1955 Complete Ticket Book

There's so much conflicting info flying around about the first Disneyland ticket books that I'm not sure that anyone has a true idea of which, if any, truly came first. There are the tickets (though not complete books) that Vintage Disneyland Tickets has posted and which sold for a truly unbelievable price on Ebay this week. Then there is a ticket book that exists where little mini-sketches of attractions appear next to their names on the tickets themselves. It's a stunning book and VERY rare. There's this one pictured here, which I always believed to be the first one since the tickets are labeled "ride" rather than "coupon". But then again, those Ebay ones don't have "ride" or "coupon." Does that make them older? And what about the Globe paper company? Were the first tickets printed on Globe paper or not? It'll make you nuts...

I apologize for not scanning the tickets in this book. I don't really want to fold back the admission ticket and risk detaching it. I love this blog and all of my dear readers and fellow bloggers....but not that much.

MMC Circus Ticket

Has one of these been posted before? They creep up on Ebay every now and then, but this one still has its stub, so I thought I would post it. If it's a repeat, I apologize and will make it up to you on the next post.

Mickey Mouse Club Circus in 3D!!!

Whether you simply remember Viewmasters fondly or collect Viewmasters obsessively, it's hard to find someone who doesn't at least have good feelings about them.

I have only two complete sets in my collection. The first is the more common 1956 set that was sold at stores outside the park; the second is more rare 1956 set and was sold exclusively inside the park. Each set has unique covers and different images, although some of the alternate images are just similar photos shot from slightly different angles.

This pack is one of the rarest of all the Disneyland Viewmasters. This is the MMC Circus pack that was sold inside the park. The version that was sold outside the park has a yellow cover and features a photo of a little girl on top of an elephant. This one is....different. I wonder if it first went on sale once the MMC Circus had already closed? No wonder this set is so rare; by 1956, visitors to the park probably had no idea what the hell the MMC Circus was.

It's almost impossible to get a complete set of Disneyland Viewmasters what with all of the test packets and foreign versions floating around. And that's not even counting the Tru-Vue slides. To those to you who have managed it, you get a Vintage Disneyland Goodies gold star.

POP Employee Handbook

Here is a well-loved employee handbook from POP's second season in 1959. I can't quite decipher the notes on the front, but it appears that the former owner of this booklet was doing some sort of accounting when he should have been listening to the orientation. Or maybe he was some kind of bookie. Or maybe this booklet belonged to Bugsy Siegel. I may be getting carried away.

Some good info can be found in here, and there's a handy map, as well.

Next post: back to Disneyland

A "POP"pourri, Part 2

Here are a few more POP goodies. I have a lot of POP stuff, so it's fun to post little examples of different kinds of POP stuff without having to crack out pretty common items like the guidebook and postcards.

Here's the cover of the now-infamous POP auction when the whole place was liquidated from the carpets on up. If faced with a choice between attending this auction or the big MGM auction from the 70's...it would be a toss-up. That "P.O.P. Goes POP!" slogan makes me want to punch the copywriter in the teeth. It's so frivolous and smug.



Here is a ticket to the opening festivities of POP's 2nd year of operation, when the place still looked (kinda) clean and smelled (sorta) fresh.



And lastly, some photos. I don't really collect "folks at the park" photos, although I marvel at what Matterhorn, Major P. and Daveland have managed to assemble. But, I do have a few B&W and color tourist snapshots at POP. Here is one of each. The B&W photo shows a mom and anxious kid posing in front of the queue for the Banana Train ride. The color one was shot, I guess, from the sky-ride and gives a nice shot of the Diving Bells and the Fun Forest walk-through in the background. For some reason, when the park was being torn down, that old "tree" in the Fun Forest was one of the last things standing; you can see it in lots of "broken down POP" photos.

A "POP"pourri of POP!

My spelling may be bad, but at least my jokes are terrible...

First up is a full-color ad for POP that ran in the LA Times Sunday comics soon after the park's opening. Sorry again my small scanner and having to post this in two parts.




Next is a color-tinted and German-printed (nice phrasing!) POP postcard from around 1960. This was probably sold off-site at Venice/Santa Monica gift shops. POP printed and sold a bunch of "official" postcards which featured both illustrations and photos. They are pretty easy to find and commensurately inexpensive.



Third....I have some amateur-shot Viewmaster reels of POP photos, but such images are very rare. If you would like some 3D shots of POP for your very own and don't want to look too hard or spend too much, why not pick up this pack featuring The Mod Squad? Luckily, the episode chosen to represent the series on Viewmaster was one shot at POP. What that means to you is a few tasty 3D images at the right price.



Lastly, a fellow POP enthusiast sent me this photo of what the front of the Magic Carpet ride looked like once it was moved to the Petticoat Junction park in the midwest after the now-famous POP auction in 1968 (or was it 1969?).



If anyone out there has any particular POP item or type of item you'd like to see, please let me know. If I have it, I will post it.

More POP Coming Tomorrow!

Well, even though my first POP post didn't set the world of fire, my post ABOUT my first POP post certainly did, so expect more posts about my second post discussing my first post. Whoa...too much time on the Flying Fish ride. Nice POP reference, Jed. Thanks very much!

Ok, I will keep up with POP until I get bored, the comments dry up, or I get tired of the complaining. I love this stuff, so I hope you will, too.

Something new and cool (to me, at least) coming tomorrow pm.

No More POP?!?

It appears that my POP entry didn't exactly set the world on fire, although I thank those people who did leave enthusiastic comments. What does the blogging world say? Should I just stick to Disneyland or more POP?

I will probably post more POP over time since I just love that stuff, but if most people don't care, I will keep it to a minimum.

Pacific Ocean Park!

At the risk of alienating some of my Disney-purist readers, I am going to post some POP stuff for awhile, but I will return to Disneyland before too long.

I first became aware of POP while going through boxes of "junk" in my grandmother's closet. Inside I found lots of travel brochures from my dad's trips to California and Las Vegas in the 50's and 60's. Along with the Disneyland stuff were some brochures from POP. One look, and I was hooked. That seaside design motif...the imaginative and themed rides...the slightly seedy beachside atmosphere. And, I've always been a sucker for well-produced knock-offs. In the world of Disneyland-inspired theme parks, POP was one of history's best.

Although I never visited the park (it was ripped into the sea when I was four-years old), I feel some kind of weird connection to it. Maybe it's the classic and tragic rise-and-fall history of the place. Maybe it's my fascination with urban archeology and forgotten places. All I know is this: I would rather stare at a photo of POP ruins than pretty much any other site on Earth. Including...dare I say...Disneyland.

Here is one of my very favorite pieces of POP memorabilia. I have over 35 different kinds of POP tickets, but this is the only ticket book in my collection, and the only one I've ever seen other than a quick glimpse of some in that old Route 66 episode where a kid is given a handfull of them.

These could not have been in circulation for long and were almost certainly an attempt to recreate the Disneyland experience for the park's early visitors. The only ticket left in the book is for the Sea Circus, but there are many empty spaces where tickets used to be, which is frustrating to say the least; so close and yet so far. And, no, the tickets were not printed by Globe.

Does anyone know of more of these ticket books out there? Has anyone ever seen a complete one?

Coming Back Soon!

Hi, everybody.

I'll be back tonight or tomorrow, so check back. I think I'll go to a 3 or 4 days-a-week schedule, as the daily thing was cramping my style.

Are you guys still out there?

Now Open: Pirates of the Caribbean!

Well, here is it...the final entry of my series of Coming Soon/Now Open flyers from 1955-1967. If anyone out there knows of another entry that I don't know about, or worse, don't own, PLEASE let me know. My 15 readers and I will be oh so grateful.

This is a very cool flyer with a real retro feel. Maybe it's seeing the old school captain on the cover now that he's been evicted (or re-skinned) thanks to Jerry Bruckheimer.

Too bad Disney never made a Coming Soon flyer for the Haunted Mansion.

On a personal update note, I am going to be taking a break from the blog until at least the middle of next week. Need to catch up on some personal and professional stuff, and this time of day/night is the only time to do it. When I return, I promise something out of the ordinary.

Thanks again for reading and for all of your comments.

Now Open: 1966...again!

I'm pooped, so this is gonna be short.

Nice flyer...used to be rare, not anymore...weird Olde English font on back cover....

There is one more Coming Soon/Now Open flyer left, thank goodness. At this point, I'm ready to move onto something new.

Now Open: Dinosaurs Eat the Children of the World!

...or at least that's what my sick imagination thinks when I see this flyer.

This features the highlights of Disneyland's 1966 season. I am particularly fond of the art in this piece since it mirrors the attractions' respective posters.

I guess I'm supposed to be disappointed that I missed all of the listed Disneyland After Dark events, but I have to be honest...each one sounds worse than the last. Except for the fireworks. Those are always good.

Coming Soon: 1966!

Man, this brochure was a bitch to scan. It's full of weird folds and is kinda two-sided and designed to be read from the front and the back.

This brochure features all the World's Fair attractions that made it to Disneyland, although without that caveman seen behind Walt...him and his whole family never made it out of New York. The flyer optimistically predicts that Pirates of the Caribbean would open that year, but it did not, and Walt Disney therefore died before he could personally see the opening of perhaps the greatest Disney theme park ride ever. Sad.

Coming Soon: Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln!

Very cool and formerly uber-rare (until eBay, that is) flyer printed on thick-ish newsprint. GMWML came straight from the NY World's Fair and took up residency in the Disneyland Opera House. It's been overhauled over the years and was finally evicted in favor of Great Moments with Steve Martin over two years ago. I wonder if it will ever come back. I hope so. It's one of those attractions that's easy to pass by or only check out every few years. But the air-conditioning rocks and both the technology and message that give root to the show are both very worthwhile. And that One Brother song has always been a guilty pleasure.

Now Open: Below Decks on the Sailing Ship Columbia!

In February of 1964, Disneyland made a big deal out of the opening of the "below decks" area of the Sailing Ship Columbia. I guess with the World's Fair attractions in full prep mode, this was the best they could do for Disneyland in 1964. That didn't stop them from printing a nifty flyer, though.

This flyer comes in 2 versions: one is blank on verso and one co-features the Tiki Room. In my obsessive-compulsive days, I had both. Then I ditched the the blank one and kept this. For some reason, both versions are pretty tough to find.

Now Open: Enchanted Tiki Room (again!)

Here the 2nd version of the Tiki Room opening flyer. Nice green color, FANTASTIC graphics and best of all, another disembodied Walt head. For those of you who remember Dug Miller's fanzine, you will remember the endless possibilities and fun to be had with those Disney heads. Although the flyer implies that this was handed out for only one day, it was actually handed out for a few weeks after the attraction opened.

New Disneyland DVD

A digression...

That new Disneyland DVD is really something. I've had a bootleg of Disneyland USA on VHS for years, but this new print and DVD transfer is totally amazing. And the commentary by Maltin and Baxter is a lot of fun. I'm sure 98% of anyone reading this blog already picked it up, but if you haven't, DO!

Now Performing: Papotin's Revue!

Originally, I thought this flyer was from a return engagement in 1964 since the showtimes are different from the flyer I posted yesterday. But I am probably wrong about that. Seems that his show was, according to some very knowledgeable comments about yesterday's post, performed only in the summer of 1963. This flyer is so non-Disneyland that I wouldn't be surprised if it was printed and distributed by Andre Tahon himself.

Now Open: the Enchanted Tiki Room!!

Great and colorful fold-out flyer with both illustrations and full-color photos (very rare in this kind of hand-out.) Would love more info on Papotin's Revue. Does anyone know anything about the show? Is there any film of it, whether shot at Disneyland or not? And whatever happened to that guy?