Discovering The Magic Kingdom

The Lifetime Achievements of Imagineer Terri Hardin

By Joshua Shaffer

I want to tell you about one of my favorite Disney Imagineers, Terri Hardin. She is known as one of Walt

Upon entering Dream Productions in Inside Out, you can spot two large monster feet. This is a nod to Ted, the monster whose legs we can see when Mike and Sulley are crossing the street in Monsters, Inc.

There are a total of 6 Disneyland poster hidden throughout Monsters, Inc. in the background.

1. When Boo is hitting Randall on the head with a bat, you can see a vintage Dis...

The Auctioneer scene on Pirates of the Caribbean is one of the most iconic scenes in all of Disneyland. This scene was also the only completed scene that Walt Disney was able to experience before his death, and the last attraction he worked on. To the happiness of thousands and the sadness of millions, Magic Ki...

#59. Peter Cushing, the actor who portrayed Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope, has twelve-inch feet. Costuming didn’t have time to custom make the boots for his costume so they hurt his feet on the first day of shooting. On the second day, he asked George if they could shoot him from the waist up because his feet were hurting and he needed different shoes. For the rest of the filming he wore carpet slippers on his feet and he was filmed...

#49. Robert Englund, who became Freddy Krueger in the Nightmare on Elm Street films, was down at the studio to audition for Apocalypse Now (1979) in the late 70’s for the production company American Zoetrope. American Zoetrope was founded by George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola. Lucas had used the company when he made his films THX 1138 (1971) and American Graffiti (1973) before he made Lucasfilm a sub...

#2169. Mark Hamill’s kids made appearances in the Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017). His oldest son, Nathan Hamill (born June 25, 1979), portrayed Saile Minnau. His second born son, Griffin Hamill (born March 4, 1983), portrayed Salaka Kuchimba, and his daughter, Chelsea Hamill (born July 27, 1988), portrayed Koo Millham. All three of them were part of the Resistance and survived all the attacks by The First Order and ended up on C...

Ben Burtt was working with the sound department. He recorded himself breathing in a scuba respirator to get the iconic breathing sounds for Vader.

Burtt also recorded the beeps and boops for R2-D2 and did the sound mixing to get the sounds we hear from C-3PO.

The voice of Chewie was created by Burtt mixing the sounds from bears, walruses, lions, sick animals, and badgers. Mayhew would either speak English lines or just ye...

Check out these photos from Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales. They show what the scenes looked like before and after the CGI (Computer Graphics) were added in.

"Don't tell heem, Carlos. Don't be cheekin." That most notable line from Disneyland's Pirates of The Caribbean was spoken by well known voice actress June Foray. June passed away at the age of 99.

Here is the bio I wrote about her in my new book.

June Foray – (Born September 18, 1917, in Springfield, Massachusetts-July 26, 2017). There have been times when Mel Blanc was referred to as the male version of June Foray. ...

Disney is planning on changing the infamous Auctioneer scene in Disneyland’s Pirates of the Caribbean in 2018, along with Disney World’s Pirates. We get the frequently spoken line “We wants the redhead,” from this attraction. Pirates first opened on March 16, 1967, just four months after Walt Disney passed a...

Opening today is the new Guardians of the Galaxy - Mission: Breakout! 

(I will be updating this as things are discovered)

In the entry level of the attraction before boarding, there are lots of Easter Eggs hinting at all of the Marvel films or other Disney things;

The Indiana Jones Adventure attraction in Disneyland has the same track layout and EMV’s (Enhanced Motion Vehicle) as the attraction Dinosaur in Disney World’s Animal Kingdom.

MERMAIDS IN DISNEYLAND? That’s right they are real. For the summers of 1965, 66 & 67 you could have caught a glimpse of them. They would swim around for 4 hours each day to entertain guests by doing aquatic stunts. Sometimes they would swim up to the people floating by in the submarine and peek through the porthole. Some of the girls started to complain about the fumes from the then diesel subs and the high chlorine content of the water. So it pressed Disney to remove...

R.I.P. John Hurt

January 22, 1940 - January 27, 2017

John played many characters throughout his 55 years of acting. He has 205 movie and television credits to his name. He will be remembered by all. Here are just a few of the movies/tv series that I know him from.

Flounder from The Little Mermaid can be seen in Moana when Maui is singing the “You’re Welcome” song.

40min 35 seconds into the movie.

HIDDEN MICKEY: In the Zootopia poster, you can actually see a young zebra holding a Mickey Mouse doll.

In Zootopia, Duke Weaselton is selling bootleg movies with titles like Pig Hero 6 (Big Hero 6), Wrangled (Tangled), and Wreck-It Rhino (Wreck-It Ralph). All are nods to past Disney films. There are also nods at future films like Meowana (Moana), Giraffic (Gigantic), and Floatzen 2 (Frozen 2).

In a bug's life, you can see the Lion King: On Broadway poster on the side of one of the boxes in the bug city.

Rich Moore was the director of Zootopia and Wreck-It Ralph. He provided the voice for Doug the Ram, Sour Bill, and Zangief.