This batch of brightly colored gems that you'll be seeing for the next few days is from September 1958. One often hears about the importance of first impressions; if that is true, Disneyland has consistently failed in that department. It is hard to believe that such a magical place has such a boring parking garage. Welcome to the magic, indeed! The tram ride fares little better. Sometimes at the holidays, the tram route is decorated with a few themed character statues, but other than that, it's pretty much snoozeville. The Monorail at least gives a sense of excitement, but dropping guests off in Tomorrowland ruins any chance of experiencing the park entrance and the sense of wonder one gets when walking into Town Square. End of rant. At least this vintage shot of the Tram at the entrance has the benefit of nostalgia on their side! Zooming in for the other signage geeks out there:
Ah, Town Square. What a great place to absorb the music, patriotism, and nostalgia of Walt's past. It's a shame that so many guests rush through this area on the way to Star Tours. They miss so much.
Like the smell of freshly made popcorn. I can almost taste it now!
Right at the edge of Central Plaza stands the Monsanto House of the Future. Walt gets a ton-o-points for finagling this white plastic monstrosity to be constructed at Disneyland.
As you can see by this closeup shot of the windows, guests piled into this place to see the wonders of the near (and not so near) future. It was a tantalizing glimpse into the home of the future. On the negative side, it was a truly wacky location; INSIDE of Tomorrowland would have been a more fitting location instead of on the edge of turn-of-the-century Main Street. Snaps to current Imagineers for the current location of their revisited home of the future...with a few "zzzzzz's" thrown in for its uninspiring nature. Here's to hoping that the Carousel of Progress building will eventually become something more progressive!
See more vintage & current Disneyland entrance photos on my Disneyland entrance web page.
It's Monday morning and what do I get as a present? The parking lot in full 1958 glory. Thank you Dave for getting my week started off in a wonderful way.
ReplyDeletePopcorn in Main Street Square, yummmm.
The HotF and beautiful surrounding grounds, maintained by a fleet of gardening and landscape robots looks marvelous.
The minute I saw that first photo, I thought of Thufer! LOL! Great pics, Dave. I agree with you - people walk right through Main Street and don't give it a second thought. It's a shame.
ReplyDeleteWhat Connie and Thufer said.
ReplyDeleteThere is a big difference between the old entry and the carefull choreographed and landscaped entrance from the parking garages today.
It' still funny to me how the HOF is such an anachronism. Nothing could be farther from how homes are created today, even the so-called manufactured ones are just shop-built versions of the same handicraft technologies a thousand years old.
Who would live in a plastic house today?
Great pics.
JG
Somehow that big, hot parking lot was part of the excitement. When I was a kid, anyway! And waiting for the tram. Anticipation.
ReplyDeleteGee, I never think of the Monsanto house as a monstrosity!
The parking garage is pretty disgusting. There is gum everywhere and ugly brown stains all over the ground. What are those stains from anyway? Spilled Cokes? Melted chocolate? Someone needs to get out there and steam clean that concrete. But I guess these days, that would be a big waste of water, huh?
ReplyDeleteThere is a large dolly being stored in plain view of the guests underneath that popcorn wagon in Town Square!