Things You Didn't Know About Disney Parks Part 2
#1 Splash Mountain Sings
Why does the cast of audio-animatronic characters on Disneyland's Splash Mountain look so different from the cast in Orlando and Tokyo? Economizing. Many of its creatures, including singing geese, frogs, and foxes, were re-purposed from America Sings, a robotic musical revue in Tomorrowland that was dismantled in 1988.
#2 Cereal Killer?
The second face in the quintet of singing buststhe one with his head broken offin the graveyard of the Haunted Mansion (Magic Kingdom and Disneyland) is Thurl Ravenscroft, who was better known as the voice of Frosted Flakes' Tony the Tiger ("They're grrreat!"). Ravenscroft was a favored Disney company player; his voice is also heard on Pirates of the Caribbean, Country Bear Jamboree, and in Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room.
#3 But Was He a Disney Fan?
On November 17, 1973, President Richard Nixon delivered his infamous "I'm not a crook" speech to a convention of Associated Press editors in the ballroom of Disney's Contemporary Resort (Walt Disney World).
#4 Chew Chew Cho Cho
The steam engines of the Disneyland Railroad run on old French fry oil. After a few days' use in kitchens throughout the park, waste oil is stored in tanks and then shipped off-site to be converted to a bio-diesel the trains can run on. Every time guests order fries, they're helping to meet the five locomotives' appetite for 200,000 gallons of fuel a year. Bonus: the smokestacks smell a bit like lunch.
#5 Boy Scouts of the Caribbean
When Pirates of the Caribbean (Disneyland and Magic Kingdom) was built in 1967, randy pirates chased the women in mechanized circles during the pillage sceneperceived by some as threateningly sexist. Eventually the critiques were addressed in a few different ways across the parks. Gender roles got switched (women now chase the looting pirates away) as did motivations (hungry pirates look like they're chasing women for the pies they're holding) for a more family-friendly rendition of the murderous scalawags.
#6 The Reality Beneath the Magic
Because the Magic Kingdom is built on sodden ground, it needed a firmer foundationtechnically most of the park is actually the roof of a two-story building that conceals the utilidor, a warren of service corridors. It's wide enough to admit vehicles and holds wardrobe, break rooms, and the Digital Animation Control System (DACS) that serves as the nerve center for the park's effects, from the currents of the flume rides to the soundtrack of the Haunted Mansion. Some 30 hidden stairwells and elevators connect it with the "upstairs" of the park.
#7 Christmas in the House of 2000
Not billed Jean Shepherd, the narrator and author of the stories that became the holiday movie classic A Christmas Story, voices the Father ("John") in the current 1994 incarnation of Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress (Magic Kingdom). YepDad is Ralphie, all grown up.
#8 City Planning Innovations
In 1971, when Walt Disney World opened, its systems were revolutionary and progressive. The resort was the first place to install an all-electronic telephone system, and it routed all unsightly cables underground. It was also the first place in Florida to institute a 911 emergency system. Generator heat warms water, hot water runoff is used for cooking, waste water is reclaimed for plants and lawns, and sludge becomes fertilizer. Trash was sucked away at 60 mph in Swedish AVAC pneumatic tubes, originally to a special incinerator that emitted no soot, only steam. (In the 1980s, Disney decided landfills were cheaper.)
#9 Looks Are Frequently Deceiving
Although the Polynesian-style roof of Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room (Magic Kingdom) looks like straw, it was actually built with shredded aluminum, which holds up to the elements better.
#10 Behind-the-Scenes: Parade Technology
The floats in Disney's signature parades stay on track and in sync with the help of quarter-sized sensors embedded in the pavement.
#11 Droids Meet Jones
Hidden among the hieroglyphs in the Indiana Jones scene of the Great Movie Ride at Hollywood Studios is a tribute to his creator, George Lucas. Look to the right, above the crate, and you'll see images of two more of his creations: C-3PO fixing R2-D2 with a screwdriver.
#12 Nuclear Mickey
Could the nuclear future that Walt Disney World's Carousel of Progress shows become a Florida reality? Maybeif Disney ever decides to act on some of the extraordinary concessions it won from the state government before construction began in May of 1967. As reported by the Orlando Sentinel, the resort is actually its own independently governed municipality called the Reedy Creek Improvement District, giving it the right to form a school district, implement a criminal justice system, and issue tax-free bonds for infrastructure projects ranging from parking structures (as it did in 2013) to airports and yes, even a nuclear-power plant.
#13 Wait-Time Tweaks
Cribbing a page from airlines' standard operating procedure about flight times, posted wait times for rides are intentional lies. According to a Walt Disney World cast member on a seven-hour Backstage Magic tour, management overestimates by five or 10 minutes so that guests are "pushed" at different areas while also coming away from rides with a warm impression of exceeded expectations.
