Bible Storyland - Some Clips

Get your geek on!

A couple years back, I was interviewed for a documentary about an unusual theme park...a park that was designed but never built.  Its name, Bible Storyland.  The park was designed by Nat Winecoff Enterprises--with Nat,  of course, being the very first WED employee personally hired by Walt Disney.  Nat Winecoff supervised many aspects of Disneyland's development, from 1952 through its opening.  In the late 1950s, Nat Winecoff formed his own company to design Disney-style theme parks for independent investment groups.  Nat was also able to hire away Bruce Bushman from Disney, an artist who completed many early concept drawings for Fantasyland.  As of today, the documentary has a distributor (Cargo Film).  There are a few clips online.

(I should point out that, aside from being interviewed, I was not involved in the production of the film.)

Happy Birthday, Walt! (Unreleased Audio of Walt -- 1937)

To celebrate Walt Disney’s 110^th birthday, we here at DHI are kicking it back old school.  We—meaning Paul—has uncovered an unreleased 1937 radio interview with Walt Disney.  The interview was conducted by NBC radio veteran, Elza Schallert on March 12, 1937.  Ms. Schallert was a career entertainment correspondent for the LA station.  The interview touches on the production of “Snow White” and also another famous birthday—that of Donald Duck.  Throughout, Walt is personable and candid, bubbling with good humor.  It is also an interesting glimpse at the company as it transitions from shorts to its first feature-length film.  We—meaning I—cleaned up the audio as best we could.  (The original source had degraded over the decades—really degraded.  But earbuds will bring the audio back to life.)  And so, here on December 5^th , we offer up a recording that hasn’t been heard by the public for nearly 75 years.  Enjoy.

Todd James Pierce & Paul F. Anderson

PS We do ask that if you’d like to repost this audio or reuse it in any way to please drop us a note first.

COVERING DISNEY~Walt South of the Border

A regular feature at the Disney History Institute is "Covering Disney" (well, nothing has been too regular at DHI for several months). The use of the magazine during Walt Disney's heyday for the purpose of promotion and exploitation. You can read my original essay on this here. To see all the essays and magazine covers at DHI, go to: Covering Disney.

I have a bit of a mercenary attitude in writing about this particular publication: I would like to see if someone would be willing to translate the article for me. As many of you know, I am working on a book on Walt Disney's contributions to the War effort (WWII) for the Walt Disney Family Foundation. A small part of this story does include the battle for South America (keep in mind as late as 1942 some South American countries were still in "play" as to whether they would go Axis or Allied!). As such, this magazine, Caminos del Aire from February 1943 was right in the middle of the propaganda war underway south of the border. If anyone is willing to take upon themselves the translation of this article, I would be most appreciative (which would manifest itself in an acknowledgement in the book). To help in this worthy endeavor, I have uploaded the two pages with text in all their glorious 3mb detail (give or take). They should provide plenty of detail to perform a babel fish operation.

As for the magazine itself (which is an airplane publication, the kind found in the pocket of your front seat along with one regulation barf bag and safety instructions), the cover is brilliant. The Pedro segment has always been a personal favorite (and I get a kick out of the well placed aviation advertisements on mom and dad's nose--CMA for Compañia Mexicana de Aviación [a Mexican-American Airline] and PAA for Pan America Airlines; these were, of course, the two main airlines that provided El Groupo with transportation). The article itself features some wonderful candid shots, three of which I have not seen anywhere else (my guess is exclusive to this publication).

To learn more about Walt's travels south of the border, I highly recommend my good friend JB Kaufman's book, conveniently named, South of the Border With Disney: Walt Disney and the Good Neighbor Program, 1941-1948 (which also, conveniently, I have for sale SIGNED in the Institute's book store, just click on the SHOP link at the top of this page and scroll down).

Enjoy!