The Disneyland Story: The Unofficial Guide to the Evolution of Walt Disney’s Dream, Part 3

disneyland-story.jpgEDITOR’S NOTE: Over the next few weeks, AllEars.Net will be highlighting exclusive excerpts from Sam Gennawey’s new book, The Disneyland Story: The Unofficial Guide to the Evolution of Walt Disney’s Dream. The Disneyland Story: The Unofficial Guide to the Evolution of Walt Disney’s Dream is the story of how Walt Disney’s greatest creation was conceived, nurtured, and how it grew into a source of joy and inspiration for generations of visitors. Despite his successors’ battles with the whims of history and their own doubts and egos, Walt’s vision maintained momentum, thrived, and taught future generations how to do it Walt Disney’s way. The Disneyland Story is now available for purchase (click on the image at left to link to Amazon).


Wild Turkeys
by Sam Gennawey

The Fred Gurley joined the Disneyland and Santa Fe Railroad fleet on March 28, 1958. Locomotive #3 was named after the 1958 chairman of the board of the Santa Fe Railroad. While the Ripley and Holliday locomotives were scaled-up versions of Walt’s backyard railroad, “They started that way because they didn’t know better at the time,” said animator and train buff Ward Kimball. “I remember that it cost $50,000 each just to make the frames for the engines and now it would be an enormous amount of money. Later it was decided, for this reason, to look into the locomotives that were being sold down in the South, at lumber companies and so forth. The decision was made to buy those that were 3-foot gauge and just throw away everything but the frames, save all that money, and get a locomotive for a fraction of the cost of starting from drawings.” The Gurley was the first narrow-gauge industrial engine to be rebuilt for the park.

Jerry Best, a railroad historian and associate of the Studio, found an 1894 Baldwin 4-4-0 Forney that ran in New Orleans on the 24-mile-long LaFourche, Raceland & Lockport sugar plantation railroad. In 1910, the locomotive was moved to the Godchaux Sugar Co. in Reserve, Louisiana, where it ran until it was retired in 1956. Best found the engine at a storage shed owned by C. W. Witbeck. Roger Broggie paid $1,200 for the locomotive, loaded it up in a boxcar, and had it shipped back to Los Angeles for refurbishment.

The locomotive was disassembled and rebuilt at the Studio shops. A boiler was fitted with both a new water tank and an oil tank. A “pony truck” was installed in front-thereby converting the engine into a 2-4-0-and an old-fashioned curved-window cab was added. Much of the work was done by Arnold Lindberg.

Along with the new locomotive were new rolling stock and a new destination. The brand-new five-car train was inspired by the open-sided Narragansett cars used during the summer months for rides in the country and at mountain and seaside resorts. The seats faced toward the inside of the park, giving guests a much better show and making loading and unloading quicker.

Starting on March 31, 1958, guests were invited to take a trip through the Grand Canyon Diorama, the world’s largest three-dimensional scenic display. The attraction was based on the 1958 Disney CinemaScope film Grand Canyon. At a cost of $435,000, artists took “more than 80,000 man-hours of design, painting, and construction to complete the first ‘reproduction’ of Arizona’s famed Grand Canyon,” according to an early press release. The 306-foot background was painted on a seamless, handwoven canvas prepared especially for the park. The palette included 14 colors, and more than 300 gallons of paint was used.

The Disneyland Gazetteer said the attraction “portrays the famous Grand Canyon of the Colorado River at early morning, as the sun sets and during a thunder and lightning storm. Even the seasons vary from Spring in an adobe village of Pueblo Indians to Winter snows covering the trees and wild animals.” The soundtrack was Ferde Grofé’s “Grand Canyon Suite.”

Walt got the idea for the diorama while visiting museums in Los Angeles and New York. He found Bob Sewell, who worked at the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History for 10 years, to help out. Claude Coats also got involved. “Walt sent me down to the Grand Canyon to get the right look of it, and what it should be like,” he said. “We did storyboards once again, and Walt liked pretty much all of it.” Coats added some wild turkeys roosting in a tree and Walt said, “They don’t have wild turkeys in the Grand Canyon.” Coats disagreed with his boss and told him that he saw some in a museum.
Later, when Walt was showing the storyboards to a guest, he asked, “Do you know they have wild turkeys in the Grand Canyon?” The guest replied, “Gee, no I didn’t know that.” Feeling confident, Walt turned to Coats and asked again, “Are you sure they’ve got wild turkeys in the Grand Canyon?” Coats was ready. Prior to the meeting he called the park superintendent responsible for the Grand Canyon. “Yes, and the flocks are on the increase!”

Emile Kuri directed the taxidermy staff. The diorama included mountain lions, deer, desert-mountain sheep, other birds and animals native to Arizona, and wild turkeys. All of the natural materials had to be treated with flame retardants. The project would prompt a new policy at Disneyland. One day Walt was giving a tour at WED when they walked into Bud Washo’s shop. Walt opened up the freezer and saw a frozen carcass of a skinned coyote, left there by the taxidermist. The diorama would be the last time that real animal skins would be used in an attraction. Walt did not want to get the reputation that Disneyland killed animals for the rides.

Trending Now



Debra Martin Koma wrote about food, travel and lifestyle issues for a number of local and national publications before she fell in love with Walt Disney World on her first visit — when she was 34! She's returned to her Laughing Place more times than she can count in the ensuing years, and enthusiastically shares her passion with readers of AllEars.Net and AllEars®. Deb also co-authored (along with Deb Wills) PassPorter's Open Mouse for Walt Disney World and the Disney Cruise Line, a travel guide designed for all travelers to Walt Disney World who may require special attention, from special diets to mobility issues.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *