A Friday Visit With Jim Korkis: Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress

Welcome back to Fridays with Jim Korkis! Jim, the dean of Disney historians and author of Jim’s Gems in The easy Guide, writes about Walt Disney World history every Friday on yourfirstvisit.net.

THE CAROUSEL OF PROGRESS

By Jim Korkis

Years before Disney World even opened, Walt Disney tried to convince General Electric to sponsor a new addition to Disneyland called Edison Square.

In one of the Edison Square buildings would be a show in four scenes that would have followed the story of a family over the decades as their life was constantly being improved by new gadgets made by G.E.

The concept evolved into a theater where the audience sat in seats that revolved around the different stages. That attraction debuted at the 1964 New York World’s Fair as The Carousel of Progress. It was so popular that after the fair it was relocated to Disneyland.

Over thirty-one million guests experienced that version of the attraction at Disneyland from July 2, 1967 to September 9, 1973.

With the opening of the Magic Kingdom in Florida in October 1971, General Electric saw the opportunity to reach a new audience. Surveys had shown that only eight percent of the guests visiting Disneyland came from east of the Mississippi.

So, the still popular Carousel of Progress closed and was relocated to Walt Disney World.

The Carousel of Progress opened in Tomorrowland in Walt Disney World on January 15, 1975 along with another attraction, Space Mountain, as part of the original Phase Two plan for the vacation destination where new things were to continue to be added between 1971 and 1975.

Extensive changes were made to the attraction, from the elimination of the Kaleidophonic Screens in the prologue and epilogue to the removal of the second floor model of Progress City—an early Epcot concept.

The theater no longer rotated clockwise since there was no reason to position guests to go up a speed ramp to see the Epcot model on the upper floor. Now the theater rotated counter-clockwise, with the exit being right next to the entrance.

There had been a change in leadership at General Electric and the new powers-that-be felt that the iconic Sherman Brothers song There’s A Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow was implying that G.E. customers should wait to purchase products because new and better things were coming just around the corner.

The Sherman Brothers composed a new song, The Best Time of Your Life, often mistakenly referred to by its opening lyric “Now is the Time. Now is the Best Time.” Now was the best time to buy products from General Electric instead of waiting for the beautiful tomorrow.

Not only was there a new theme song that was repeated throughout the show but the final scene was updated to showcase the 1970s, and a new voice cast recorded dialog for the entire show. Other minor changes were made as well.

The final scene was once again updated in 1981 to showcase the future of the 1980s. Early in 1985, General Electric decided not to renew its contract for the show, especially since it was sponsoring a similar show at the newly opened Epcot entitled Horizons that included some references to the carousel show.

So the Disney Company once again updated the show, removing General Electric references (although the Hotpoint oven in Scene Two and the G.E. refrigerator in Scene Three remained).

Finally, in 1993, the entire attraction was once again rewritten and re-recorded with another new voice cast and re-named Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress. The original theme song returned to the show. It is now supposed to be a museum of earth technology in the space port of the future to entertain travelers as they wait for their flights.

Over the decades, this show has changed more than any other Disney attraction. Some of those changes have been relatively minor such as changing Orville from a cousin to an uncle, while others have been significantly more major including reformatting the scenes to reflect different seasons of the year.

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Thanks, Jim. I never knew before the theory behind why the Carousel is in Tomorrowland!  And come back next Friday for even more from Jim Korkis!

In the meantime, check out his books, including The Vault of Walt, Who’s Afraid of the Song of the South?, and The Book of Mouse, and his contributions to The easy Guide to Your First Walt Disney World Visit, all published by Theme Park Press.

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