1991:
Disney's Port Orleans Resort French Quarter, a re-creation of the streets and rowhouses of New Orleans' French Quarter, opens at 2201 Orleans Drive in Walt Disney World. The Downtown Disney area resort offers 432 guest rooms in 3 buildings (the room count will increase to 1,008 when construction on the remaining 4 buildings is completed). Also opening is the Sassagoula Floatworks and Food Factory food court, Jackson Square Gifts and Desires shop, and Bonfamille's Cafe restaurant. (In 2001 it will be renamed Port Orleans Resort when it is merged with Dixie Landings Resort.)
Touchstone Pictures release the comedy What About Bob? directed by Frank Oz
and starring Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfuss. A successful psychiatrist loses his mind after one of his most dependent patients, a highly manipulative obsessive-compulsive, tracks him down during a family vacation.
Actor and rapper Daniel Curtis Lee is born in Jackson, Mississippi. His Disney credits include Zeke and Luther and Good Luck Charlie.
2005:
Walt Disney Records releases "Best of The Muppets featuring The
Muppets' Wizard of Oz" from the upcoming The Muppets' Wizard of Oz television movie. (This is the Muppets' first major album release since the franchise was purchased by The Walt Disney Company in 2004.)
It is announced on this day that Roy and Patricia Disney have pledged $10 million
to Providence Saint Joseph Foundation to build the San Fernando Valley's first and most comprehensive free-standing cancer center. In recognition of their generosity and
commitment, the California cancer facility, the largest provider of cancer services in the valley, will be named
Actor and impressionist Frank Gorshin passes away at age 72 at Providence Saint
Joseph Medical Center in California. He played the role of Iggy the bank-robber in
Disney's 1965 live-action film That Darn Cat! Television fans will remember him best for his role of the Riddler on the 1960s Batman series.
1909:
Science expert, physicist, author, world-wide lecturer and television guest & host, Julius Sumner Miller is born in Bellerica, Massachusetts. A student and friend of Albert Einstein, Miller portrayed Professor Wonderful on new introductions, filmed at Disneyland, to the syndicated reruns of Mickey Mouse Club. (He is best known in Canada for his "mad professor" work on the short-lived 1971 TV series The Hilarious House of Frightenstein.)
1925:
Disney's Alice Comedy Alice's Egg Plant, featuring Dawn O'Day as Alice, debuts in New York City at the Rivoli Theater.
1935:
French composer Paul Dukas passes away in Paris, France. His most popular piece L'apprenti sorcier, better known under its English title The Sorcere's Apprentice, will be heard in the 1940 Disney film Fantasia. (Although Dukas wrote a fair amount of music, he was a perfectionist and destroyed many of his pieces out of dissatisfaction with them. Only a few of his compositions remain!)
1940:
Disney's Donald Duck cartoon Billposters is released.
American computer scientist Alan Kay is born in Massachusetts. In the mid-1980s he
joined Walt Disney Imagineering as vice president of research and development before going on to work for
Hewlett-Packard and Viewpoints Institute.
1950:
Disney Legend Howard Ashman, playwright, producer & award-winning lyricist is born in Baltimore, Maryland. He co-produced The
Little Mermaid with John Musker, and co-wrote many of the film's songs including
"Under the Sea" with composer Alan Menken. Ashman's Disney credits include
Oliver & Company, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin, (He is also known for his
rock musical Little Shop of Horrors which he co-wrote with Menken.)
1955:
Actor Bill Paxton, the director of Disney's 2005
The Greatest Game Ever Played, is born in Fort Worth, Texas.
1962:
Disney's live-action comedy Bon Voyage, starring Fred MacMurray, Jane Wyman, Deborah Walley, Kevin Corcoran & Tommy Kirk, is released. The Willards from Indiana travel abroad for a once-in-a-lifetime vacation to Paris, France.
Actor, comedian and talk-show host Craig Ferguson is born in Glasgow, Scotland.
Known for his Emmy Award nominated The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, he supplied the voice for owl in Disney's 2011 animated release Winnie the Pooh. (Before his career as a late-night television host, Ferguson was best known for his role as the office boss, Nigel Wick, on The Drew Carey Show.)
1964:
Disney's Wonderful World of Color TV show airs the
episode "Disneyland Goes to the World's Fair." Walt is shown
working on a scene from the Progressland show along with
Wathel Rogers, his principal Audio-Animatronics programmer.
Although Disney hasn't built the fair's Kodak Pavilion, Walt explains to millions
of viewers about how the development of Kodak cameras make it possible for
people to record their World's Fair memories ... and actually plugs the Kodak
Pavilion! Kodak's structure is located next to Pepsi's "It's a Small World"
attraction and the Tower of the Four Winds - the only place where visitors can
get a picture taken with Disney characters.
1986:
"American Journeys," a CircleVision 360 film, debuts at Tokyo Disneyland.
1987:
The Wonderful World of Disney airs the movie "Spot Marks the X."
1989:
Disney Channel airs episode 18 of MMC. Today is Anything Can Happen Day!
1997:
Disneyland's Mike Fink Keelboats re-closes for the second time in the
attraction's history.
Disney's animated Nightmare Ned airs on ABC-TV with 3 episodes - "Headless Lester," "My, How You've Grown, Part 1," and "My, How You've Grown, Part 2."
1998:
At the Drama Desk Awards, Disney's stage musical The Lion King wins the most awards with Outstanding Featured Actress in a Musical (Tsidii Le Loka), Outstanding Director of a Musical, Outstanding Choreography, Outstanding Set Design of a Musical, Outstanding Costume Design, Outstanding Lighting Design, Outstanding Sound Design, and Outstanding Puppet Design.
The Wonderful World of Disney airs the television movie "Miracle at Midnight."
2002:
The 29th Daytime Emmy Awards are presented at New York City's Madison Square Garden. Disney Channel's Madeline wins for Outstanding Children's Animated Program and Disney's Teacher's Pet takes home an award for Outstanding Special Class Children's Animated Program.
The Lizzie McGuire episode "The Longest Yard" debuts on Disney Channel.
2004:
Phase 1 of Disney's Saratoga Springs Resort & Spa (the 7th Disney Vacation Club resort built at Walt Disney World) welcomes its first guests. Phase 1 features 4 Villa Buildings in a section called Congress Park - opening with 184 Vacation Home units. Jodi Benson (best known as the voice of Ariel in The Little Mermaid) takes part in the opening festivities singing "Part of Your World" and other Disney classics. The resort (inspired by the city of Saratoga Springs, New York) is situated on the former site of the Disney Institute at 1960 Broadway. (Phases 2-4 will open over the next 5 years.)
The Hollywood Reporter reports that the Disney theme park ride Jungle Cruise will be turned into a live-action feature film.
Comedic actor Tony Randall, who hosted the 1987 television special
Walt Disney World Celebrity Circus, passes away in his sleep of complications from heart surgery. Also appearing on The Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park Grand Opening 1989 television special, fans will remember Randall for his classic role of Felix Unger on the sitcom The Odd Couple.
2006:
The late Sam McKim, the man who drew the first Disneyland map, receives a Window on Main Street at Disneyland. Hired in 1954 as Walt's Master Map Maker, McKim's sketches were also used to help design the park, especially Main Street and Frontierland. During his 32-year career, McKim worked on several of the Studio's films, including Zorro, Johnny Tremain, The Shaggy Dog, and The Gnome-Mobile. He also played a key role at the 1964-65 New York World's Fair, for which he contributed sketches for all four Disney attractions. (McKim passed away in July 2004.)
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Instead of Disney's California
Adventure, Disney originally
considered building a West
Coast version of Epcot!
WestCOT was announced to
the public in 1991 ... but
scrapped in 1995. WestCOT
would have been the first
Disney theme park of its kind
to have resorts actually
on its property.
1908:
Disney writer and director Ralph Wright, the gloomy
voice of loveable Eeyore in such classics as Winnie
the Pooh and the Honey Tree and Winnie the Pooh
and the Blustery Day, is born in Grants Pass,
Oregon. He (along with his fellow Disney contemporaries) was a pioneer in the use of "gags" within cartoons, often acted out in front of the "story board," a bulletin board pinned with sequential sketches of the cartoon's scenes - a technique still in use today in most major animation studios. Wright's story credits include Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too!, The Jungle Book, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, and The Aristocats. His directing credits include the 1957 live-action Perri.
"There's only one thing worse than a man who doesn't have strong likes and dislikes, and that's a man who has strong likes and dislikes without the courage to voice them."
-Tony Randall (1920-2004)
1946:
The National Council of the Boy Scouts of America awards Walt Disney and eight other recipients the prestigious Silver Buffalo during a ceremony in St. Louis, Missouri. The Silver Buffalo, Scouting's highest commendation, is awarded annually for "distinguished service to boyhood."
1954:
Tony Award-winning musical theatre lyricist David Zippel is born in Easton, Pennsylvania. His Disney credits include Mulan (co-writing the songs "Reflection" & "True to Your Heart" with Matthew Wilder), Hercules (co-writing "Go the Distance" with Alan Menken), and Tarzan (collaborating with Phil Collins).
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MAY
MAY 17
"If you can't find Disney, look for Kodak... and if you can't find Kodak, just look for Disney... " -Walt Disney
2000:
The Field Museum in Chicago unveils Sue, the largest, most complete, and best preserved Tyrannosaurus rex fossil yet discovered. A replica of Sue stands in Disney's Animal Kingdom. Visit Sue on your travels to the Dino Institute in Dinoland USA. (The dinosaur is named after Sue Hendrickson - an American paleontologist, who along with her team in August 1990 discovered the bones of this huge Tyrannosaurus rex in South Dakota.)
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MAY 17
THIS DAY MADE IN THE USA
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Walt Disney awarded Silver Buffalo
"The best way to predict the future is to invent it." -Alan Kay
selected works:
co-written with Menken for
The Little Mermaid:
"Part of Your World"
"Kiss the Girl"
"Poor Unfortunate Souls"
co-written with Menken for
Beauty and the Beast:
"Be Our Guest"
"Gaston"
"Beauty and the Beast"
1921:
Disney Legend Harrison "Buzz" Price is born Oregon City, Oregon (though he will grow up in Southern California). A research economist who recommended Anaheim to Walt Disney as the location for Disneyland, Price later formed Economics Research Associates and conducted studies for many theme park clients. He also had a helping hand in finding the location for Walt Disney World.
