Disney World After Dark: Mission: Space

During Christmas 2003, my wife, my mother and I decided to make a quick visit to Walt Disney World. My wife would enjoy the time away, my mother would love the parade, and I, well there was new ride to ride. Mission: Space opened on October 9th and I was eager for a new Future World experience. I wanted to feel the G Force, experience the effects of weightlessness, and learn how they would provide the illusion of hibernation.

I will not share the full play-by-play of that first ride. You have all been on the ride so you know what goes on. I will share though that on December 26th, I skipped breakfast (taking precautions) and headed straight to Epcot and immediately to Mission: Space. My wife and mother waited for me at the Electric Umbrella. The ride was thrilling! It was at about the four and a half minute mark that I started feeling a little uneasy. I didn’t become ill, but I knew that having had the experience, it would be awhile before I printed a FastPass for this ride. Now, a few years on, I am happy for Mission: Space Lite. I can enjoy the images without taking chances of something far worse happening.

So there you have it. A little more Back Story from Doc.

All of this has been to lead up to a new group of Disney World After Dark pictures. Those wonderful people at Imagineering have given us many architectural gems and Mission: Space is a gem. The sweeping spans reach out as if to draw you in. It is visually inviting. It is as though the building is embracing you as you walk into the queue.

And, as it is with other areas of Disney, when the night falls, a whole new magic emerges. Here is Mission: Space After Dark.


(Editor's Note: Having paid this photographic tribute to Mission: Space, I must also express my appreciation for Horizons. I will often put in a VHS tape from eariler trips and revisit this extinct attraction. It was one of Doc's favorites.)

The Legends: John Lounsbery

Today, we celebrate another of Walt’s “Nine Old Men”.

John Lounsbery was born on March 9, 1911 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Early in his life the family moved to Colorado where he was raised and was introduced to drawing. Following his graduation from high school he enrolled in and received his diploma from the Art Institute of Denver. In 1932 he moved to California to work as a commercial artist while attending courses at the Art Center School of Design. At the School of Design he was introduced to his life’s work.

In July of 1935 Lounsbery was hired as an animator by the Walt Disney Studios. His early days were spent working on “Pluto” shorts and assisting with animating the Witch in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Later he was promoted to directing animator on Dumbo.

His pencil gave life to Honest John in Pinocchio, Timothy Mouse in Dumbo, Ben Ali in Fantasia, Tony in Lady and the Tramp, and many others.

If you review the Disney Canon, you will see the name John Lounsbery attached to almost every film of the first Golden Age of Disney Animation. He was still contributing to Disney, working on The Rescuers, when he died on February 13, 1976. He was named a Disney Legend, along with the other “Nine Old Men”, in 1989.

(Photo: Disney Legends website)

Where In The World

The Composite Challenge is over. For this Where In The World challenge I offer this this single image. No hints just yet.

As the sign says, enjoy!

The Legends: Ward Kimball

Ward Kimball was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota on March 4, 1914. Following high school he enrolled at the Santa Barbara School of Art with the hopes of becoming a magazine illustrator. After watching a matinee showing of Disney’s Three Little Pigs, Ward packed his portfolio bound for Hollywood. He joined the Walt Disney Studios in 1934 and rest, as they say, is history.

During his time at Disney he took part in most all of the classic animated features. His contributions include Jiminy Cricket, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, Lucifer the Cat, and others. He directed two Academy Award winning short subjects; Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom and It’s Tough to Be a Bird. The latter featured both live action and animation. Ward produced and directed three space films for the Disneyland television show. In the 1960’s he helped to write the story and script treatment’s for Babe’s in Toyland.

Along with a few select others, Ward became known as one of Walt Disney’s “Nine Old Men”.

Kimball once remarked that as long as it didn’t interfere with his animation work, Walt permitted his “second career”; that of trombone player for the Firehouse Five Plus Two. Along with Danny Alguire, Harper Goff, Clarke Mallery, Monte Mountjoy, Ed Penner, and Frank Thomas, the group produced at least 13 albums and played various venues between the 1940’s and early 1970’s.

Like Walt Disney, Kimball also had an enthusiastic love of the railroad. He had a full size locomotive that he operated in his three acre backyard. His railroad was called the Grizzly Flat Railroad. He also helped build the Carolwood Pacific Railroad in Walt’s backyard.

Kimball retired from Walt Disney Studios in 1972 and was honored as a Disney Legend in 1989. He died in Los Angeles on July 8, 2002.

(Editors Note: Kimball also worked on one of my favorite extinct attractions, The World of Motion. I did not know this. The next time I am in Epcot and look at the Test Track building, I will pause for a moment and be thankful for people like Ward Kimball. He, and those like him, have given us all so much joy.)

(Photo credit: The Disney Legends website Wikipedia)

Disney World After Dark: Canada

We now come to Canada, the last country on our evening stroll around Epcot's World Showcase. Like some of its counterparts along the Promenade, Canada gives us so much of the flavor of this country in such a small space.

"Canada is the last pavilion in the World Showcase, combining the several traditions and geographic regions of the country into a setting that is at once startling in its diversity and inviting in its verticality. Towering above is the distinctive French Gothic architecture of the Hotel du Canada (modeled on Ottawa's Chateau Laurier). Alongside and beneath the chateau is EPCOT Center's Canadian Rocky Mountain, which houses a Circle-Vision theater. The Northwest Coast atmosphere is heightened by enormous totem poles and a native log house. There is also a miniature replica of the famed Butchart Gardens, a 30-foot waterfall, a restaurant, and the woodsman's haven of Salmon Island."

From Since the World Began, by Jeff Kurtti, page 114

Honestly, Canada is not one of my favorite pavilions, but it is near the top of the list. What strikes is the grandeur of the area. And this, from Disney's exquisite use of forced perspective. The Hotel du Canada, and the Rockies, appear to be so tall from a distance. It is only once you are in the pavilion that you realize just how much you have been taken in by the illusion. For me it represents the art of perspective at its finest.

I hope you have enjoyed our nocturnal visit to the World Showcase. Disney After Dark takes on a whole different magic and I hope these photos give you just a taste of it. Next week we will stay in Epcot and visit a few sites in Future World. Until then, enjoy this view of Canada.

Where In The World: The Rest of the Composite Challenge

It is time to bring The Composite Challenge to a close and say thank you to those who participated. In my last Where In The World I noted that all but four of the photos had been correctly identified. But those four were somewhat perplexing. So that we can close the chapter on this challenge and move onto other Where In the World subjects, I offer you the answers to pictures 5, 6, 7, and 10.

Photo number 5 takes us to China in the World Showcase to visit a dragon. The area used in the challange is the "Eye of the Dragon".

Norway, actually, the shingles on the roof of the outdoor dining area at the Kringla Bakeri Og Kafe in Norway provides us with the subject in photo number 6.

You have to look up and over Mrs. Doc's right shoulder to see where we drew inspiration for photo number 7. My lovely bride is posed in front of the wall fountain in the Cantina De San Angel.

And photo number 10 will take you bayside at Downtown Disney Marketplace. If you decide to take a moment to rest and perhaps in engage in a little people watching, you may also notice Mickey in the tables and chairs.

Again, many thanks to those of you who picked up the gauntlet. Other challenges are not far off. So, in the words of Sherlock Holmes, "The game is afoot."

How Do You Do!

Mighty glad to meet ya. It seems as though I have been away for so long. While I had the opportunity to check other favorites blogs from time to time, I was hard pressed to actually do anything on The Disney Obsession. I hope that I haven't lost many of you during my time away.

What have I been up to you ask? Well, quite a bit actually. And too, I have had ongoing trouble with my computer and our household network; which makes one wonder how did we ever manage just ten short years ago. But that is another thesis entirely.

But February has been eventful in that I have been waging a war against a cold or flu for over two weeks now. Not much fun there. During this time and for the month or so leading up getting sick, I was involved in a local production of Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street.

What does this have to do with Disney? Nothing actually. Well, the film version did star a certain pirate that we have all become familiar with. Oh, and the director of the film is currently working on a version of Alice in Wonderland for Disney. So I suppose there is a small connection.

At any rate, thank you for coming back and visiting the Obsession. And for your viewing curiousity, I offer you a photograph from Sweeney Todd. Yours truly is on the left in the role of Judge Turpin. On the right is Dan McGeachy in the title role.

Sweeney closed last Sunday, but the cast has been called back for an encore performance this coming Tuesday. So, once more into that good night.