Post by Dave on Jun 9, 2014 8:00:09 GMT -5
1934: Donald Duck made his very first film appearance in The Wise Little Hen, a Silly Symphony short by Walt Disney.
1984: Laserphonic Fantasy, a show at EPCOT, began. The show was essentially a less sophisticated version of Illuminations, without the spotlighting of individual countries. (Does anyone else remember this show?)
Jim Cummings, the voice of Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Zummi Gummi and countless other Disney characters, provides the narration at the beginning of Epcot's IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth. Reflections of Earth's beginnings can be traced back to the original IllumiNations.
CommuniCore (short for Community Core) was an Epcot pavilion dedicated to technological advance. It was in two semi-circular buildings to the east and west of Spaceship Earth (they are now the home of Innoventions). CommuniCore closed in 1994. (I remember this one, too.)
The animated feature Sleeping Beauty was made while Walt Disney was building Disneyland (hence the 4 year production time). To help promote the film, Imagineers named the castle at the park Sleeping Beauty's. The castle was originally to be Snow White's.
Donald Duck is the only popular film and television cartoon character to appear as a mascot for a major American university. A licensing agreement between Disney and the University of Oregon allows the school's sports teams to use Donald's image as its "Fighting Duck" mascot.
