Steve Alcorn and David Green were there, as employees of Disney's WED Imagineering. Building a Better Mouse describes what it was like to be in the trenches as a Disney Imagineer leading the frantic dash to opening day. It is a breathtaking, breezy, E-ticket ride of a book, required reading for Disneyphiles and anyone interested in themed entertainment.

    Want to join them? This is your guidebook to the theme park that Disney never built.In this unique, extensively researched book, Christopher Smith discusses the many attractions, shows, and resorts that were planned for Walt Disney World, from opening day to the present day, but that exist only in the minds of Imagineers.You'll find old "favorites" such as Thunder Mesa and Beastly Kingdom, as well as those lost to the pixie dust of time, like Dick Tracy's Crime Stoppers, the Enchanted Snow Palace, and Buffalo Junction. Smith looks at the politics and internal struggles behind the decision to shelve each concept, and imagines what guests might have experienced.Every park at Walt Disney World—Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios—has its hidden cache of "lost" attractions. They're all here, along with the many resort hotels that Disney intended to build, but didn't.Put aside those guidebooks of the Walt Disney World that is, and come to a vacation kingdom that you can visit only if you find the second star to the right and then keep straight on till morning.

    Step behind the scenes to immerse yourself in one "ordinary" day at Disney. In addition to the book, the Disney+ team was on hand to capture stories along the way. A full-length documentary and 52 short-form episodes expand the profiles and delve deeper into the essence of what it's like to be a Disney cast member. On a Thursday in 2019, a small army of photographers and videographers scattered across the globe to capture what goes on beyond those tantalizing "Cast Members Only" doors - whether eavesdropping on historic endeavors or typical tasks. All the photos in this book were taken on that single Thursday, beginning early in Tokyo and following the sun around the world through Shanghai, Hong Kong, Paris, Madrid, the Bahamas, Costa Rica, and dozens of places throughout the United States. More than 40 hours after it began, the day ended as the sun set on the Aulani resort in Hawaii. On that day, some 80 Cast Members agreed to open up their workshops, dressing rooms, kitchens, cubicles, TV studios, labs, locomotive engines - and some even more surprising and diverse work spaces. They also shared their stories: childhood dreams and chapters, career pivots and triumphs, workaday hurdles and joys. It was just a day in the life, as extraordinary as any other day at Disney. As any Cast Member can tell you, a Disney job is less a destination than a limitless journey. And for just One Day at Disney, we can all tag along for the ride.

    Readers also get the insider's take on:The smell of home-baked cookies on Main Street in the Magic KingdomThe Fountain of World Friendship in Epcot that contains water from rivers and oceans around the globeWalt Disney's opening day speech tapped out in Morse Code in FrontierlandThe eco-friendly benches (recycled milk jugs) in the Animal KingdomTwo versions of The Great Movie Ride at Disney's Hollywood StudiosComplete with secret tips from Disney's Imagineers, this book is the perfect in-park companion for Disney World fans.

    It's a pedestrian's world, where the streets are clean, the employees are friendly, and the trains run on time. All of its elements are themed, presented in a consistent architectural, decorative, horticultural, musical, even olfactory tone, with rides, shows, restaurants, scenery, and costumed characters coordinated to tell a consistent set of stories. It is beguiling and exasperating, a place of ambivalence and ambiguity. In Vinyl Leaves Professor Fjellman analyzes each ride and theater show of Walt Disney World and discusses the history, political economy, technical infrastructure, and urban planning of the area as well as its relationship with Metropolitan Orlando and the state of Florida.Vinyl Leaves argues that Disney, in pursuit of its own economic interests, acts as the muse for the allied transnational corporations that sponsor it as well as for the world of late capitalism, where the commodity form has colonized much of human life. With brilliant technological legerdemain, Disney puts visitors into cinematically structured stories in which pieces of American and world culture become ideological tokens in arguments in favor of commodification and techno-corporate control. Culture is construed as spirit, colonialism and entrepreneurial violence as exotic zaniness, and the Other as child.Exhaustion and cognitive overload lead visitors into the bliss of Commodity Zen—the characteristic state of postmodern life. While we were watching for Orwell, Huxley rode into town, bringing soma, cable, and charge cards—and wearing mouse ears. This book is the story of our commodity fairyland.

    What if you could still have a glimpse of those treasured rides even today? This book will expose the remnants of previous rides and attractions still visible at Walt Disney World, including many elements that were folded into the shows and rides that replaced them. There are also numerous intentional reproductions of parts of former rides, planted as a kind of ultimate inside joke. That's not all. Interwoven with these remnants is a rich tapestry of homages throughout the Walt Disney World parks, there to pay respect to the designers, artists, and engineers who built these magical realms. These references are often hidden in plain sight, and many are given without explanation. This book will uncover so many tributes and homages, you'll forever see the Disney parks in a whole new light. This book is an update of "101 Things You Never Knew About Walt Disney World."

    The author of the best-selling Mouse Tales: A Behind-the-Ears Look at Disneyland reveals how Walt Disney's City of Tomorrow evolved into a sprawling resort where?despite extraordinary efforts to control every aspect of the show?everything doesn't always go according to script.

    He saw this project as a way to influence the public's expectations about city life, in the same way his earlier work had redefined what it meant to watch an animated film or visit an amusement park. Walt and the Promise of Progress City is a personal journey that explores the process through which meaningful and functional spaces have been created by Walt Disney and his artists as well as how guests understand and experience those spaces.

    0-8109-4964-4$60.00 / Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

    Rewind your Mickey Mouse watch back to the 1950s and travel with us through the decades as the wondrous story of Disneyland unfolds via fascinating, behind-the-pixie dust stories and incredible imagery. Like a visit to the park itself, it's a trip you'll never forget, ensuring that the spirit of Disneyland will remain--then, now, and forever. Filled with color photos of how the park looked at its opening and through the changes of the years up to the present day in 2005.

    A celebration of a century of Disney features the antics of Mickey, Donald, and the gang, while also celebrating the corporation's many groundbreaking moves, such as the jump to television and the most recent revitalization of the company.

    Tracing the relationship of the Disney parks to their historical forebears, Designing Disney's Theme Parks: The Architecture of Reassurance charts Disneyland's evolution from one man's personal dream to a multinational enterprise, a process in which the Disney "magic" has moved ever closer to the real world. This is a unique perspective on one of the great post-war American icons.

    That’s more than twice the number of employees at the Pentagon (23,000), one of the world’s largest office complexes. WDW is, in fact, the largest single-site employer in the United States. Disney’s effort to be “green” includes the production of more than 30 tons of fruit and vegetables per year, which are grown at the Land pavilion at Epcot. Victoria & Albert’s at Disney’s Grand Floridian Resort is the only AAA five-diamond restaurant in Central Florida and has been recognized with an Award of Excellence by Wine Spectator as well. Approximately 1,100 audio-animatronic figures inhabit the Magic Kingdom alone, and about 2,000 populate the four theme parks in total. Typhoon Lagoon’s Crush n’ Gusher is the only water roller coaster in North America that has three unique and separate rides you can experience from one tower. The animals in Animal Kingdom’s Africa are “tucked in” every night in Disney’s Night Houses, each specifically designed by experts to suit the species it hosts.

    It’s Kind Of A Cute Story is the life story of one of the most beloved Imagineers, Rolly Crump. Covering his long and varied career, including designing some of Disney’s most famous attractions and working directly with Walt himself, Rolly’s stories weave into a lighthearted yet riveting narrative of his life and accomplishments. Packed with over 200 photos, many of which have never been seen before, It’s Kind Of A Cute Story is a tribute to the life and work of a true original.

    He spent his first decade at Disney as "the kid," the very youngest of the creative team Walt had assembled at WED Enterprises. But despite his youth, his talents propelled him forward into substantial responsibility: he became Walt's speech writer, penned Walt's and Roy's messages in the company's annual report, composed most of the publicity and marketing materials for Disneyland, conceived presentations for the U.S. government, devised initiatives to obtain sponsors to enable new Disneyland developments, and wrote a twenty-four-minute film expressing Walt's philosophy for the Walt Disney World project and Epcot. He was Walt's literary right-hand man.Over the next forty years, Marty Sklar rose to become president and principal creative executive of Walt Disney Imagineering, and he devoted his entire career to creating, enhancing, and expanding Walt's magical empire. This beautifully written and enlightening book is Marty's own retelling of his epic Disney journey, a grand adventure that lasted over half a century.