SPEAKER_03 0:00

Attention, Autopia drivers, please remain seated in your car at all times. And always keep your seatbelt fastened. To make your car go, press your foot down on the pedal. To stop, take your foot off the pedal. For your own safety and the safety of other drivers, please do not bump the car ahead of you or stop your car in the middle of the track. Thank you.

Kelly 1:02

My name is Kelly McCubbin, columnist for the theme park website Boardwalk Times, and with me as always is Peter Overstreet, University Professor of Animation and Film History in Northern California. So, Pete. Yeah.

Pete 1:17

What are we talking about today? Well, we're going to be talking about a couple of things today. It's it's going to be it's not a complicated show in the fact that uh we are gonna do some mega deep dives tonight. Um, but it is gonna be complicated in the fact that we've got two or three things to talk about tonight. Yeah. Um it's a potpourri. It's a potpourri show. Uh it's a lighthearted potpourri show, and we guarantee it'll be a lot of fun. Um the first thing that I I wanted to mention to the audience, and is tell everybody who's listening, is that Kelly and I have never actually traveled together before. That's right. Yeah. Until a couple of weeks ago before we recorded this. Um so our respective partners um both kind of expressed to us, you guys have to go on a road trip and you have to go to Disneyland together.

Kelly 2:06

Trevor Burrus, Jr. And I don't think it was a please God get out of the house kind of thing. But maybe it was.

Pete 2:13

A little bit. I'm sure it was a little bit. You know, it it life gets stressful, and they b and to be fair, our partners know that this is our happy place. And so and and they really kind of want to see what would happen if we if we hit the road. And also, uh, and we will talk about another motivator shortly uh on why we went. But Kelly and I I picked him up on a Wednesday morning and we just drove down in my car and we went down to Anaheim and we went to Disneyland Park together for the first time. We did. It was one of the easier trips I've ever had going to the park of just kind of going, we both know how to do this park pretty easily, with our own temperaments, you know. And we soaked it in as a regular park uh patron would be. And we also soaked it in as the show. And we came up with idea after idea of going, we gotta do this on the show, we have to do that on the show. And one of those subjects we will talk about tonight.

Kelly 3:06

We had we had such a great time, and um Pete is the perfect traveling partner for me to Disneyland because I can and did say, Hey Pete, can we go find the wall on Main Street with oddly shaped bricks?

Pete 3:22

That was in the first five minutes of walking into Main Street. It wasn't like, hey, look okay, the first thing we did was, oh, Mr. Lincoln is down, darn. Yeah. They're doing something new to Mr. Lincoln, which is an update. We I don't know if we talked about this before. Probably not. But because we had talked about this as a plus up in our very first episode of saying, gee, wouldn't it be nice if they acknowledged Walt and his connection to Lincoln in this? Yeah. And the rumors are abound that may actually be happening.

Kelly 3:56

Yeah, that's what we're hearing is uh and these are these are super unfounded. Yes. So please don't anyone assume that we're saying we know this is what's happening.

SPEAKER_07 4:05

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Kelly 4:06

But what we've heard is there's a a large renovation going on there. Uh they're definitely working on a turntable of some sort in on inside the stage. And the rumor is that but potentially an audio animatronic Walt might be coming into play. If that's true, then um Pete is psychic because this is exactly Pete's plus up for great moments with Mr. Lincoln.

Pete 4:32

And we we're we have yet to figure out what they're going to do. I don't even think that uh imagineering even knows what they're going to do, but there's another attraction that we also did a plus up on, which was the golden horseshoe. Uh-huh. And which we talked about, gee, wouldn't it be nice if we came up with a whole new show and that kind of thing. And this is not exactly a happy plus up for us.

Kelly 4:52

We kind of we kind of got the opposite.

Pete 4:54

Yeah, we kind of got the opposite on this one, which was yeah, they're we're we're going to get rid of all performers right now. Yeah. So currently the golden horseshoe, as of this recording, is down, and there's some sort of rudimentary display that you mentioned.

Kelly 5:08

Yeah, so so I mean the the restaurant's still open, so you can get your chicken nuggets. But um and I assume is it still Pepsi? I forget.

Pete 5:17

I think Disney, and I'm sure somebody in the company is gonna go, no. But it's I think it's actually Coke is their main sponsor.

Kelly 5:24

I think you're right. And I was trying to remember this the other day, and I went, uh, it does Pepsi doesn't sound right anymore.

Pete 5:29

Joan Crawford isn't around to bully Walt anymore, so we don't have you know we can't have Pepsi in the park anymore. Right. Walt, get out there and sell my Pepsi. But to to um see seeing that's my Harvey Feerstein doing Joan Crawford impersonation of some sorry.

Kelly 5:48

You heard it here first, folks. So assumedly to celebrate Juneteenth and the time around Juneteenth, there's currently a display on the stage of uh instruments that would have been played by black musicians at at the turn of the last century, you know, the late 1800s, early 1900s. I I have to point out that what might have been a better tribute is to have black musicians play music on that stage. Yeah. But that's not what they did. They put some instruments there with some little cards on it. Yeah. I think uh just as kind of an overview of where we're going today, um, we're gonna talk a little bit about going to Disneyland because it's cool. Yeah. And uh we're also going to talk about, and I can see the gears whirring in Pete's head when this came up. So we we we had a plan to talk about something more complicated, and we realized um, you know, we uh we pushed ourselves probably harder than two gentlemen of our age should when we were in Anaheim. I came home quite sick. Um I was very sore, I will be fair. And so we said, let's let's tone it down, let's do something a little simpler. And I could see what was happening in Pete's head. Pete was like, I'm gonna figure out something that we can talk about that will not allow Kelly to tell me anything more about the dark water system at Disneyland. He was like, what is absolutely the farthest away from any of those points that he made me look at when we were at Disneyland?

SPEAKER_05 7:32

And I have to admit, like my my my beloved partner, Tanya, and I she we we got together with Kelly and his family as well for dinner, and he mentioned this to Tanya, and she got this look on her face like, what the ever-loving.

Pete 7:51

And she looked at me as if I was gonna like join her in this. I go, no, it was actually quite fascinating. And I that's when I realized, like, no, we're we really are you know park buddies. Like we really know how to do this park together. I think that's the thing, is that there are some people who just absorb the park and then go, entertain me. I just soak it in. Or I don't care, I'm just gonna, you know, some of the annual pass holders. I'm just gonna be here for a couple of rides and leave. Yeah. That's fine. That's the way we do we look at it as like we see every little nook and cranny and we're fascinated by it because of the history that goes into this.

Kelly 8:28

I I believe the thing that really Tanya could not believe was that I had sought out and taken multiple pictures of a light bulb that was painted half white and half red. A single incandescent light bulb.

Pete 8:48

Yeah. I mean, she could probably understand us looking for like the Disney Legends, you know, windows and going, ooh, there's Bob Gerr and person over there, and there's Bill Evans. Yeah, Bill Evans, there it is, you know. And we were super thrilled. Oh, there's Dominguez's, you know, windows. Ron Dominguez, it was great. We we really had to search for Ron Dominguez's window. We it took us two days to find it, but we found it.

Kelly 9:09

And it's odd too because I was there, it was put up. I was there that day. Yeah. Um and and it wasn't where I thought it was.

Pete 9:17

It took a couple of Mickey Mouse chocolate chip cookies to get you to remember it. That's right. It was worth it. Good brain food. Yeah, it was good. Yeah, I think I gained about five pounds at Disneyland and it was worth every bit of it.

Kelly 9:27

But before we move on, I do want to just uh a little bit more about um our trip to Disneyland. Yeah. Because Pete and I got to guest on Paul Berry's wonderful window to the magic. Hey, Paul. Yay!

Pete 9:45

That was one of the best ex like one of the craziest, most frantic excursions in and out of the park I've ever been on. Yeah. And it was so much fun.

Kelly 9:55

Oh, it was it was great. And uh you know, we went, we we'd never met Paul in person before. We communicated back and forth through emails. Um nicest guy in the world. We went out and met him in the Esplanade outside of Disneyland, and it was as if we had been friends forever. Like the three of us just took off. Uh, we you know, he's he explained a little bit of the ground rules because if you haven't listened to his uh podcast, it's wonderful. Uh what he does is he has these super high-end binaural recording microphones, and he'll walk through the parks so that when you listen to it back, you feel very immersed in the space. Yeah. You can be at Disneyland for a little while in your ears. And so he he met up with us, we went in, we we chatted with him for a while, we uh we rode some rides, we we rode uh the train all the way around, and and Paul showed us a really cool thing that I never knew existed.

Pete 10:56

However, I'm gonna actually say, you're gonna have to listen to a show to find out what it is. Oh, yes, good call. So, Paul, we're gonna leave that one up to you. Yeah.

Kelly 11:09

So yeah, we we we wandered around, we we we did some cool stuff with Paul. We chatted with him for uh, you know, it was a couple hours. Um, and uh we're gonna be on the show around the first, I believe. I think he's just gonna drop on the first. Yep. And um, if you're not familiar with Paul's show, here's a little bit about it.

SPEAKER_01 11:32

Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, in just a few moments, the window to the magic podcast show will begin. My name is Patrick.

SPEAKER_04 11:44

My name is Calvin. I'm Mousketeer Gray. My name is Paul, and I will be your guide through the wonderful world of Disney sound experiences. This show is a weekly trip into the world of the Disney theme parks and resorts. And this is the place where you get to use your ears to surround yourself with the magic. For your safety, please remain seated while listening to the window to the magic.com podcast. Maybe there's a name for this, something like Disnotic Obsession. Please visit window to the magic.com for more information, or you can find us on Apple Podcasts and in the iHeart Media app.

Kelly 12:31

And we're back. Hey, we're back. Please do go go uh if you if you don't listen already to Windows to the Magic, uh please do. It's it's a wonderful experience. Yeah, show him some love.

Pete 12:42

It's it's it's a great show. Yeah. And he's been doing it now for 20 years almost. Is it 20, 15, 20, something like that? Yeah. He's coming up on one heck of an anniversary. And it's it's pretty amazing.

Kelly 12:55

So we we anyhow. So the the the attraction that uh Pete came up with to keep me from talking about the singular flow of water from from near Tomorrowland down to uh the rivers of America was the Autopia, because it's far away from all of that.

Pete 13:16

Yep, it's furthest away. And it's also one of the simpler-ish rides for us to talk about. But there's another reason that we chose this. That's right. And it happened to be we just before we left, I think it was only a couple days before we left for the trip. Yeah. One of us found it on social media. We found an advertisement for it. Garner Holt Productions, one of the biggest and one of the most illustrious producers of animatronics in the world. Probably the biggest, I would think it's yeah, absolutely. And uh I've interacted with uh Garner. I mean, there's a lot of people in in this uh fandom world and in industry who have interacted with him. He's very personable. Yeah, nice guy. Really nice guy, very sweet. Uh he was throwing a charity event at his workshop, and by workshop I mean gigantor warehouse. I had no idea it was gonna be this huge.

Kelly 14:09

Uh if you've seen an animatronic this year, it probably started in that building.

Pete 14:14

Yeah, yep. And we we showed up. Kelly got a VIP pass, I got a standard pass because I was kind of running out of money at the time. And uh, but we showed up and uh the staff was wonderful. I think there was only like about no more than 200 people at the whole at the whole thing, the whole shebang. And uh I actually think Tiki Maynard was there. Uh and Maynard, if you're listening, please let us know in the comments if you showed up. But I didn't want to I didn't want to bug you, but you were super cool to me a whole bunch of different times. Yeah. And I just want to go, Maynard! You know, but he was he was just in his own little world. But the person, yes, it was cool to see Garner, it was cool to see all the animatronics, it was cool to see Garner's collection, including the two cars from the Great Race. Yeah, which was like Which he just has Yeah, there's the Leslie special, there's the Hannibal twin eight, like right. What? You know. Um, but the person we went there to see was the Gran Maestro of Autopia, yeah, Bob Gurr. Yeah, yeah. And that was the whole point was to go and see Bob Gerr. Imagineering legend. And we said this is our final day down in LA together. Let's just give up a day at the park and we're just gonna go meet Bob Gerr. Forget it. Let's just do it. So that's what we did. And we and we thought what was gonna be like a little hour little thing, turned out to be like a four and a half hour experience with this guy.

Kelly 15:34

Yeah. And it was cool. It was it was crazy. And you know, we we got to get pictures with Bob, uh, talked to him a little bit, not a ton, but a little bit, and he was very nice. He made jokes with me about his red shoes. Um he signed a bunch of stuff. We got some really cool prints signed by him, uh, and he gave this talk that was I'd love to hear your take on this, actually, Pete. Yeah. Like, this was not the talk I thought he was going to give. I agree.

Pete 16:03

I agree.

Kelly 16:04

Yeah, he looked at this audience. Uh so Bob Gurr in his 90s, I think. He is sharper than I'm ever going to be in my life. Oh, yeah. Looking good, he's smart, and he gave this wonderful speech about um he didn't want to kind of just dig into the same old stories he tells over and over again because he figured this crowd already knew that stuff.

SPEAKER_07 16:25

Yeah.

Kelly 16:25

So what he did was talk about how he got things done, like how uh he managed projects and how Walt got things done. And it was enlightening, it was eye-opening, uh, it was smart, it was uh a little bit acerbic.

Pete 16:45

Um, yeah, it was delightfully so. Yeah. Sometimes you're used to watching some of these older Imagineers or animators go, oh, Walt was wonderful, and this was Mundra, it was all you know, lollipops and Mickey Mouse. And like there were times where like Bob would you know, we would kind of look at each other across the room because Kelly's seated way up in front of VIP, and I'm all the way in the back row trying not to be resentful. No, I wasn't resentful at all. I had paid for my own ticket. That's all. But but but Bob would just let these things out every once in a while where you know he was holding back, but at the same time, he's like, No, this doesn't work for me. Yeah. And I kind of applaud that honesty. Yeah. I love it when I get to meet people who have worked in that company and on that per on that particular park that have those types of stories. Like Rolly Crump would do that during some of his interviews. But Bob's talk, I agree with you, it wasn't just the let's go down the lollipop, the lollipop tree of um Disney that happened when I was at Disneyland.

Kelly 17:50

Yeah.

Pete 17:50

Yeah. It was like he it's kind of it was like a business lesson and a management lesson from Bob, and I really appreciated that. And when we got in line to get our stuff signed, we got these prints signed. I got Adventure Through Inner Space, Kelly got a couple, he got the monorail and Yeah, and I got the people mover and inner space as well. Yep. And um I told Bob, and Bob was kind of you know, when celebrities get into signing autograph mode, they kind of just zone out. Right. Because they're getting stuff handed to them. They got their Sharpie, just and I said, you know, you know, Bob, um, I I am an artist, I am a designer, I've designed stuff, uh, but I also got my degree in a master's degree in business and entrepreneurship. And it was really fascinating to hear you talk about some of the aspects of project management and planning from that aspect from a business standpoint. So thank you so much for sharing that. And he just lit up, going, There's not enough people who have that crossover, the creativity and the business. There's not enough people. I said, Well, that's why I got my degree. Good for you. And I was like, Yay, I got approval from Bob Burr. You know, like that's my moment. And that was the end of the conversation.

Kelly 18:58

It was literally that quick. And if you want a more thorough rundown of what Bob said, I wrote an article on Boardwalk Times uh about a week ago that goes into a lot more detail about it. But it's a you know, the one of the other things that really stuck out to me was he was talking about when they were trying to build some stuff early on at Disneyland and and uh how the the unions were so partitioned that it was becoming difficult to do some crossover. And you think you know the end of the story. You think the end of the story is somehow we bucked the union and did something else. But that's not the end of the story. What he said was, so we formed a union that could do everything we needed to do. Yep. And I thought, well, there you go, right? He's he's not against representation e when it got in the way. He found a way to keep representation for the workers and get stuff done. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I mean means a lot.

Pete 19:58

Yeah, so this was this was really, really great uh experience, and and then Garner surprised all of us with okay, we're gonna take you to a part of the warehouse, and they've got it all parted off from you know from curtains. They did not let let us have phones and cameras out in certain parts of the warehouse. Yeah, most of it. Most of it, except for this little reception hall that they had kind of erected. Um, but we could take pictures in this one area, and uh, if you've been following us on social media, you've probably already seen some of these pictures. Yeah. But they have uh apparently Garner has a collection of ride cars. So he has an original Peter Pan ride car, he has one of the original Dumbo ride cars. Yeah. Um, he has one of the Mike Fink River boats, just standing, you know, Mike Fink Riverboat, yeah, like everybody does. And he has several other uh he has stuff from other parks as well. Uh and he has a train from another theme park that he's fully restored. I mean, it's it's the size of one of the Disneyland trains. Right? I don't I don't remember if it was from Knott's or some other park, but it's certainly the same type of make and size. But he did surprise us with with and Bob with something really interesting. And I guess we can talk about this because they they let us take pictures of it, so I can't imagine that's yeah, he probably did. He didn't say not to do this, so Garner, if you're mad at us, we apolog we apologize. Um but they unveiled a couple of pieces of a project that they're working on right now to restore a ride car, and it's the one of the original trains from Nature's Wonderland. Yeah. And they had the smokestack and they had the lantern, and I think they had the bell of the train, and they found one of Bob's blueprints, and so they put that I'm you should have seen Bob's face when they pulled the stuff off. He was like, Oh my god, I remember this. And he was he was so into it.

Kelly 21:53

So yeah, it's it's a commission uh from Disney to restore the train. Yeah. Um they're collecting pieces right now. Now, the pieces they can't collect, they're having fabricated. Um, I don't know what they're gonna do with it ultimately, but it's really cool that there's going to be still at least one existing mind train through Negature's Wonderland. I'm I'm really excited about that. That's so cool.

Pete 22:17

So we've talked about Bob Gurr. Yeah. We've taught we talked about our experience. And if you have a chance, I'm gonna do a quick little plug. Yeah. The Garner Holt Foundation and the Bob Gurr Foundation are both dedicated to helping out underprivileged children in certain areas of Los Angeles with different summer camp programs specifically designed uh towards uh kids who have an interest in animatronics.

SPEAKER_09 22:43

Yeah.

Pete 22:44

They apparently did uh a recent uh version of the Garner Holt Foundation's uh get together for uh camp for kids, is they did animatronic hummingbirds. Oh, cool. And they were so cool. I I checked it out, and uh I've already donated, uh I donated the name of this podcast, send them 50 bucks. If you have a chance, uh for those who are listening, please visit the Garner Holt Foundation and the Bob Gerr Foundation is a scholarship fund for people who also want to get into engineering and mechanics, etc. So please show a little love. Fi any little bit helps, but please help the Garner Hope Foundation and the Bob Gerr Foundation if you can.

Kelly 23:20

Yeah. So thank you for doing that. I appreciate that.

Pete 23:22

Yeah. Uh okay, so plugs aside, yes, let's pull the plug on this attraction, Autopia. Autopia, the Richfield Autopia. Ah, yes. And Autopia is one of those attractions that actually isn't grandiose, and yet it is so beloved by so many people. And I I I grew up loving it. And it it really is evocative of America's obsession with cars.

Kelly 23:58

Yeah, and and I think it's a it's really interesting, you know, uh again, it's a perspective thing. So how we look at the Autopia now is pretty different than how people would have looked at the Autopia in 1955 when it opened up. Absolutely. And the thing to keep in mind is the Interstate Highway system, the the the actual bill to fund the Interstate Highway System was signed the year after the Autopia opened. So so it actually was future-facing. Yes, it was. The the Autopia, this idea that you were gonna go on these highways on great distances in your soul-owned car, was really unusual.

Pete 24:47

Let me let me pull off our projector here for just a minute, our our old uh educational projector here. That's my bad projector sound effect, but President Eisenhower, in order to protect us from nuclear nuclear war, decided to actually build highways till it would be easier to evacuate large urban areas. And that's like so scary to me is the fact that highways were born out of nuclear war fears.

Kelly 25:17

You know, there's some question about that because it is, in fact, like the Interstate Highway and Defense Bill. Yeah. Um there is some question as to whether Eisenhower actually thought it was that significant towards defense, or that he just wanted to be able to draw from defense funds to pay for it. That's true. It's hard to say.

Pete 25:36

Well, he did he did actually appoint a certain judge who um took over a certain principality that he felt needed to be reined in a little bit. Yeah. And um he found a way how to actually keep the citizens of this particular municipality in check with a special mixture of benzedrine and you going. Kelly's giving this serious look. Like, where's this going? That's right, they're calling it a freeway. Sorry, it's my Roger Rabbit reference there for a minute. Sorry. Oh, no, that was good. You got me? You totally got me. But anyhow, but all joking aside, yeah, it's regardless of whether it was just pork or whether it was an actual intention, yeah. It comes out of this this the the the the the urban sprawl of the 50s.

Kelly 26:28

Yeah, and there's something interesting that kind of goes on here. So def defense was being funded a lot, obviously, because we'd just come out of the war. I think it's useful to look at the idea of leisure in America. Yeah. So in 1938, uh FDR signs uh a labor bill that says if you work more than 44 hours a week, you're on overtime. So he uh coup a couple of years later, they shrink that down to 40 hours.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

This generation of workers has a rendezvous with a coffee break.

Kelly 27:03

So it's part of his uh attempts to get us out of the depression. Yeah. So he he signs that bill. A couple of years later, it comes down to 40 hours and limits work to five days a week. So prior to 1940, there was no limitation. Yep. So what this suddenly did was give people room for leisure. But that's cut a little short because we suddenly move into the war. Yeah. So we're in wartime production, all bets are off. Yeah. And it's not until after the war that do we really get to reap the benefits of this. Right. Right. And so coming out of the war, all of a sudden, people in America have this thing that they have literally never had before: free time. Right. Actually, as a as a quick aside, one major employer in the United States actually um cut the uh work week down to 40 hours and to five days a week earlier than than Roosevelt. Because in 1928, Henry Ford changed the um the hours and and the pay for his employees because he discovered that no one working for him could afford to buy one of his cars. Geez, funny thing that. And yeah, they could, they didn't have time to use it. So um he he actually was trying. I mean, uh, Ford is a very difficult figure in American history. Oh, yeah. But he was actually trying to uh get ahead of the federal government and and push people to do this earlier. It didn't really take most other jobs, most other companies didn't do this. But Ford did. Uh he had a 40-hour work week before most of the rest of the country did. That's wild. Yeah. And you know, talking about Utopia. Right.

Pete 28:59

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. This moment when the middle class suddenly has access to uh automotive transportation.

Kelly 29:08

Right, and they can and they can now use it for their you know two days of free time to go somewhere.

SPEAKER_07 29:14

Mm-hmm.

Kelly 29:15

Um, which Disneyland was going to very much benefit by. Oh, yeah. Big time. There are three things I found, uh, probably more than this, but three super interesting things that I found about the creation of the interstate highway system that benefited Disneyland. Okay. Um one of them's obvious. Yeah. It was that I-5 was planned roughly along the route of State Route 99. Right. Which went smack through Orange County, smack through Anaheim, and they knew that when they bought the land that that was coming. Sure. Um, I read this great quote from Van France. Do you know Van France? He uh early Disneyland guy, mostly known for creating the training program for Disneyland employees in the 50s and 60s. Okay. Uh, but very deeply involved. It's a great quote about the fact that when they were opening Disneyland, the highway wasn't quite finished.

unknown 30:22

Oh, wow.

Kelly 30:23

So he says in in his book Window on Main Street, by the authority I give myself for doing this history, I'll also give myself credit for completing the harbor off ramp two days before opening. Cars would come down the freeway and hit a boulevard stop. Wood, this is C V Wood, who we talked about before. Yes. Um, would warned us, without that off ramp, traffic will be backed up to San Francisco. The problem was that the contractor's agreement stipulated that no overtime be paid by the state. I went to meet the superintendent of the job. Fortunately, he was a young guy who understood our problem. Without any paperwork, except C V Woods OK, I said we'd pay for any overtime involved. I also threw in lunch if they could complete it before the opening day. Oh wow. That off ramp was completed two days before opening. Oh my goodness. The crisis had been averted. We celebrated over lunch and cocktails. I got my off-ramp and a hangover to boot. Van France. Oh my goodness. I actually um found recently a copy online of Van France's unpublished memoirs of the early creation of Disneyland. Oh wow. I don't know where this came from, but it's pretty fascinating. Anyway, so that's number one. Okay. Obviously benefited by i5 coming through. Yeah. Um number two, we talked about in our last episode. Bill Evans. Bill Evans. Part of the reason that they were actually able to stock the jungle crews and other parts of Disneyland with so many trees was because the guys making the interstate highway system were knocking them down. Wow. So Bill Evans would get in front of the plans, tag the trees, and pay them off to allow them to come remove them and take them over to Disneyland. That's so cool. So that's number two. The last one, do you remember, Pete, when we were in the penny arcade at Disneyland? Yeah. And you started up that big musical Wurlitzer looking thing? Yeah. Mm-hmm. That particular inst instrument is there because of the Interstate program. What? A significant portion of the musical instruments, the like ancient ones that used to populate the Penny Arcade and other things around Disney, including that specific one, came from the collection of a guy named Albert Clifford Rainey, who had a large assembly of mechanical music machines. In 1953, California was building the San Gabriel River Freeway, the 605, through the Rainey estate. And Rainey's widow, Ruby, decided to sell the collection. Walt was fascinated by them, bought 30 of them for the park. Whoa. So he bought all those.

Pete 33:33

Okay, that's another episode I think we're gonna have to look into. The Rainy collection, like hunting down the remnants of the Rainy collection. Isn't that great, though? That's fantastic.

Kelly 33:42

Because of the interstate, Walt got these machines. Walt got a machine that you literally played a week and a half ago.

Pete 33:49

That's so cool.

Kelly 33:51

Yeah.

Pete 33:51

That is really, really cool. Oh my god. All right, yeah. Well, and also a lot, um, I mean, this is also the golden era, the 1920s onward, of roadside attractions. Yeah, yeah. And I mean, being who we are on our trip to Disneyland that we mentioned earlier, Kelly and I actually made a point of stopping at some of these roadside attractions on the Highway 5. Yeah. And one of which was P Soup Anderson's. Right. Which looking at a real old one. Yeah, that's it's been around since the 20s. It's this weird, kitschy Norwegian style kitchen with gift shop. Yeah. And we mostly use it as a bathroom break and a stretch our legs. So we've been driving for two and a half hours, but that's the whole point, is that these things were set up all over the roadways of America, and everything ranging from come buy our oranges from our orange-shaped, you know, vending uh stall, or something as lavish as P. Soup Anderson's, the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose was a roadside attraction in order to uh allow people to stretch their legs, see something interesting, and then move along with their day. Yeah. Um, and so a whole industry of leisure, of the smaller time leisure of like we don't need to charge them a huge amount of money, just a little bit. A little bit because because there's gonna be so many people driving past us. Right.

Kelly 35:19

Because because it's leisure that you travel to, yeah. Which was unheard of before uh we started building the highways and before you had time to do it. That's about it.

Pete 35:30

The cars got you a little bit further, and you didn't have to deal with other travelers. You could move at your own pace, and that was big. Yeah. That was really, really big. And I think that also built up people's identity with their cars. Yeah. Because we never, when whenever we're hit in a car, I mean, I just said it. Yeah, we are technically not hit. Yeah. Our car is hit by another car. Oh, yeah. But we we so identify with our vehicles that oh, I got hit in an accident the other day. No, actually, your car got you were inside your car that got hit. Right. Technically speaking, not to mansplain it too much, but that's actually what really happened. Yeah. But that's the phenomenon that we have, is and that identity with cars. Yeah. And that association also leads to the customization of Henry Ford himself. We'll sell it to you any color that you want as long as it's black. Yeah. Right. Then you have their competitors saying, Well, we offer it in creamy white. I mean, we offer it in lead paint white, you know, and but then you know, colored cars really started popping up in the 30s, early 30s, and the colors got brighter and bigger, and it just became more and more apparent that the cars were actually taking on different, they weren't just these cookie-cutter cars of the way that Ford and uh Chrysler and all these other uh companies that existed in those days were pumping out.

SPEAKER_09 36:50

Yeah.

Pete 36:50

Suddenly they were taking on new personalities, new shapes, new forms, and it was all about ego because people were spending so much time in their cars.

Kelly 37:00

Yeah, and this and this is kind of the where where Bob Gerr comes from. Yeah. Because Bob Gerr starts off his career as a car stylist. He is designing the look of cars. He doesn't become a real kind of grease monkey engineer until he's at working for Disney for a while and they don't have anyone else to do it. Right.net, you'll find some of the most well-considered and insightful writing about the Walt Disney Company, Disney history, and the universe of theme parks available anywhere. Come join us at BoardwalkTimes.net.

Pete 38:03

Yeah, yeah. So let's while we're talking about the past here, yeah. Because everybody who's listening to this probably already has a good notion of autopia. Yeah. Okay. And we'll get to that. But I want to, you know, this is one of the things that we're known for here.

SPEAKER_09 38:17

Mm-hmm.

Pete 38:18

Is we're going to give you a lowdown. Yeah. Okay. And the lowdown is the origins of Autopia, has very, very deep roots, not just in America's obsession with cars, but also how that permeated throughout popular culture. And it actually stems from carousels. Okay. Okay. This is where it starts. Carousels. Um, I have restored two carousels in my lifetime, one of which is in Los Gatos, California, the Billy Jones Wildcat Railroad. Yeah, we need to go down to that. We do. Uh that'll that'll be another show in its own. Um but um and I helped restore another one that was in Santa Cruz. Uh but there were two the the carousels are as old roughly as the 1600s. The notion of of having a mechanized arc that takes you around in a circle over and over and over again at various speeds. And you have uh various designs in which you have uh some carousels in which they're buckers in which they go up and down. Some they just stand uh completely still. Carousels were actually mostly designed to travel. So they would all fold up. They usually have their calliope and their engine, usually driven by steam, and later by electricity, but mostly by steam and this as a center wagon. Yeah. So usually there's two wagons in a circus for a carousel or a carnival. One is to carry all the horses and the platforms and all of the panels. Right. Uh the rest is all just one wagon just for the engine itself. Well, carousels really started taking off in the 1860s. Uh especially when you have a lot of traveling fairs all over the place. Uh all the car, you know, the carnival circuit was really building up in the 1870s, post-Civil War. And then you actually had an event in California that changed the look of carousel horses. Most of the time, carousel horses were usually carved, you can always tell when they were built. If they are earlier than 1870, they are usually carved with their feet extended both in the front and in the back. Yeah. If they are post-1870, they usually have their hooves underneath them. Or they're or if they if their feet are extended, they are extended to more natural form, like they're rearing up. And the reason is because of the experimentations and animation by Edward Moybridge. Yeah. Because no one had actually photographed a horse in motion before. And um I think the artist's name is Massonnier, who actually was very famous for painting horses, actually wept when he saw the photographs because he'd been painting the horses incorrectly in running stamps. Yeah. Their hooves are, you know, when they're extended outward, that is not when they are off the ground, all four of them. Their hooves are off the ground when all four are underneath the horse. Okay. Okay. So usually when you have horses going up and down on a carousel, the legs are extended outward because it makes it easier for the pole to go up and down.

SPEAKER_09 41:44

Yeah.

Pete 41:45

Okay. Because of those buckers, because of the ones that are that go up and down, ladies in big skirts and bustles can't usually get on them and maintain their lady-like notion. So carousel manufacturers like Denzel, like Loof, all these other uh all these other manufacturers started experimenting with other forms of transportation on a carousel. Okay. And they started off with a gondola, which is basically like it's a it's it's a couple of benches, usually surrounded with some sort of ornately carved side. Yeah. It'd be a swan or a dragon or a hippocampus or something like that. And it rocks, gently rocks back and forth.

Kelly 42:25

Sometimes it'sn't the hippocampus part of your brain?

Pete 42:28

Uh yes. Hippocampus is a seahorse. That's it okay. That's actually what they call a seahorse. So they were they're called hippocampus. So like are we uh riding your brains? In America, they're called seahorses. In Europe they call them hippocampi on the on the carousels. All right. Uh so you have the rocking, or you have the spinners, where they gently spin around Mr. Toad style, or I'm sorry, teacup style. My dog is Mr. Toad, so I've been saying his name a lot. Um and so but the gondola would rock gently back and forth, thus allowing ladies to demurely sit while their gentlemen would ride the horses. They were supposed to be sitting on the gondola. It didn't always work out that way. Yeah. But that was the original intention. In 1906, in England, um, you actually see a new type of gondola show up. Uh actually, I should back up for a minute. Um Carousels, like any ride, there's a one-upmanship that happens. So you have a standard carousel that just goes around in a flat plane. So now I'm I'm talking about the evolution of innovations, and so this is where it really, like I said, this is a deep dive. Now you have to make it more thrilling. How do you do it? Yeah, you do what is called a switchback, in which the gondolas and horses would then climb a hill and then rise up in the back of the ride and then go downhill at the at the front. So it goes up and down as well as side to side. Okay. Thus giving you the notion of you're climbing up a hill and you're racing down. A hill with all of the different rows. Yeah. The switchbacks were very, very popular during the turn of the century. So we're talking 1899 to 1905. In 1906, that's when you actually see a new type of gondola in order to promote a new mode of transportation as a way to sell this notion of these machines that were actually terrifying to some people. Not everybody grasped the automobile. We're talking about the horseless carriage. We're talking about the horseless carriage. Yeah. They were used as gods. So they would take the engines out and they would put them on, and instead of having gondolas or horses, it would just be a circle of cars going up and down and up and down.

Kelly 44:40

So they they would actually okay, I'm blown away. So they would actually take the um outer frame of the car, they take the engine out and take the outer frame and mount it on a carousel. Wheels and all.

Pete 44:55

That's crazy. It's insane. And they would usually have about a dozen cars of different styles. Yeah. And if if for those who might be trying to imagine your head, we'll we'll post it on our Facebook. I have some photographs of these. Um, but they basically look like Mr. Toad's car. You know, with the big open seat with the leather, the tucked leather. So if you ever looked at the Mr. Toad, just imagine that huge and with three rows of vehicles. So it's like take the Indiana Jones Jeep and you mix it with Mr. Toad's car, and you get these horseless carriages that they're trying to sell. Wow. And that's what people would go around on. And this was kind of the first time. I mean, I've got a book, uh, part of my collection here. It is called Fairground Art by Jeff Whedon and Richard Ward. It's a British book. Uh-huh. Uh, it's one of my reference manuals for a lot of my deep dives, but also it's I used it as a way to help me um uh put together uh carousels. Yeah. But it's been in my collection for some time. Uh but uh uh French manufacturers, uh like Peugeot, uh Daimler Chrysler, and even Ford with American switchbacks would put cars and eventually to even put motorcycles on these cars.

Kelly 46:06

And this is right. This is like in like the 1900s? Yes, yeah, the early 1900s. That's how these are amazing. And so this kind of begins the car as an amusement ride. And it's fascinating because this this resembles so much the thing that um Walt Disney and Bob Gerr put together for the World's Fair that is not a World's Fair with the Ford Magic Skyway. Yep. Coming back around to Henry Ford. 100%. Right. So they basically took the frames of Ford cars and stuck them on poles.

Pete 46:46

Now we're gonna go so I'm gonna go through this natural progression here. Yeah. I mean, so this is gonna be a little peat-heavy for a minute, and then I'm just gonna totally hand it over to Kelly. Um Petey. This is gonna be a little peedy at first, but trust me. Like a fine Scott. You'll dig this. You'll dig this. Yeah, it's fine. Scotch. Um In the 1920s, two amusements come out. Yeah. And it is because of the advent of um electric motors.

Kelly 47:16

Yeah, okay.

Pete 47:18

And the use of conducting electricity through different poles. Okay. The first one is a carnival attraction. Yeah. And you would walk into this tent, and there would be basically essentially a slot car, a gigantic slot car track on the inside of this tent. Yeah. And there would be a chalkboard with numbers written on it, one you know, one through ten or one through eight, whatever. And you would bet on which car would win the next race. Yeah. The pilots of these cars were monkeys. Monkey tracks. Um, and so for those of you who like the squirrel nut zippers, they actually have a song called The True Macaq, in which they're talking about monkey races. And these terrified, you know, simians are stuck in these little slot cars going around and around in circles. But how they're guided is it's not just a slot car. They're on a track with a metal pole right underneath the car that keeps them from going too far left or too far right. Oh, wow. You see where I'm getting with this? I do. Okay. So we'll keep that in mind as we go through the design.

Kelly 48:33

If only they thought of that right away with the Autopia. Took them a few rounds.

Pete 48:40

They didn't test it with monkeys. They should have tested it with monkeys. They almost did. Spam in a can. The other thing that came out roughly about the same time was two guys named Max and Harold Strower. Uh, they were brothers from Lawrence, Massachusetts, and they they took the electric car design and they took the monkey track design a step further. And they said, rather than putting monkeys in this, let's take it off the track. And instead of having the track electrified underneath with just a simple pole that goes up into it, yeah, what if we make the floor metal and we have a pole reaching up to the you know, the ace, you know, the the positive and the negative, and basically you're driving a circuit. Yeah, what could possibly go wrong? What could possibly go wrong? And they created the dodgeums. That's what they originally called. What we call bumper cars. Yeah. And the Dodgeum Corporation. The Dodge Jum Corporation installed its first bumper car traction just a few miles away from their own factory, uh, at a shop at Salisbury Beach in Massachusetts as early as the 1920s. And the Dodge Jum Corporation sold its business in 1961, and its uh subsequent owners stopped making rides in 1970. So they had been around a long time, 50 years of making Dodgeum cars. Yeah. The appeal of the Dodge Jam car is not about driving, it's about whacking the hell out of whoever else is driving there. Yeah. And thus that becomes one of the next seeds that gets planted of the elements of Autopia. So that's my back-in-time deep dive on some of the early influences that may have shaped Autopia.

Kelly 50:23

Aaron Powell The thing I'm most amazed by that story is that you pulled it together. I was like, where is he going? Welcome.

Pete 50:30

I have a couple of students who listen to the show and they're they're probably going, Kelly, this is what every day is like for us. You'd think I'd figure it out by now. Well, man, you landed that way. Yeah, you never know where I'm gonna go. It's like, where's he going? Like, because Kelly was actually giving me this look on his face, like, what are you doing? Why are you doing this to me? We're running out of time. Give me a break. Oh, no, no.

Kelly 50:55

Wait, no, he actually got it here. Oh my god, he got it. It was more befuddlement than anything. But we but we got it there. Yeah. There's I you know, I want to I want to kind of because we talked about bumping, I kind of want to uh just jump into the history of the attraction itself a little bit. Absolutely. And you know, I don't want to go too awfully deep in because you can get that anywhere.

SPEAKER_07 51:19

Yeah.

Kelly 51:19

The attraction being built prior to Disneyland opening, uh Bob Gerr, whose title is the Director of Vehicular Development. Nice. A title which he pretty much kept his entire career. Yeah. In fact, it was it was joked about that when he left uh Disney, his title had not changed from the day it had from what it was when he started. And I have a quote from him. He said, Uh, I had no inkling when I started that I would be doing mechanical engineering. I was a car stylist at the time, but I worked up from there and I've been doing this stuff ever since. It's kind of cool, actually. It's really cool, and you know, we got this a lot from listening to him talk. Yeah. Where he said, you know, you just did it. Yeah. You you figured out what needed to be done and you learned how to do it. I mean, this is the guy that learned trigonometry so he could figure out how to design the Matterhorn.

unknown 52:14

Wow.

Kelly 52:15

Right?

Pete 52:16

Wow. That's you know, that there's something to be said for that type of mentality.

Kelly 52:21

Yeah, the first tubular steel roller coaster in the world. No one had ever built one like that before. Wow. Just amazing. Yeah. Uh the the first cars he designed to look like Italian Ferraris. They were they were 7.5 horsepowers. The engine could go up to 25 miles an hour, but they had a governor that stopped them at 11.

Pete 52:43

Uh except for that one, probably where you actually see him doing a Tokyo slide. That's one of my favorite photographs of Bob. It's just sliding one of those things sideways.

Kelly 52:52

Well, there were three cars that did not have the governor. Ah. And actually, I'll go a little bit more into this in a second, but yeah. The three cars were one that was a show car that was built for Walt. Um, it was often just on display. It was metallic maroon, red and white leatherette interior, and a re-welded actual Pontiac bump bumper. That one could go the full speed. Also, there were two police cars. Really? That were designed to look like sheriff cars. Now you have to remember when the Autopia first opened, it wasn't on a track. I mean, it was it was in these lanes. Right. But the lanes were two car wide. It was intended that you could pass each other. Oh, wow. So the police cars were there literally to go keep people in line.

Pete 53:51

Why am I imagining Cubby from the musk the Mousketeers going, pull over? Or worse, Roy Williams. Yeah. Roy, pull over.

Kelly 54:04

Roy coming to breathalyze you on the Autopia.

Pete 54:08

Touch your finger to your nose, dick.

Kelly 54:11

So those were the Mark I cars. Okay. Um Mark Ones. They were not super resilient. Uh they had some problems. The two-lane thing was not working real great. Yeah. In 1956, the second Autopia, the Junior Autopia, was built over on the Fantasyland side. Um they built Mark II cars for those. Uh they had slightly different engines. They had uh uh uh Wisconsin engines instead of Gladden engines. I don't know what that means either. They uh and they were they were they were built with extender blocks on the accelerator because the junior Autopia was for smaller kids. Oh uh eventually they they started replacing all of the Mark I's with these Mark IIs anyway, though. Sure. For both tracks. Sure. A Bob Gerd then built a single Mark III car. It was an experimental one with a different kind of clutch and a different kind of engine. They never built another one. So there were a bunch of Mark I's, a bunch of Mark IIs, one Mark III. Okay. And right around that same time, the Tomorrowland Autopia, the main one, they got rid of that two-car lane. Yeah. It just was a nightmare. Uh so they ended up making it two single-car lanes so they could double the capacity. Okay. Uh they built Mark IV cars, uh, also new engines, Kohler engines with Doris gearboxes, but the same Ferrari body. In 1957, uh the midget Autopia opened. So now we've got three. Right. Uh we've got the Tomorrowland Autopias, the big one, the uh Junior Autopia in Fantasyland, and the Midget Autopia. The Midget Autopia is kind of an Autopia just in name. It actually is just a dark ride car put on a track. The kids have no power over it. See part where monkey races. I mean, it's exactly. Exactly. And you could bet on them. And you know, if you could find uh Roy from the Masketeers.

Pete 56:17

He was usually hiding inside the yellow barn. Yeah.

Kelly 56:20

He was like, I'll take the little toe-headed kid.

Pete 56:24

Wow. It's got really dark.

Kelly 56:29

So in 1959, uh the open the new Tomorrowland with the subs, the Matterhorn, and the Monorail. Wow. Uh the Fantasyland Autopia, the what used to be the Junior Autopia, was expanded, so it was as big as the other one. So now they had two full-sized Autopias. What year was this again? 1959. Okay when the new Tomorrowland opened. Okay. You now had two full-sized Autopias. The tracks were very ingeniously designed because both tracks would kind of meet up and you would end up side by side with the other Autopia. And occasionally you would actually come be sort of facing the other Autopia. So they merged like an actual highway of the future. The Mark IV cars were replaced by what they call the Mark V car. This is where the smashing into each other thing becomes a real problem. This was called the Committee Car. The reason it was called the Committee Car was uh I'll quote Bob Gurr here. I knew you were going there. By 1959, we had decided to build an entirely new car instead of continuing to evolve the first car any further. We went to a car designed by all these consultants and experts, and they tended to disagree with each other. The Mark V reflected everything that everybody wanted, and as a result, became the worst car ever. Oh my god. The car was so massive and so heavy it would take chunks out of the concrete curves. Oh my god. It was a massive car. Wasn't that the one that was actually styled after the Stingray? No, that's coming up. Okay. So after that, in 1963, Aero Development, who did a lot of theme park vehicles, amongst other things, said, We can make you a new one. Okay. So they built something that was the Mark VI. Gurr was not much involved in it. Okay. He did come out and seem to do some styling stuff towards the end, but for the most part it was Aero Development on their own. Okay. Their whole deal was you had a problem with these big heavy cars. We're going to make a super light one. The way that you make the structure light is by making it weaker. Ugh. Oh dear. So they would slam into each other and the entire chassis would bend or buckle or snap. And the only way to fix them was to weld the pieces back together, which made them heavier and heavier and heavier. So they they were weak and getting heavier. Lead sleds. They were turning into lead sleds. That's right. Oh my god. That's right. Wow. Right after that is the one that was designed. It was actually not designed after the stingray. It was designed exactly at the same time as the stingray. Interesting. Okay. Gur says that he uh met someone that worked on the design of the stingray. They looked at each other's designs and just shook their heads, going, we don't know how this could have possibly happened. So it was a much better car, uh, not so rigid. It could actually handle a little compression on its frame. So if you bumped into each other, things would not suddenly break. The bumper and the frame was high, the uh seats were low, there were no holes or welds to weaken it. That had a Kohler engine, a Mapo clutch, and Doris gearbox.

Pete 59:59

So, real quick, I want to put a pause. Yeah. The styling of the you mentioned nobody knows how this mixture happened. Yeah. There's a legend. And I'm saying this is it's a legend. It's a great and a it's a great apocryphal story, but it is a legend. Yeah. The Corvette. Let's talk about the Corvette for just a second. I grew up in a Corvette driving household, so I have to show this story off for a moment. Okay. When they switched over from the it looks like an electric shaver, the earlier stingrays, where it still had the steel body of the early 60s and became the fiberglass body stingray that we know now. Um some people have speculated it was inspired by I mean, obviously, using this new technology of fiberglass was a big deal. But also, uh there's a rumor on how the shape of the stingray took place. Because let's think about when this was designed. What year was this designed? 1963. Okay. 1963 is a changing time. And one of the things that they needed to sell big time was uh and this was sex was becoming much more prevalent in advertising.

Kelly 1:01:19

So the rumor is We were doing the Wizard of Bras later.

Pete 1:01:23

Oh, okay. Maybe I shouldn't tell the story. Oh, I'm gonna tell it anyway. This the rumor is that the designers at Chevy take together this humongous piece of paper and got a huge arc light, and they hired a local stripper. Uh-huh. Some people who tell this legend say it was Meryl Monroe. I think they're full of caca. But this is a great story because once you hear this, you're never gonna unsee this. When you look at a stingray from the side and from the top, right? They had her stand upright with her arms up on her head like this, uh-huh, and they just traced her outline. Yeah. So you have the long nose of the stingray that bell bells out, and then the waistline is right where the door's into the car, and then it kind of buckles out a little bit. That's where the torso would be, and then there's the back of the car. Oh, that's hilarious. That's the top of the car. And then they had her lay down on her side, kind of Odalesque style, and they traced that. That's the side silhouette of the car. Yeah. I don't know if that's true or not, but it's a great story. But now that I know that story, I cannot unsee that every time I look at those models of cars. Right. So, anyway, so that's that's a fun little pocketable legend. So, you know, Bob, if you're listening, please tell us who that model was because obviously you were there. Obviously, you saw the same model. Yeah, you say the same model. Maybe it was Marilyn Monroe. I don't know. The only thing I had on when I was being photographed was the radio.

Kelly 1:02:56

Well, and and so that that was the most successful design. That stayed the design for like 25, 26 years. Oh, yeah. Um, it's it stayed the design till long after Richfield Oil, who were the original sponsors, uh stopped sponsoring it. Yeah. Um, by the way, did you know that there was an official gas of Disneyland?

Pete 1:03:21

No. Tell me who the origin the initial the the uh official gas of Disneyland is.

Kelly 1:03:28

It is Richfield boron gas.

Pete 1:03:32

Oh that sounds terrifying.

Kelly 1:03:34

Yeah. Now, interestingly enough, I so I looked a little bit up about uh Richfield boron gas. I mean Richfield's obviously a big gas company. Um the boron, it turns out that if you take uh boron, or you take the the um acidified version of boron that you mine um and some somehow integrate it into like petroleum products. Yeah, like it it forms this kind of lubricant. It's very much an early version of version of like Tecron. Oh my gosh. So it it was this fuel that was high octane, a hundred octane. Whoa! So like crazy high.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:17

Whoa.

Kelly 1:04:18

With this extra lubricant made out of boron. Oh my god. Oh now it is it is not looking into this, I was like, is that what they used for the Autopia?

Pete 1:04:29

It's not. Okay. They use like that was like that's why I was worried, like for a minute, like going, oh my God, every no wonder every baby boomer's messed up. Yeah. No, just some joking.

Kelly 1:04:39

No, they used they used um Richfield ethyl gasoline for for the actual Autopia.

Pete 1:04:44

I don't know if that's better.

Kelly 1:04:45

I don't it's either you're ingesting lead or boron fumes. Oh god. Have you ever been down to the city of Boron, California? There's a city called Boron. Oh yeah. It it's named after the boron mines that are there. Oh my God. I hear it's a pretty boron place. It's a little, it's a little south of Bakersfield. Okay. Um I've I drove through there once because a friend of mine was like, you need to drive through boron on this trip you're making. And I was like, okay. Um Boron is a ghost town in progress. It is uh apologies to the 2,000 of you that currently live there. Um it is a town that has been dying for a long, long time. Yeah. The uh getting back to the interstate highway system that we were talking about earlier, um, it pretty much bypassed them. Oh, wow. So they they were a moderately vibrant small town that had this huge mine. They supplied more than half the boron that's used in the world. Wow. But when the highways came in, it just bypassed the city altogether and it just slowly. Began dying.

Pete 1:06:00

I'm looking at Google Maps while he's talking about this, and he's absolutely right. Right?

Kelly 1:06:05

It's like it is it is on the verge of being a ghost town. Wow.

Pete 1:06:10

Oh my god, in the Google Maps, there's actually a tumbleweed right in the middle of the town. Okay, as Kelly's talking about ghost towns, there it is. Okay. Wow. Anyway, just the interesting side note. Okay. Boron, California. I had no idea that that's the fuel that they were using.

Kelly 1:06:26

That is so wild. Yeah, and and Richfield sponsored it up through 1970. And here's an interesting thing I learned about that. Huh. There was an attraction, another attraction that Richfield sponsored at Disneyland. I had never heard about this before. Uh-huh. Never. And uh, you know, you and I know a good amount about this stuff, so tell me if you've heard about this. It was an attraction called The World Beneath Us. I don't know this one. It was there from 1955 to 1960. Wow. And here's what it was: it was a bunch of sort of displays that included like uh large-scale models. There was some um models of geographic area outside of Los Angeles that would had a little motor under it so it could simulate an earthquake. Like a diorama. Okay. Walk through, you'd look at these models, and then you would go into a little room where there was an animation that Disney had put together specifically for this. Huh. And it was this is it's so bizarre. I gather that there was um someplace on the coast in Southern California that had a large area of oil reserves. Okay. But to get oil up out of the ground, you need some pressure. Usually you need like water pressure or gas pressure or something to pump it up. Right. Okay. And these uh oil reserves had had no more pressure. So there was a bunch of landowners, mostly farmers, that owned this area with a bunch of oil that nobody could get out. So the world beneath us had this animated professor explaining how you could pump seawater into oil reserves to build up the pressure so you could get them out.

Pete 1:08:27

So it's basically Ludwig van Drake talking about how are we going to actually do fracking.

Kelly 1:08:31

Right. And trying to get some sort of like, I don't know, some sort of purchase on legislation or some sort of drive with the landowners in this one specific area of California. Wow. To get them to extract this oil. Wow. So that was Richfield's other attraction.

Pete 1:08:50

That is bizarre. I'm looking at pictures right now of this thing. It's insane.

Kelly 1:08:55

It's really fascinating.

Pete 1:08:57

I wasn't that far off. I mean, the the picture of the professor is kind of a human Ludwig von Drake. He totally is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Great, actually. It's a Ward Kimball designed type character. It's really, really awesome. There's posters of like, see us at the exciting Richfield show, The World Beneath Us, in Tomorrowland. It's free. Yep. Because we really got to push something. And the professor's writing on a mastodon, which is, you know, it's a Labrea Tarpitz kind of connection.

Kelly 1:09:22

I saw a quote from a postcard of the time where it just said, The world beneath us in CinemaScope and Technicolor. This Walt Disney cartoon motion picture tells the story of oil presented by the company, which fills your car with the West's foremost premium Richfield boron gasoline over 100 octane. Oh, geez. This wow.

Pete 1:09:49

Wow. That's all I gotta say is wow.

SPEAKER_10 1:09:52

Yeah.

Kelly 1:10:02

This month at Boardwalk Times, we're talking about Doctor Who, Universal's Dark Universe. Which Avengers might be returning to the MCU and why the Disneyland Resort is canceling so much live entertainment. Come check it all out at BoardwalkTimes.net.

Pete 1:10:31

Before we get into the 70s, um, we have to talk about midget Autopia. Yeah. Because, you know, before we start moving forward with Autopia, we have to mention that this very sweet little ride for kids because parents couldn't ride. They were the cars were so small, they were designed specifically for children to ride them. Yeah. Or monkeys. Either way. But but but the uh midget Autopia uh just could not survive for several reasons. One, uh it was kind of a I hate to use the term, a kind of a rinky-dink little attraction. It was starting to fall off on popularity. Yeah, you couldn't drive the cars was part of it.

Kelly 1:11:15

Like you just it was just a dark ride car.

Pete 1:11:18

Yeah, you turn it on and off it goes. I mean, it literally was like monkey racing, where the monkeys are not actually in control. Yeah. 1966, the the not world's fair is finished, and the uh all of these attractions that have gained a huge amount of popularity um are going to either go into storage, get destroyed, or they're gonna come to Disneyland. And the one that is very definitely going to come to Disneyland is it's a small world. Yes. And they need a place to put it. And so they tear out Midget Autopia 1966 in order to make room for It's a Small World. However, remembering his roots, and also as kind of like he had a little soft spot for this sweet little ride, Walt sent all the cars to Marceline, Missouri. For the midget autopia. The midget autopia. Just tacked them all up and gave them to Marceline to set up a midget autopia in the middle of a park out in Marceline. Huh. And they did. They they designed the track, uh, they laid it all out, they put the ride up, and it lasted for another 10 years until finally in 1976 it was torn out because mostly because people in Marceline couldn't afford to, you know, there wasn't enough people. It's like everybody was like, I've already ridden that, I don't need to do it again. Yeah, right. And you don't have a lot of people at this point who are Disney fanatics going, I'm gonna drive all the way out to Marceline to go see this. Right. Now there is. Now people are definitely going out there to go see Disney stuff.

Kelly 1:12:53

Yeah, it's becoming much more of a tourist attraction.

Pete 1:12:55

Absolutely. Um, including a certain bed and breakfast that is going to be installed that we heard about when we were in the world. Oh, that's right. Yeah. Uh one of one of the uh people who uh runs Garner Hold actually told us that they have recently acquired a bed and breakfast out there. But uh I'll let them unveil that. Yeah. Um anyway, the uh the ride you can still see today. The track still exists, and you can actually see the big metal posts sticking out where the the center rail would be. Oh huh. And you can walk the trail of midget autopia and Marceline still. It's just like it's like a little paved path. And it backs and forth, it switches back and forth, and it's really cute. But uh the cars have been spread to the nine winds, you know. Collectors out there have, you know, I've got my midget Autopia car out in my Disney collection, you know, that's cool. But yeah, that's that's the life of Midget Autopia. And at the same time, while that is going on, they refurbish Fantasyland Autopia and regular Autopia to kind of goose it a little bit. In 1989, here's another deep dive. Okay. Okay. The deep dive is the advent of cable television. Uh-huh. Okay. And cable television in the mid-70s is rearing its ugly head. As a matter of fact, there would be trailers in front of Disney Films saying don't get cable TV. It's evil. You're gonna pay for television, this is evil. Seriously, you could look these up. There would be movie trailers, not necessarily Disney specific, but there would be movie trailers at movie theaters basically saying, Don't buy cable TV. It's evil. While cable TV is rising, we've got a company that is starting to struggle. Yeah. They're putting out all these, they're going through Walt's dying list of live action, Kurt Russell movies. And, you know, the the the computer war tennis shoes and all these other, you know, Gus, the mule, and all these other live action pushes. Yeah. And Disney is actually starting to implode a little bit when it comes to its intellectual property. And the theme parks are also suffering at this time. Yeah. So Disney has to come up with another way how to make money or die. Yeah. So they decide well, we have this huge stable of cartoons. Why don't we get one of these cable stations and just play cartoons on it? And that's the birth of the Disney Channel. Right. Okay. Okay. Now, we see the rise of Disney-oriented programming, where you have movies, you know, that they could pull, they could show the classic cartoons. They started making original content. And it's starting to build up quite a following. Everybody's talking about old cartoons again.

SPEAKER_09 1:15:44

Yeah.

Pete 1:15:45

Awesome. And roughly about that time is when Disney starts producing one of its first new original animated series, The Gummy Bears. Yeah. And that gains a popularity on ABC. Are you taking us down to Gummy Glen, Pete? Uh Gummy Bears! Yeah, I used to watch that religiously. And then you have more development, where people are looking at these older characters saying, I love these old cartoons. And Disney took this attitude of, let's take some of these old characters that weren't necessarily stars and turn them into stars. Yeah. So then they release DuckTales. Woo! And then you have Tailspin. Tailspin, uh, Chippendale's Rescue Rangers, Darkwinged Duck, Darkwing Duck, and you can probably see where I'm going with this because the popularity grows, and so by 1991, so this is a stretch of about six or seven years of this growing content. Yeah. Then now you have a new generation of kids that have been raised on this and want to see this in the park. Yeah. So what does Disney do? They say we need to represent it, but we're not really making a lot of money with the park right now. Yeah. And we're having some legal and financial issues that we're dealing with right now. So what's the quickest, cheapest way for us to represent this material?

Kelly 1:17:06

Yeah. Which is huge. I mean, I it's probably hard for people who weren't growing up at that time to know how big the Disney Afternoon was. It was a big deal.

Pete 1:17:18

Absolutely. Yeah. Absolutely. I taped them. I had stacks of videotapes of Tailspin and Chippendale and DuckTales. I love those shows. Yeah. So you've got these little kids that have grown up on gummy bears and tailspin, and now they're teenagers who are starting to drive. So what do you do? You change Fantasyland Autopia to the Rescue Rangers Raceway.

Kelly 1:17:38

Yeah, I I I remember, and I actually never got out there when they were doing the Disney afternoon stuff. Um but everyone I've ever talked to that did was so disappointed.

Pete 1:17:50

It was it was a big sign to get on the ride. And that was pretty much what I, you know, anybody who's ever gone to one of these candy cane lane decorations, street decorations things and most large enough cities will have one neighborhood that's totally into Christmas. Yeah. And inevitably, there's that one house that has the big automated merry-go-round with lights all over it, with dolls on it. Yeah. And almost everybody has cutouts of Disney characters. That's kind of what the raceway was like. It's like here's this diorama or a billboard featuring Baloo watching on ABC. It was a way to kind of pump it through. The ride was still fun. It was the same old track. Yeah. You were still zipping around on these cars and whacking into each other, but it was much more about teenagers. And that was cool. But it was always, it felt a little tacked on. But in 1999, they merged the tracks of Fantasyland, aka Rescue Rangers Raceway, with Fantasyland, with the rocket rods intersecting with them. They extended the track so that we had actually drove over and around the Autopia because they needed longer track to get over the people mover track. And it was terrifying to be driving your Autopia, you're just like but, but, but, but, but, and all of a sudden, zipping past you. This weird Mad Max looking framework zipping past you. It was absolutely terrifying.

Kelly 1:19:21

A couple of interesting things about this reopened uh Autopia in which reopened just in the beginning of 2000. Um, Chevron had taken over the sponsorship. They'd been unsponsored for like 30 years. Oh, yeah. But Chevron took over. Uh, that's when we get the Mark VIII cars, yep. Uh, which are the very cartoony looking cars.

Pete 1:19:42

Based off of the Chevron commercials that were designed by Ardman Animation, the people behind uh Wallace and Gromit.

Kelly 1:19:49

I did not know those were Ardman. Yep.

Pete 1:19:51

That's great. The original Ardmans. Yeah.

Kelly 1:19:54

And here's a weird piece of trivia about the 2000 Autopia. The music you would occasionally hear, both in the loading area and on the ride, was the old people mover soundtrack.

Pete 1:20:06

Oh, that makes my heart hurt. Yeah, they just lifted it and put it there instead. I wish they had, you know, at least kept the Tron tunnel in there.

Kelly 1:20:15

Yes. Hey, how cool would that be to be on your Autopia? You have entered the game grid of Tron.

Pete 1:20:23

What? I don't understand. What is that? Might as well be saying you're gonna be driving with Condor Man. You have escaped. What'd I do? Yeah, well, I didn't do anything. I just sat in the people mover. Yeah, that the music. And it's wonderful. I mean, it's a great little homage to the past, but yeah, it's it's kind of weird.

Kelly 1:20:43

I'd rather have the people mover. Yeah, I agree. Strangely enough. I remember it being a big deal. Oh, yeah. And uh and and kind of thinking, it's the Autopia. Is it really that big a deal? But it was nice.

Pete 1:20:57

Yeah. I mean, part of it is the fact that it was a bigger track. Yeah. It's still not a people eater because it takes forever to get onto this thing. Yeah. Because you have to load in, load out, then you have to move cars that need refueling, etc. etc. I mean, it's a big deal. Um but they did things to the line that made it interesting, where you could do videos of the Chevron cars animated. You had you could buy the model cars, right? Which by the year 2000, we had already entered into this era of like I find it weird, and this is gonna move into our last portion of our show here. I find it weird that you would go to uh Innovations, which was the carousel of progress and America Sings area, in which you had your eyes roll audibly. I I they did. It was amazing. Yeah, it was amazing. Like this the sides of your eyeballs were wider than Space Mountain. It was amazing. A lot of these companies were touting environmentally friendly technologies like wind power, solar, and then the future, the house of the future. And Autopia is like Chevron.

SPEAKER_09 1:22:05

Yeah.

Pete 1:22:06

You know, and it's like okay, we're I mean, we're all talking about global warming here, and Disney is like pushing Chevron really hard to the point where you're buying cars. And again, that just shows the world's obsession with cars.

Kelly 1:22:20

Right. We're about to get to the present where um there that's about to be addressed. But yeah, 2016, speaking of innovations, Honda takes over. Yes. And Honda introduces Azimo. The robot. Oh, yes. Who was originally stationed in innovations. He was originally part of that. Yep. And then when Honda took over, they put him in various places uh around the track and stuff with his friend Bird.

Pete 1:22:52

I've always wanted to see a cage match. Between Asimo and Bird? No. Between Asimow and Tomorrow. Oh. Wouldn't that be a robotic, you know, battle fest? That would be and maybe Sir from Alien Encounter. Oh, I'm I'm in there. Yeah. So there. Well, you know, the referee is going to be Rex, you know, from Star Tours. Hi, everybody. This is my first robot wars. You could just see, I mean, you know, there would never be a fight because tomorrow's, oh yes, it's a beautiful thing. Hoo-ha! Because it's Robin Williams with the voice of Tomorrow. It's like Azimose, like, just fight, you know.

Kelly 1:23:32

Well, and then so leading up to kind of what's going on with the uh Autopia now, and I think it was really great that we got to see Bob Gerb talk about this a little bit, they have decided that they finally are going to replace all of the uh combustion engines, the gasoline engines, with electric engines. Yes. And I will quote Bob Gerr on this. He said, Thank God. Yeah.

Pete 1:23:58

Two big thumbs up. He leaned over in his chair, thank God, with big thumbs up.

SPEAKER_09 1:24:02

Yeah.

Pete 1:24:02

And the audience applauded. The locals are thrilled to hear about this change. The Los Angeles Times in April wrote an article about this that the activists were petitioning Disney of getting rid of the gasoline engines over and over and over again. And finally Disney listened. And um in a written statement, it says here in the Los Angeles Times. So this article is uh April 19th, 2024. So, in a written statement, uh Disneyland spokesperson Jessica Good confirmed uh to the Los Angeles Times that electrification means fully electric. It does not mean hybrid or any other version of a gasoline combustion engine. They are going full electric with these cars.

Kelly 1:24:47

Excellent.

Pete 1:24:48

And she added that the theme park will no longer be using the current engines within the next 30 months. Yeah. So this is within three years, Autopia is going to be fully electric.

Kelly 1:25:01

That's amazing. You know, my wife pointed out to me earlier today that if you are on the uh giant Ferris wheel at California Adventure, which you will never get me on. But if you were on it at w at one of the peaks, you can see one of the largest solar farms uh anywhere that Disney uses to power a tremendous amount of stuff in the parks. Obviously, that power is going to go straight to those Utopio cars, and and that's great.

Pete 1:25:34

Absolutely.

Kelly 1:25:35

And so this is Do you know, by the way, um where the single largest solar farm in the country is? No, tell me. Just outside of Boron.

Pete 1:25:44

Oh, really?

Kelly 1:25:45

Weirdly, yeah. Okay. Well, that is right. Right outside, right? It's because it's right on the edge of the Mojave.

Pete 1:25:49

Oh my god. Yeah. Well, that makes perfect sense.

Kelly 1:25:52

Yeah.

Pete 1:25:52

That's our next road trip. We're gonna go to Boron.

Kelly 1:25:54

Yeah, just hang out in Boron.

Pete 1:25:56

Well, we'll probably make a trip out to like Calico. Like go to old Calico, but we'll stop in Boron a little just to go.

Kelly 1:26:02

Yep, we've been to Boron. So we should we get to the meat and potatoes here. Which is the potatoes and which is the meat?

Pete 1:26:09

I'm I'm not gonna comment at all. I'm feeling kind of potato-y these days.

unknown 1:26:15

Okay.

Pete 1:26:17

Uh yeah, so we're gonna go we're gonna get to the the second part of our of our show's title, the plus up, in which we pay no attention to safety or budget or any other type of constraint, and we plus up the attraction that we're discussing at the time. I'm gonna hand the I'm I'm usually the one that kicks it off this time. All right. I did the jungle cruise last time first. It's Kelly's turn to start off.

Kelly 1:26:43

All right. So I here's what I think, and I think very much in light of so first the obvious first plus up, they're doing. They're electrifying the cars.

Pete 1:26:52

They kind of beat us to it.

Kelly 1:26:53

Yeah, that was that was the easy one. So you know about me, and I know about you the exact same thing, that we have strong feelings about Tomorrowland. Oh, yes.

Pete 1:27:04

And for those who are listening, trust us, when we finally get to Tomorrowland, it's probably going to be six hours long. It's gonna take a while. It's gonna be a long episode.

Kelly 1:27:14

So anyway. So I think I I I would like to see a Tomorrowland that leaned back into Walt's sort of mid-century ideas of of transportation and actual progress. What I would love to see the Autopia become is a sort of exit from the city into the countryside. So when you leave Tomorrowland, like you come through some sort of chamber or pod or something that says, you are exiting the city, here is your electrified car to move into your leisure side in the countryside. So now suddenly you you get this car that Is issued to every citizen who wants to walk out of the city. And it takes you around tracks. And there can be show scenes that talk about the renewable energies that power your car. You can see solar energy plants. You can see some fusion experiments. You can see some hydrogen plants. Maybe there's even some tunnels with some show scenes in it. And then you come back around and you finish your drive and you enter back into the city of tomorrow after experiencing nature in your car. That's my plus up is make it a real themed experience that actually describes hey, we have the city with all this cool public transportation and the kind of progress we had actually hoped for in the 1950s and 60s.

Pete 1:28:47

Yeah.

Kelly 1:28:48

And here, if you want to go outside of it, here's a renewable way to do that.

Pete 1:28:54

That's awesome. I love that notion. It's I think that's fantastic. Thank you. And what's really weird is it's very similar to my plus up. Not like that's ever happened before. No, I mean but I think that I'm gonna predicate my my version of that with saying that Autopia and this change of Uptopia presents the park with a unique opportunity to actually plus up Tomorrowland like nobody's business. Make this the inaugural uh ride that takes you into the 21st century and beyond by bringing back probably one of the most important aspects of Tomorrowland. And again, we'll talk about this more in our Tomorrowland episode coming up. But the element is not technology, it is not aerials, it is not fins, it is not chrome, it's hope. Yeah, because that is something that I think tomorrow needs, we need more of for tomorrow. And because we live in a nation that is so obsessed with the automobile and we've built our whole society around it, yeah. Uh I commute two hours a day.

SPEAKER_09 1:30:13

Yeah.

Pete 1:30:13

Not because I like it, but because I have to. Uh because that's just the way the economics are built around it.

SPEAKER_09 1:30:19

Right.

Pete 1:30:20

And being able to show people something hopeful again, yeah. That we can take something that has kind of taken and eaten our lives and get control of it again in a way that is beneficial to our souls, our environment, and our lives would be very beneficial. And I think it'd be actually kind of funny to set it up as a little bit like the carousel of progress. Uh-huh. And take a little bit of the carousel progress and also take a little bit of the virtues that Epcot was originally trying to go for in the 80s when it first opened. Yeah. In which here is the possibility of the future. We've got the technology, we've got the know-how. All you have to do is this one little thing. All you got to do is this one little thing.

SPEAKER_09 1:31:07

Yeah.

Pete 1:31:07

And I agree. Getting onto a car, have it be a smart car. Yeah. And what better way to have a smart car than to actually have that little professor from the world beneath us be the avatar for the artificial intelligence on board your smart car? Oh, God, that's so great. So there he is, like, okay, everybody, we're gonna take you to the future. And we're gonna show you how life can actually be totally perfect for you.

Kelly 1:31:37

So he's basically Jay Audubon Woodlore.

Pete 1:31:39

Pretty much. Yeah. Yeah. And you're driving, and as you say, you're in the city of the future.

SPEAKER_07 1:31:44

Mm-hmm.

Pete 1:31:46

Use the autotope, you know, use the autopia and people mover uh soundtrack again if you want to. Yeah. Uh, and then leave. And like you say, go into the countryside, and you're not just driving through pastoral scenes, you're also driving through what every day is like. Yeah. When the car is once again just a tool and not a piece of our society that is killing us, but is actually something that is beneficial to us again. Right. Uh, and also, I think this is a marvelous opportunity for Disney, who is very, very hell-bent right now on theme park innovation and construction. That's where they make a lot of their money these days. Not so much animation and IP development, although that's part of it.

SPEAKER_07 1:32:32

Yeah.

Pete 1:32:32

But a lot of their money comes from theme parks. And there was a time in which Walt was very much on working with other companies like Monsanto to promote these new technologies.

SPEAKER_07 1:32:45

Miracles, molecules.

Pete 1:32:49

What could possibly go wrong? Yeah. Being able to take these companies that are junior companies, these little teeny weeny companies that are trying to make the world a better place and giving the opportunity to showcase it by saying, we will take. You might not be able to get cities to do this. We'll take it. We'll do it.

SPEAKER_09 1:33:09

Yeah.

Pete 1:33:09

And make these companies, you know, shoot through the roof, or it would be a way to prove, nope, that didn't work. Become a testing ground again. Make Tomorrowland a place that is kind of like the Brad Bird movie, in which Tomorrowland is actually a testing ground for a hopeful tomorrow. Not just we're gonna give you a promise, we're actually testing it here.

Kelly 1:33:29

Or or or like the the dream that Epcot was.

Pete 1:33:32

Absolutely. It's like bringing because it's a smaller landscape. Tomorrowland in Anaheim is much smaller.

SPEAKER_09 1:33:38

Yeah.

Pete 1:33:38

And it's basically taking innovations out of the big carousel and putting it out into the rest of the park. And the perfect place to start is with Autopia, especially if you're going to go all electric and work with companies like Solar Roadways. For those who don't know, look it up, solarroadways.com. It is a company that develops these hexagon tiles that are that are meant to be put into the roadways, and they are solar cells that connect together like Legos, and you can build entire roadways with them, and they have LED lights implanted in them. So if you want to have an emergency roadway, it'll all turn red to tell you don't drive here. And you could put lettering and you can have it reactive to temperature and et cetera, et cetera.

SPEAKER_09 1:34:23

Yeah.

Pete 1:34:24

So suddenly you can actually see the entire roadway of Autopia, or at least the sides of it, done in this fashion. Yeah. In which, yes, you leave the flashiness of the future, but just say, yes, the future is flashy, but the future is all made up of real people who want to go through everyday lives and they're gonna be great. And here's how they can be great with renewable energy and electric cars, and not just electric cars owned by rich people. Yeah. Electric cars that are actually sustainable, that actually will work, that the batteries aren't gonna be an issue anymore, and we're testing them here. Yeah. And oh, by the way, this whole road, uh this whole ride is actually powered by the road you're driving on. Yeah. And on your way back, you know, you get these light shows, especially like it should be an attraction you want to ride at night because it's a light show. Yeah, and it'll be so cool.

Kelly 1:35:18

It absolutely it becomes the thing that Tomorrowland was supposed to be. Yes. You know, it's it becomes this demonstration of technology that puts it in your hands. Like you are a part of the demonstration.

Pete 1:35:29

You you get a little taste that you can actually do this, and you're supposed to walk out of there going, I actually did that. Yeah. That felt great. Yeah. Like that's the way I felt when I first went to Tomorrowland as a kid. Yeah. Yes, it was Monsanto's inner space and journey to Mars. Yeah. But you still walked out of there going, I could do that. That's cool. It was inspirational. You just to make something a little inspirational with something as mundane as a drive through the country, I think would be fantastic as a plus up.

Kelly 1:35:57

I'm I'm totally there with you. I think it's such a great idea.

Pete 1:36:00

So Disney Imagineering, Solar Roadways.com. Go check them out. Yeah. Another play. And by the way, we are not affiliated with Solar Roadways. I just think what they're developing is cool. So that's a freebie for you guys.

Kelly 1:36:11

Yeah. So And you know, go out there and find your own cool stuff too. And and think like dream about what that would be like if you got to test it at Disneyland.

Pete 1:36:20

Absolutely. I mean, if if and and imaginary is interesting these days because they really are about innovation.

Kelly 1:36:26

Yeah.

Pete 1:36:26

With the robotics and also the traveling uh pathways that they're working on. Yeah. You know, the hollow floor, whatever they're calling it now. Yeah. That's so cool. It's great, but like start working with the little guy. And you never know who you're gonna wind up with. Like, wouldn't it be great you're supporting a little guy who really does change the future? Yeah. And it becomes as, well, you know, Disney helped us through this. Yeah. That's quite a thing to tout, especially when you have other things that you don't want people to be talking about. Right. But that's another story. Yeah. But yeah, but giving people hope through Autopia. Because Autopia is fun, it's goofy, it's great. But if you can have them walking off of that thing, not going, that was a good go-kart. Yeah. And actually get off of that thing thinking, that was interesting. Yeah. Like I I kind of want to do that again. And this time I want to pay attention to what's on the left side of the car. Right. Because that was so cool. Yeah. And you have the little professor guy on a screen on your car going, okay, kids, now let's go look at Disney. You know? And it so that way it harkens back to the fit, like you said, retrofuturism. Yeah. And yet basing it off of like taking retrofuturism and then building it off of what we currently have, I think would be a remarkable opportunity for Disney.

Kelly 1:37:40

Yeah, cynical dystopian futurism is too easy. Like hopeful futurism is where it's at.

Pete 1:37:48

And it's very difficult. I am well aware of that. Sure. I remember having a conversation again with uh Tony Baxter of Imagineering. And we talked very briefly in our conversation uh about uh how Tomorrowland is so difficult. And everybody who works at Disney, yeah, especially in Imagineering, has everybody has a theory.

SPEAKER_09 1:38:09

Yeah.

Pete 1:38:10

But they all say the same thing in the end, which is the one problem with Tomorrowland now is that there's no hope. It is so it's such a mishmash of a little bit of everything.

SPEAKER_09 1:38:21

Yeah.

Pete 1:38:22

If you stop, I mean, we you can't call it hope land. Yeah. But making tomorrow hope, I think is the big key here. And I think Autopia actually presents them a very unique opportunity to actually play with that and go, we tried it here, we learned from our mistakes, we fixed it up a little bit, now we're gonna take it to the submarines. Now we're gonna take it over here, now we're gonna take it over there and start spreading. So it becomes this ray of hope, oddly enough, from a car ride to spread out with the rest of the land.

Kelly 1:38:59

Yeah, that sounds like a good place to stop to me.

Pete 1:39:01

I think so too. So thank you very much for listening.

Kelly 1:39:04

Yeah, thank you very much. Hey, check us all out on uh Window to the Magic on July 1st. Yes. And uh we'll be back in a couple of weeks. Yep, I'm Peter Overstreet. I'm Kelly McCubbin. And you've been listening to The Lowdown on the Plus Up. We hope you've enjoyed this episode of The Lowdown on the Plus Up. If you have, please tell your friends where you found us. And if you haven't, we can pretend this never happened and need not speak of it again. For a lot more thoughts on theme parks and related stuff, check out my writing for Boardwalk Times at Boardwalk Times.net. Feel free to reach out to Pete and I on our Lowdown on the Plus Up Facebook group or send us a message directly at comments at lowdown-plus-up.com. We really want to hear about how you'd plus these attractions up and read some of your ideas on the show. Our theme music is Goblin Tinker Soldier Spy by Kevin McLeod at Incomfitech.com. We'll have a new episode out real soon. Why? Because we like you!

SPEAKER_03 1:40:34

Attention, Autopia drivers, you are approaching the unload area. Prepare to stop. To stop, take your foot off the pedal. Do not bump the car ahead. Once you have reached the unload area, please remain seated until the car behind you has parked.