Meet Walt Disney

During this 70th year of its opening day, Disneyland is still having growing pains, in this case, making plans to turn Walt Disney into an animatronic exhibit, much like the popular Mr. Lincoln.

Since opening on an extremely hot day in July, 1955 at the orange grove laden crossroads of Katella Avenue and Harbor Boulevard in Anaheim, the world’s most famous theme park has boomed in attendance, popularity, innovative rides, lands and imitators. But one proposed innovation, the possibly Mr. Disney animatron has drawn the sharp opposition of Disney’s granddaughter Joanna Miller, who told the L.A. Times, it “goes against the wishes of her grandfather, who, she claims, never wanted to be a robot.”

When Disneyland was starting its fifth year, Anaheim High School graduate Sylvia Liebi (my future wife) washired on at a popular Disneyland restaurant. Born in Los Angeles, but raised in Anaheim, her life paralleled and recalled the impact Disneyland had on her pre-teen and teen years.

Her first memory was at Katella Elementary School when the teacher, Mrs. Wright told her second grade class that “Walt Disney just bought an orange grove just across the street and he’s going to open a new park” and promised “one day we’ll take a walk over there on a field trip to the park.” No timing was proposed.

Then came Disneyland’s opening day. Sylvia’s brother, nine-year-old Brian was one of the tow-headed youngsters filmed rushing the park on opening day. It was the time of e-tickets, which meant the low price of admission plus lettered tickets good on certain rides. To this day, the term e-ticket is part of our slang-uage.

In 1956, after Sylvia’s father had designed and built a family home on an orange grove on Katella Avenue, he was approached by a city official who told him that Katella Road was going to be widened to accommodate increased Disney traffic, putting the front door fifteen feet from Katella. The same thing happened to Sylvia’s friend, Vikki Brown whose family lived on Harbor Boulevard. Sylvia recalled her father was angry over this and chose to move the family out of the home to South Street.

When Sylvia graduated from Anaheim Union High School, she spoke with Al Hicks at her church who managed the Red Wagon Inn. Hicks hired her as a busgirl and soon Sylvia was working summers at Disneyland while attending Fullerton Jr. College and later Long Beach State as an art major. Her service at the Red Wagon lasted four summers. Now the Plaza Inn, it’s at the crossroads of the park leading from Main Street USA to Adventureland and Frontierland on the left, Fantasyland and the castle straight ahead and Tomorrowland to the right.

Turns out the Red Wagon was the choice of celebrity visitors as well as the engineers and designers later known as Imagineers, a term Disney copyrighted. Among the movie stars, Rock Hudson, a friend and his parents dined at the Red Wagon, and appropriately, Mary Tyler Moore in a red pantsuit with a group of guests. Sylvia recalled staff was told to not approach these stars, leaving the serving to designated employees. Sylvia did recall Moore was careful about her food choices, getting up to confirm the details of what she ordered. Sylvia herself served CBS news anchor Walter Cronkite, his spouse and his four children and members of the Russian Ballet, who were on tour.

The well-appointed Green Room with Victorian décor, filigree and candelabras was reserved and used infrequently for the future imagineers to hold meetings and presentations. The public was not allowed in the room which might have contributed to the firing of her other brother Eric. Employees were allowed access to the cafeteria for lunch breaks. Eric chose restaurant prime rib to lunch in the Green Room, despite warnings. After his firing, he became a sketch artist in the park. Another employee she sponsored was fired from the parking lot job, missing out on the New Year’s Eve party with booze confiscated from entering vehicles.

During lunch breaks, Red Wagon staff often visited the various nearby lands still wearing their uniforms. Sylvia, her sister Marie and a friend, Sheila were at the crossroads as they noticed a well-known figure heading toward Tomorrowland. It was Walt Disney himself. They began walking in his direction, following him. Several times he nervously looked back in their direction. Finally, they returned to their jobs. Next day, an edict came down from Hicks that any lunchtime visits to the park by employees needed to be in street clothes.

Miller recalled another side of Disney, that he “would take photos with fans and sign autographs.”

According to the Times, a prototype of the sculpture “depicts Disney in 1963, when he was 62. One could detect age spots on Disney’s hands and weariness around his eyes.”

“Her family’s biggest mistake,” Miller told the Times “was selling the rights to Disney’s name, likeness and portrait to the company in 1981 for $46.2 million in stock.”

Location of the animatronic Mr. Disney has not been indicated, but an ironic spot would be where Sylvia and her server mates “stalked” Disney at the crossroads near the Plaza Inn, decades ago.