Follow That Tree

Nothing captures my interest in something at Disneyland faster than somebody telling me it's been around since Opening Day and has been relocated to a new spot. This excerpt from the October 14, 1982 Disneyland Line is a classic example:

This beautiful ficus, located in front of the Pirate Ship since opening day, was temporarily removed. It will be relocated in the new Fantasyland.

Now, checking the available photographic evidence, it appears this ficus did not appear in front of the Pirate Ship until the Skull Rock improvement of 1960. I suppose it's possible that the tree was on property Opening Day, but Disneyland World of Flowers did not mention it at all. Still, if present in today's Disneyland, the tree would have been on site for over fifty years and that's impressive enough. I was unable to find good enough photos of the tree trunk online, so I made it today's mission at the Park to confirm that the tree still existed on site.

You can see the ficus off to the left of the Pirate Ship entrance:

Pay no attention to the destruction in the following shots; you're supposed to be focusing on the tree!:

Tranquility:

One last shot of the tree in situ at its original themed location:

The destruction around the ship has started and the ficus has been pruned:

Remember, your focus is the tree:

No more ship, but the tree stands!:

Most people avoided taking a picture of the tree; for these Skyway riders, that was one of the few things left to photograph:

But the demands of the future Dumbo the Flying Elephant required the tree to move. It was first removed from the ground (presumably for the first time in 22 years)...:

...and boxed...:

...so it could be moved...:

...out of the way by the Mad Hatter for a couple of months:

At least 24 people supervised its new permanent placement in the Mad Tea Party queue:

The wooden fence affords the ficus a small level of protection from the construction vehicles:

From the Skyway:

Pictured here as queue construction is beginning:

And here it is as the first New Fantasyland Guests saw it:

And while the fencing has changed, you can see it's still the same tree there today:

I don't ride the Mad Tea Party often, but I'm sure it's a great shade producer:

You can see I was not the only one admiring the tree today:

You need a wide angle lens with this tree now:

I hope this tree remains at Disneyland for at least another fifty years--and that each of you climb it on your next visit. Here's to arboreal adventures!

It All Began Here

June 21, 1997 was the first time I saw construction work for Disney's California Adventure, in the former Alice Cast Member parking area. It was probably the first time for a lot of people, as the above photo was taken within a few days of the work beginning. The Disneyland Line clippings below explain what's going on, although once the closure date changed they (frustratingly) do not mention the exact beginning of the construction. I wonder how long it had been since bulldozers were last in that area...

May 9, 1997:

May 16, 1997:

June 6, 1997:

June 13, 1997:

June 20, 1997:

Snow White's Adventures Demolition

More? Of course there are more! Here's one of Snow White's Adventures, from right around the very day I was born:

Peter Pan Flight Demolition

As a companion to the post showing the exterior of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride (1955-1982) shortly after its closure, here is an equivalent photo for Peter Pan Flight:


To the far right of the picture, you can see some of the medieval shields amidst the other debris. The ride vehicle track is still present, as is a very small portion of the Claude Coats/Ken Anderson mural, but otherwise the entire attraction was gone within a few weeks of closing.

More Old Fantasyland Demolition

It's been a long time since I last posted a destruction shot of the old Fantasyland from the 1982-1983 timeframe. Here's Mr. Toad going to pieces:

A (Small) Bit More of Carousel Theater Destruction

So apparently I lied when I last informed you that I only had one image of the Carousel Theater interior when it was gutted in 1996. I discovered a few more images. No, don't adjust your monitors; they really are that size.

These have not been scaled down--they were the full resolution shot at the time! It was pretty cool to have a camera that would allow me to upload photos to my web site (in 1996, "Wicket's Disneyland Home Page" with somewhere around 10 or 25MB of storage space) the same day! Photos could also be taken at 640x480, but the image quality suffered (yes, even compared to these!). I used a Casio QV-10, which I'm sure we still have somewhere around the house. You can read a period review of the camera here. It talks about a bunch of design flaws, but the only thing I remember about the camera is how small the photos are!

Check back tomorrow for a fun internal document from the 1970s. The promised Thesaurus Thursday post might wait until Thursday.

Fantasyland Theatre (1965-1981) Destruction

It's been some time since the last installment of my destruction series. Today we'll travel back to January 1982 and get a look at a bulldozer pulling down the Fantasyland Theatre structure. While Disneyland retained the roof of Snow White's Adventures, the Fantasyland Theatre/Juice Bar/rest room structure was torn down completely to facilitate construction of the Fantasyland Basement, Pinocchio's Daring Journey, and the Village Inn (later renamed the Village Haus for reasons unknown to me--hopefully for better reasons than the renaming of the Golden Bear Lodge).

First up is the bulldozer poised down below with a line running to the top of the building...

A simple mechanical action and gravity does the rest:

The still photos don't really give you the destructive effect, though; to compensate, I've created an animated GIF, which gives a better sense of the demolition process. Click the image to enlarge.

Oh, and it's a big anniversary day today. In 1960 both the Mine Train Through Nature's Wonderland and The Art of Animation opened; in 1966 "it's a small world" opened. ( and Disney A-Z and The Nickel Tour say "it's a small world" opened on May 28. If it did open on the 28, it was not dedicated until May 30.)

Cascade Peak Demo

I don't have any gory photos of Cascade Peak coming down, but I was a frequent visitor to the Rivers of America in the summer of 1998 and did document its final sad state. No exact dates for the first two, but they are undoubtedly from July or August:

These are detail shots of Cascade Peak, showing its deterioration prior to removal. The first two are from August 30 and the following three from September 9.

When I returned to the area on September 30, much of the peak was gone:

By December 20, the area had been replanted:

Finally, a 1997/2008 before and after view of the area... still popular with the ducks!

Travelport Destruction

I never did spend too much time at the Disneyland Hotel. I lived in Southern California and if I was going to Disneyland, I was going to Disneyland (Park)! One of my few Disneyland Hotel memories was going there on a Saturday afternoon to buy Mighty Ducks merchandise on the first day it was available. (I still have the hat.) I only dined at the Monorail Cafe once, about a month before it closed. I did take a number of photos of destruction of the Travelport, though; here are a "select few" of that. The first batch is from September 7, 1999.

September 19:

September 30:

October 11:

Hey, a photo of the parking structure! And the Pinocchio lot! I hope it's OK to post...