20th Anniversary Surprise Celebration Parade

    The 20th anniversary surprise celebration at Walt Disney World was a 15 month long campaign which began in 1991.  The celebration included a daytime show at EPCOT Center called Surprise in The Skies, the debut of Spectromagic, as well as a new daytime parade that took place in the Magic Kingdom. Guests would also be randomly surprised with 20th anniversary themed merchandise.

    The Magic Kingdom parade had it's origins beginning at Disneyland.  The parade was called Party Gras, and ran for about 11 months for the 35th anniversary of Disneyland.  This was a hugely popular parade and was arguably the most popular part of the 35th anniversary celebration.  The parade only ran for less than a year during 1990 because of the incoming Celebration USA parade.

   This parade was pretty much just sitting unused in California.  So in typical Disney fashion, why not haul the parade over to Walt Disney World to be used during the 20th anniversary celebration.  The only problem with this was that the themes of Mardi Gras and Carnival did not entirely gel with the theme of the "surprise" celebration on the east coast.  But they went along with it anyway being that this was the most economically feasible option.

    The parade featured massive character balloons that stood around 40 feet tall.  These balloons featured the Fab 5 as well as Roger Rabbit.  The floats did receive some aesthetic upgrades and an entirely new Mickey balloon for the stint at WDW.  The Disneyland version portrayed Mickey in his sorcerer garb.  

Cinderella and Snow White Graced this float

   The parade also featured characters from Pinocchio and the Jungle Book.  As well as Chip and Dale in their own individual mini floats and various dancers and unique costumed characters.

    Although the parade did not have all the fantastic elements that made the Disneyland parade so popular, it did have enough staying power to last for almost 3 years. This parade ran throughout the celebration and for a couple years after, until the ever popular Mickey Mania parade replaced it in 1994. 

The 15 Years of Magic

       The 15 years of Magic celebration ran from October 1st, 1986 through September 30th, 1987.  At this time in Walt Disney World history there were still just two parks in existence.  Both parks celebrated the milestone with entrance displays unique to the park in which it resided.  The logo that was developed for this celebration combined both parks icons.  Spaceship Earth and Cinderella Castle combined to form this iconic logo.  The anthem for this birthday celebration was "Only Just Begun".  Which is a pledge that there is much more magic to come in the future.

Eastern Airlines and Walt Disney World

      Right around the opening of Walt Disney World, Eastern Airlines started servicing the Orlando area. To promote the tourism to the east coast Disney project, Eastern was brought on board as a sponsor and named the "official" airline of Walt Disney World.  This was a mutually beneficial relationship in the fact that Eastern was able to use the Disney name and characters in it's advertising and Disney received sponsorship money.  It was an estimated ten million dollars that Eastern put forth to sponsor an attraction in Tomorrowland named "If You Had Wings", which opened on June 5, 1972, eight months after the Magic Kingdom officially opened.  This attraction was designed by Claude Coates, and offered  to guests without a ticketed entry fee as to expose people to Eastern Airlines and promote the company.  This attraction was extremely popular mostly due to the fact that you did not have to use one of your A through E tickets to ride it and it was included with the park admission.  This sponsorship lasted until June 1,1987 when Disney cut ties with Eastern Airlines and the company later filed for bankruptcy in 1989.
     

        Sponsorship did play a major part in the expansion of Walt Disney World, and still does to this day.  The reason that we have lost good things in the parks is due to lost sponsorships, or lack of sponsorship funds.  I hope that companies see the benefits of Walt Disney World attractions once again and put the money toward viable experiences in all the parks.

25th Anniversary Castle

    For the 25th anniversary of Walt Disney World in 1996 Cinderella castle had a wrap that included inflatable elements which resembled a birthday cake.  Many guests expressed malice towards this deformation of Cinderella Castle, but it was a part of the history of the Magic Kingdom now.  Here are some pictures to either relish in the grandeur of, or despise the existence of the cake castle.  Most of these pictures are from the Skyway so you can not hate on them too much. Enjoy!

You do not see this everyday

Not all of the castle was wrapped

Splash Mountain construction

     Here are a couple of photos from the Magic Kingdom of Splash Mountain being constructed.  This attraction soft opened on July 17th, 1992.  With a dedication ceremony commencing on October 2nd of that year which signified the official opening.  There was a twelve year gap between Splash Mountain's opening and the last major new attraction to grace the Magic Kingdom. The last attraction to open was Big Thunder Mountain Railroad on November 8th, 1980.  This attraction completed this side of Frontierland, which remained largely undeveloped before 1980.  There was a Marc Davis deigned attraction that was to be a multi faceted experience which was going to be called the Western River Expedition.  That is a whole story unto itself.  The construction of Splash Mountain necessitated that the Frontierland Train Station be demolished and for a while there were only two stops which included Main Street USA and Mickey's Starland (as it was called at the time).