio here in the show so we can all hear it.

Granted, that was 2001, but between 2001 and its closure, is there any reason to think Splash got more popular than the giant icon at the front of EPCOT?

A question from Greg Taylor:

Our next trip is planned for the first full week of May in 2025.  We’re booked for seven rooms at Caribbean Beach.  What effect do you think Epic Universe will have on Disney World attendance?  Should we expect to see discounts or free dining plan offers late in 2024 or early 2025?

Research/Patents (use query "disney enterprises".as AND "theme park".ab)

Fireworks at Disneyland – Part Two

Okay. On last week’s show, we met Bernard Wells. Who was a member of the family that founded Joseph Wells & Sons. Which had been staging fireworks spectaculars in the UK since the 1830s.

In 1951, Bernard has a falling out with his father and then emigrates to America. Where Wells then founds the Atlas Fireworks Company. Which catches the attention of Tommy Walker, who – at that time in 1951 – is the special events director at USC.

Jump ahead now six years. It’s now the Spring of 1957. And Tommy Walker (who’s now the Director of Entertainment at Disneyland). And Tommy is trying to convince Walt that they should start presenting regularly scheduled fireworks display at his family fun park.

Mr. Disney is initially hesitant. Largely because … Well, once you light off a fireworks shell and explodes in the sky, the money which you spent on that rocket is gone forever. It’s gone up in smoke, if you will. Walt wonders if – long term – it would be far smarter to funnel the money he’s now making at Disneyland into far more lasting, tangible things. Like new rides, shows & attractions for the Park.

Which is why Walker – without letting his boss know in advance that he’s doing this – arranges for Wells to come out to the Park one Friday night in April of 1957 and effectively audition to become Disneyland’s fireworks guy. Tommy has Bernard set up in a remote corner of Disneyland’s parking lot. Walt sees this demo and then says “Okay. Let’s give it a try.” And with that, fireworks displays at Disneyland Park are born.

Except that … Well, this is Disneyland of the mid-to-late 1950s. A place where Walt Disney Productions doesn’t necessarily own or – truth be told here – actually have complete control over its operation.

Case in point: Most of the shops along Main Street, U.S.A. were third party leasees. Likewise most of the fast food / quick service locations within the Park were run by ABC / Paramount (Which was a subdivision of the American Broadcasting Corporation).

A lot of the way that Disneyland operated in its early days was stuff that had been made up on the fly. EX: When it was realized a few days in that Walt’s family fun park was going to need a security team to patrol his park, a call was made to Camp Pendleton (The Marine Base that’s just 50 miles to Disneyland’s south).

Off-duty Marines were given the opportunity to make good money as Disneyland’s security officers. Plus when the Park threw in the perk of free passes for friends & family … Marines fought to get this gig.

And – of course – the upside of doing something like that is … Well, Disneyland wound up with this great looking security team of young, fit Marines without having to pay what they would have paid if they’d signed a long term contract with a professional security company.

This would – of course – change years later. But what the Park did with its security needs was kind of the template for what Disneyland would eventually do with their fireworks display.

Okay. So it’s a handshake deal between Bernard Wells & Walt Disney. The Atlas Fireworks Company – soon to be renamed California Fireworks – will now be the outfit that stages fireworks displays over Disneyland on Friday & Saturday nights as part of that theme park’s new “Date Nite at Disneyland” promotion. Which is initially only supposed to start in late June of 1957 and then run through that Summer.

Long story short: Because – going in -- this could be a very short-lived enterprise at Disneyland, Walt isn’t willing to spend a lot of money on the Park’s fireworks program. Certainly not enough to justify Bernard Wells driving out to Anaheim two nights a week to then personally fire off all of these rockets.

Which is why Wells then recruits young Harold Aronson, who – during the day – is an employee of Pacific Bell. Aronson is an amateur fireworks enthusiast that Wells has had some dealings with. Bernard likes & trusts this 27-year-old. So he turns to Harold – whose nickname was “Mickey,” by the way – and says “You wanna do something fun for the Summer.”

So this whole thing starts off as a part-time job for Mickey Aronson. Every Friday (after he finishes work at Pacific Bell), Aronson has to swing by California Fireworks headquarters and then load up his truck with two days worth of shells. Aronson would then drive down to Disneyland and then quickly load half of those shells into the launch tubes that had (again) been set up temporarily backstage at the Park.

And remember that line from the “Date Nite at Disneyland” theme song (i.e., “ … the skies light up at Nine each night”) ? Well, Mickey – years later, when he’d talk about the early, early days of Disneyland’s fireworks program – would talk about how nervous he’d get when he’d get caught in traffic on his drive down to Anaheim. Wondering if he’d have sufficient team to actually load that night’s show before he then needed to start lighting off shells.

And back then … Again, this was all done by hand. With Aronson – with a lit railroad flare in his hand – running from tube to tube and then lighting that exposed wick. All with the hope that – given this show’s pre-recorded soundtrack (which was now blasting through speakers all over the Park) – this totally-slapped-together offering would still somehow look like  something a professional entertainment company would present to its paying customers.

And – as it turns out – Disneyland Guests like fireworks in whatever form they could get them. So if the “Date Nite at Disneyland” display was a little rough around the edge back then / wasn’t exactly in sync with that show’s soundtrack … To be honest, nobody cared. They just turned their faces to the sky and “Oohed” & “Aahed” as colorful shells exploded high overhead.

Mind you, Walt … Now that guy had some thoughts about fireworks displays at Disneyland. And that first Summer, he’d regularly meet with Mickey after the show to discuss how things could be tweaked.

EX: On the Disneyland TV show (which began broadcasting on ABC in Late October of 1954), they regularly ran this piece of animation where Tinker Bell flitted in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle as fireworks exploded high in the sky off in the distance behind Disneyland’s castle.

Walt reportedly turned to Mickey at some point during the first Summer that Disneyland had a fireworks display and said “People who watch our TV show each week are going to eventually expect to see that image when they come to the Park. So how do we make Disneyland’s fireworks display look like the one they regularly see on television?”

Pulling that off took a lot of trial & error. Aronson kept moving the location of the launch site backstage, adjusting the height of the shells. Walt would then stand at the end of Main Street, U.S.A. (He’d slip out of the Disney family apartment just before showtime and then stand in the crowd that had gathered in the Main Street Plaza) and then watch how the show went / gauge how the Guests had reacted to individual shells.

Long story short: Over the course of the Summer of 1957, Walt & Mickey Aronson fine-tuned the “Date Nite at Disneyland” fireworks displays. And by the time Labor Day rolled around that year, Walt was now a full-blown pyrotechnics enthusiast. From here on in, if Walt Disney Productions opened so much as an envelope, the Company’s founder was then “We need to get Mickey Aronson in on this. I want the ceremony to end with a really big bang.”

So when Walt – with the help of Tommy Walker, of course – handled the opening & closing ceremonies of the 1960 Winter Olympics up in Squaw Valley, Mickey Aronson was a vital part of the team. Shooting up daytime AND nighttime fireworks.

Where this gets interesting is that Aronson was taking on all of these big, important projects for Disney while he was still a Pacific Bell employee because … Well, back then, anyway, fireworks were just a seasonal thing at Disneyland. Presented on weekends during the Summer. And over the Christmas week when the place was packed with tourists & locals. So you didn’t really need a full-time staff.

Plus the actual full-time staff at the Park – take, for example, Owen & Dolly Pope (who ran the 10-acre Pony Farm backstage at Disneyland) – they weren’t necessarily fans of Disneyland’s fireworks display. For obvious reasons. The noise frightened the horses. And every morning after a fireworks display, they’d then have to police up all of the pens. Make sure that none of the spent shells had landed on the ground or fallen in feed bins or water buckets.

That’s a part of fireworks that people sometimes forget about. Sure, these things look pretty when they explode overhead. But in order for this thing to reach that height and then explode in just the right shape and in just the right color, there’s a pretty impressive combination of lethal chemicals interacting there. Things that – over time and prolonged exposure – can have an impact on animals & humans.

Which started to become a genuine concern at Disneyland as the 1960s gave way to the 1970s. And the orange & walnut groves that previously bordered the Park to its West & its North were replaced by a housing subdivision filled with people who weren’t necessarily fireworks fans.

How did Disneyland deal with these folks and their concerns when it came to all of those chemicals that came raining down out of the sky after each night’s fireworks display? We’ll get to that with the next installment of this series.