Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, housed in the space formerly occupied by Take Flight, opens at Walt Disney World. Presented by Mattel, the first interactive dark ride at the Magic Kingdom will have an official opening November 3.
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The day after the passing of Steve Jobs, Walt Disney Company CEO Bob Iger has both the U.S. and Disney flags fly half staff (mast) for a week in observance of the passing of the Apple Founder and Disney board member. Steven Paul Jobs, a computer entrepreneur and inventor and member of the Walt Disney Co. Board of Directors, passed away on October 5, 2011 at age 56 in California. Co-founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of Apple Inc., in 1986, Jobs bought the computer graphics division of Lucasfilm Ltd. (for $10 million) which spun off as Pixar Animation Studios. Jobs joined Disney’s board in 2006, after Disney bought Pixar for $7.4 billion in stock, which also made Jobs the largest individual shareholder of Disney stock.
In Anaheim, California, the Disneyland Hotel opens (opposite the main exit of Disneyland.) Although a 104-room hotel, just seven rooms are ready for the public; an eighth serves as the hotel’s office and lobby. The first hotel guests are Mr. and Mrs. Robert Arnone of Inglewood. Owned by the Wrather Corporation, the Disneyland Hotel will be fully functioning by August. The hotel underwent several expansions and renovations over the years before being acquired by Disney in 1988. The hotel was downsized to its present capacity in 1999 as part of the Disneyland Resort expansion.
Disney World's Mission to Mars attraction, running since June 1975, closes in Tomorrowland. (It will be replaced in 1995 with ExtraTERRORestrial Alien Encounter ... and ultimately with Stitch's Great Escape!
Disney's second TV series Mickey Mouse Club is launched on ABC. It is a daily series featuring the talents of 24 kids known as the Mouseketeers (though over the next 4 years the show will have a regular but ever-changing cast of preteens). Mickey Mouse Club also features cartoons, educational segments, singing, dancing, serialized adventures, and special guest stars. Led by adult leaders Jimmie Dodd and cartoonist Roy Williams, the show airs during the late afternoon/pre-dinner hour, primarily aimed at a pre-teen audience. (The Mouseketeers have already made their first TV appearance on the ABC broadcast of Disneyland's opening in July 1955.) Today is Fun With Music Day.
Although it's been running since July 17, the Splash Mountain attraction at Disney World has an official grand opening. Based on the 1946 Walt Disney film, Song of the South, the ride features the antics of Brer Fox and Brer Bear's attempts to catch the wily Brer Rabbit as he looks for his laughing place.
Walt Disney World Resort opened its doors after seven years of planning, however the official grand opening and dedication took place on Oct. 25, 1971. Almost 10,000 visitors converge near Orlando, Florida, to witness the grand opening of Walt Disney World, which includes the Magic Kingdom (Disney's second theme park) and two resorts. The Magic Kingdom, encompassing approximately 107 acres, featured Adventureland, Fantasyland, Frontierland, Liberty Square, Tomorrowland, a Main Street USA, and about 5,500 Cast Members. The two resorts were the 15-story Contemporary Resort and the Polynesian Village Resort - both built by U.S. Steel and both connected by a monorail system. The hotels were conceived by WED enterprises and the Los Angeles architectural firm of Welton Becket & Associates. U.S. Steel was to originally own the hotels, but just before opening, Roy Disney decided to buy out their interests and let Disney run the hotels themselves.
EPCOT Center at Walt Disney World has its grand opening with more than 100 television crews from all over the world covering the event. Bands and orchestras play to the huge crowds and Walt Disney's wife Lillian helps in the dedication of Spaceship Earth. (The park itself will be dedicated on October 24.) The park's name derived from the acronym EPCOT (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow), a utopian city of the future planned by Walt Disney. (He sometimes used the word "City" instead of "Community" when expanding the acronym.) Walt's original vision of EPCOT was for a model community, home to twenty thousand residents, which would be a test bed for city planning and organization.It is Disney's third theme park and by 1995 the name EPCOT Center was shortened to simply Epcot.
Reedy Creek Energy Services, Incorporated (originally known as Reedy Creek Utilities Company, Incorporated) is merged into the Walt Disney World Company. It provides electric power to the Reedy Creek Improvement District, which specifically covers Walt Disney World outside of Orlando, Florida, by supplementing the public power grid.
At Epcot, the Mickey Mouse arm holding a wand is dedicated with "2000" over Spaceship Earth - signaling the start of the Millennium Celebration. Instead of dismantling the Icon Tower at the end of Millennium Celebration, the decision makers at Disney decided to make it permanent. The number 2000 was replaced with the name Epcot. A Walt Disney World press release in December 2000 proudly announced, “The makeover will turn the 15-month Walt Disney World Millennium Celebration icon created for Spaceship Earth into a new and lasting beacon to a magical Disney world.”
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