I’m sure Becky, our Disneyland Tour Guide on June 28, 1963 is a sweet girl and all, but let’s face it...there’s something a little intimidating about the riding crop that the Disneyland Tour Guides carry!
Over at The Flight Circle in Tomorrowland, there’s a crowd gathered round the fence.
I am looking forward to Cox Pilot’s identification on the two gents working here:
Ah, the cool Blue Monorail...so sleek in all its 1950’s styling!
I am zooming into the Santa Fe logo for the simple reason that I can.
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12 comments:
What a beauty... I mean the Santa Fe logo. Nice job of zooming Dave. Much appreciated.
Ha Ha, you're a zoomer!
I always thought the riding costume for the Tour Guides was an inspired idea. It gets a woman into an distinctive, authoritarian costume that doesn't mess with gender roles, and gives her a prop that allows her to point distinctively but still remain lady-like in doing so. Really, Disney at its best.
Nice response Katella. Never thought of it that way before.
Love that blue monorail Dave! It looks like it says,"Santa Fe and Disneyland NY"? Or possibly "RV"? What do the last 2 letters represent?
To A Snow White Sanctum...
Although many people refer to the Santa Fe as Railroad... It is in fact correctly known as the Santa Fe Railway. The abbreviation of railway is RY or Rwy.
Just thought you would like to know.
Thanks View :)
The Tour Guide is only intimidating if you have been very very naughty.
Finally! I guess this is the Holy Grail of photo blogs. That guy flying out in the center of the circle is me. The guy knelling down at the take-off point is Keith Palmer, my high school buddy who got me the job in the first place.
Thanks, Dave. I'll never look at the tour guides the same way again.
Lee - Glad I finally found one of you! Next Holy Grail - looking for a closeup!
Hi Dave: Sorry I didn't get a chance to really take a good look at that photo of the Flight Circle. (A lot going on at home with the recent storms and snow in our area.) However; now that I look at the photo, it really takes me back to those days.
It must have been early 1963, because in July I went active in the Naval Air Reserve. HS-772 Helo Anti Submarine Squadron needed my services. I didn't return to the Circle until the following summer in '64.
If you look REAL close at Keith kneeling down, you can see another arm (just under the elbow of the girl in green). That, most likely, would have been Bart Klapinski.
You didn't include a couple of things in your close-up that would have told me the time of day. The triangle "next show" clock just to the right and would have displayed the time of the show we were performing. The airplane I'm flying would have been the very first, the "Lil Stinker". A very small biplane patterned after the famous Pits Special racer of the '30s and '40s. This would have been less than 5 minutes into the show. The sound of the first plane gathered quite a crowd.
I know it was early in the show because the Mercedes Benz race cars have their hoods up, ready to be started. This happened after the Lil Stinker, Curtis Pusher and Piper Comanche were flown. The next step was to power up the boats, and then the cars. The Comanche was flown low and slow because it was very large and to dangerous to fly at full speed on such short lines, and we wanted to keep it below the fence for safety. The Curtis was design to go slow (just like the original) and was not flown at such a high angle.
Now: All we need is an actual Date. I see a lot of girls in green. Maybe it was Girl Scout Day.
I can smell it now. The combination of hot slurry, castor oil in the airplane fuel, and the compressed air of the Astro Jets.
I could still give the full spiel: "Good afternoon everyone, and welcome to the Thimble Drome. This demonstration is brought to you by the L.M. Cox Manufacturing Company of Santa Ana, California . . . the world's large maker of ready to fly powered models. The plane you see in the air now is . . . . "
Lee - as always, thanks for the great info. As for the date...I guess you didn't see the title of this post!
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