Random WDW Info - I Never Knew!

[harvey]

Wowsers! Great thread. I took the KKTK tour years ago and can't remember most of what the guide said, lol, but a couple things:

There was a flying Tinkerbell in DL who retired at age 70.

Many of the Mickeys are women...

The women in the dance group that performs on the castle stage (I believe they're called Equius?) all wear wigs. Always.

They took out the overhead skyway thingy (can't remember the name?) not because they were unsafe or that people were throwing stuff on guests' heads, but because it went against Walt's thing about illusion. From up there you could see the parking areas behind main street.

Also, I have a friend who works for Disney in MK and is a Traditions teacher. When I asked her if Disney was ever worried about Universal getting HP World, she laughed and said that mid-construction funds were running out and Disney basically bailed them out. So no, they're seriously not worried.

If you have netflix, there are several Disney documentary-type things, and the imagineers give lots of cool tidbits. There's like 5 of them, and I think they were made in 2010 all by the same company...kinda like informercials for Disney, but we watch them all the week before we go to get psyched up.

 

[LifeIsDis]

I am in love with this thread.

I still have half of it to read, but I would love to post some stuff.
Sorry in advance if anyone has already posted any of this!

1) As you walk down Main Street, notice how at the beginning, the street lamps start as gas and end as electric at the end by Casey's. It's supposed to be as if you are "moving through time."

2) In Liberty Square, there are two-digit numbers on all of the doors on every building. If you put "18" in front of the numbers, that is the year the house is supposed to be from.

3) The plane you see on the Jungle Cruise is the other half of the plane seen on the Great Movie Ride in the Casablanca scene.

That's all I've got for now! I'm loving everyone else's facts. They are great!

 

[GirlDreamer]

The tree of life is built out of an oil rig.

The Osborne christmas lights in HS consists of 5 million lights, and they start putting them up already in august to have enough time to program it all.

There's also a lot of other interesting facts in the Modern Marvels about WDW: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1E4Kea2plZw

 

[Simba's Mom]

cinderellas original dress color in the original film is white - although it is marketed as blue.

Wow-this information is so cool! Why is it, I wonder, that her dress in WDW is blue? I mean, Disney is so particular about being true, I wonder.
And if any other princess wore a dress in the park that was a different color than in the movie, there'd be such an outcry, I wonder how she got away with it.

 

[DisneyDetective]

great facts! did you know that the exteriors of the the attractions a painted white due to visitors being affected by glare?

 

[Simba's Mom]

The tree of life is built out of an oil rig.

I knew that, but does anyone know specifically what oil rig company built it? I've been trying to find out for almost 10 years now. I asked n the Backstage Safari tour and they told me that Disney built it itself. However, I remember reading about it coming across the Gulf of Mexico from Houston so I tend to think it was a company that builds them. It's just that DH's company does a lot of business with various companies that build oil rigs, and I'd love to know if the builder was one of those.

 

[aVASTGrl]

If you have netflix, there are several Disney documentary-type things, and the imagineers give lots of cool tidbits. There's like 5 of them, and I think they were made in 2010 all by the same company...kinda like informercials for Disney, but we watch them all the week before we go to get psyched up.

THIS I am going to have to check out!!

 

[SydneyJoLynn]

- Castaway Cay used to be a drug-smuggling island. There is a plane runway [the path that a tram would take you to the 18+ beach] that used to aid in the smuggling.

- As you are exiting your WDW Tower of Terror vehicle, before you even see your photo, there is a door on the right that 'breathes'. If you place your hand up to the crease on the door and wait, you will feel a puff of air. Pretty creepy.

- On Main Street, there is an off-shoot street to the right. If you sit for a while, you will hear music lessons/dance lessons being held in the studio on the second story.

- A popular myth is that the castle can be lowered into the ground should a hurricane be headed for WDW. This is false. However, WDW does put together a Hurricane Rideout Crew who sleep over at the park during Hurricanes and aid in preparing for a hurricane. [Moving park benches and trashcans...] Also, they clean up the aftermath [branches, excess water, etc..]

 

[doconeill]

I knew that, but does anyone know specifically what oil rig company built it? I've been trying to find out for almost 10 years now. I asked n the Backstage Safari tour and they told me that Disney built it itself. However, I remember reading about it coming across the Gulf of Mexico from Houston so I tend to think it was a company that builds them. It's just that DH's company does a lot of business with various companies that build oil rigs, and I'd love to know if the builder was one of those.

I've always felt that calling it an oil rig was overstated - I think it is more likely that they adapted the structure of an oil rig...

 

[JetsetJAK]

Just thought of a few more Disney tidbits. Again, apologies if these have already been mentioned and I missed them in this huge thread!

- Did you ever wonder why the Tower of Terror in DHS is a different design than all the other ToT's in the various Disney parks? It's because during construction, the Imagineers realized that while standing in the World Showcase at Epcot and looking across the water at the Morocco pavilion, you could clearly see the back of the ToT building. As a result, the ToT was designed to blend in with the Moroccan architecture.

- Did you know that there is a "lost" Disney princess? In 1986, Disney released their 25th animated film "The Black Cauldron", featuring the long-haired blue-eyed "Princess Eilonwy". The film was generally regarded as being darker than the standard Disney fare, and was a box office disappointment (apparently even "The Care Bears Movie" made more money than "Cauldron"). Subsequently, when the Disney Princess franchise was launched in 1999, Princess Eilonwy got the snub and was not included, and as far as I know, the only references in the parks to the film was a restaurant in Fantasyland in MK called "Gurgi's Munchies and Crunchies" that closed in 1993, and some kind of attraction in Tokyo Disneyland that also closed in 2006.

- Speaking of Disney Princesses, did you know that Giselle from the film "Enchanted" was supposed to join the ranks of the official Disney Princesses after that film came out in 2007? That year there was even a Toy Fair where a Giselle doll was displayed in packaging that declared her to officially be a part of the princess line. However, soon enough somebody at Disney realized that, since Giselle was based on the appearance of real-life actress Amy Adams, they would have to pay her life-long rights for the use of her image. While I'm sure Amy Adams would have been fine with that (can you say "early retirement"?), Disney decided it wasn't worth the cost. This is why, even though Giselle does occasionally appear in parades and whatnot at the parks alongside the other princesses, she's not officially one of them.

 

[wookiebeck]

3) The plane you see on the Jungle Cruise is the other half of the plane seen on the Great Movie Ride in the Casablanca scene.

OK, Jungle Cruise went in 1971. So where/why was the front half of a plane saved for nearly two decades to put in TGMR? I think the trivia is fun, but some details don't add up sometimes and it makes me go "hmmmm".

 

[doconeill]

OK, Jungle Cruise went in 1971. So where/why was the front half of a plane saved for nearly two decades to put in TGMR? I think the trivia is fun, but some details don't add up sometimes and it makes me go "hmmmm".

I don't believe it was originally in the Jungle Cruise. It did time on the studio backlot tour first, then moved to the Jungle Cruise.

Incidentally, the long-repeated-but-supposedly-debunked story that it was the REAL plane from the movie might not be so debunked...I posted this last year:

Could the GMR CMs actually be right about the Casablanca plane?!?

 

[michsig]

These are fun to read!

 

[Minnesota!]

- Castaway Cay used to be a drug-smuggling island. There is a plane runway [the path that a tram would take you to the 18+ beach] that used to aid in the smuggling.

- As you are exiting your WDW Tower of Terror vehicle, before you even see your photo, there is a door on the right that 'breathes'. If you place your hand up to the crease on the door and wait, you will feel a puff of air. Pretty creepy.

- On Main Street, there is an off-shoot street to the right. If you sit for a while, you will hear music lessons/dance lessons being held in the studio on the second story.

- A popular myth is that the castle can be lowered into the ground should a hurricane be headed for WDW. This is false. However, WDW does put together a Hurricane Rideout Crew who sleep over at the park during Hurricanes and aid in preparing for a hurricane. [Moving park benches and trashcans...] Also, they clean up the aftermath [branches, excess water, etc..]

I would SO LOVE to be part of the Hurricane Crew!!!!

 

[chartle]

- Speaking of Disney Princesses, did you know that Giselle from the film "Enchanted" was supposed to join the ranks of the official Disney Princesses after that film came out in 2007? That year there was even a Toy Fair where a Giselle doll was displayed in packaging that declared her to officially be a part of the princess line. However, soon enough somebody at Disney realized that, since Giselle was based on the appearance of real-life actress Amy Adams, they would have to pay her life-long rights for the use of her image. While I'm sure Amy Adams would have been fine with that (can you say "early retirement"?), Disney decided it wasn't worth the cost. This is why, even though Giselle does occasionally appear in parades and whatnot at the parks alongside the other princesses, she's not officially one of them.

This is another of the unsubstantiated rumors. If they can afford John Depp's price (I don't see him retiring) I'm sure they can afford Amy Adams. One thought is Giselle is not a princess since she is not the daughter of a king or queen and never married a prince. Also there are not many "real face" characters at all, I can only really think of Mary Poppins and Bert.

I know there are issues with Mulan, but really do you need me to spell out to why she is a princess. . And I don't know the story of the Princess and the Frog.

 

[disneynutsss]

Wow-this information is so cool! Why is it, I wonder, that her dress in WDW is blue? I mean, Disney is so particular about being true, I wonder.
And if any other princess wore a dress in the park that was a different color than in the movie, there'd be such an outcry, I wonder how she got away with it.

its all in the marketing and i think that they chose blue since the dress looks blue in the shadows of the movie.

 

[chartle]

its all in the marketing and i think that they chose blue since the dress looks blue in the shadows of the movie.

Just a thought, would it be too much like a wedding dress?

 

[OKW Lover]

They took out the overhead skyway thingy (can't remember the name?) not because they were unsafe or that people were throwing stuff on guests' heads, but because it went against Walt's thing about illusion. From up there you could see the parking areas behind main street.

Also, I have a friend who works for Disney in MK and is a Traditions teacher. When I asked her if Disney was ever worried about Universal getting HP World, she laughed and said that mid-construction funds were running out and Disney basically bailed them out. So no, they're seriously not worried.

As to the first of these items, it was Walt that put them in the park in the first place. They had them in DL before WDW's Magic Kingdom was ever built.

I'm also seriously doubting that Disney would "bail out" Universal. Why help out your competition? What would be in it for Disney? Couldn't Disney find a better investment of any funds?

 

[doconeill]

I'm also seriously doubting that Disney would "bail out" Universal. Why help out your competition? What would be in it for Disney? Couldn't Disney find a better investment of any funds?

"Yes, we could help you out. By the way, about all those Marvel characters..."

 

[mesaboy2]

I'm also seriously doubting that Disney would "bail out" Universal. Why help out your competition? What would be in it for Disney? Couldn't Disney find a better investment of any funds?

Yeah, that one's been bugging me too. It makes zero sense.