Tony Baxter: Imagineering Legend

Former Imagineer executive and Senior Vice President of Creative Development Tony Baxter is a Disney Legend in every meaning of the word. During his tenure, he continually pushed the standards for guest experience on the attractions, lands, and parks he designed. He created half of the Disney mountain range, arguably the most beautiful Disney castle complete with a fire-breathing dragon, one of the most popular, yet unrealized lands, and what is my absolute favourite attraction of all time. Needless to say, I am a bit of a fan of the guy.

Please note that this is only Part 1 because his resume is too long to fit into a single post. Read Part 2 here.

Tony Baxter was a huge Disney fan from the start. He grew up watching Walt Disney on the Disneyland television show as well as visited the original park whenever he could convince his parents to take him. He would build his own attractions in his backyard, which is super relatable because my brother and I would do this all the time. Perhaps we missed our chance to be Imagineers. Finally when Tony was just old enough, he started working for the Walt Disney Company in 1965. His earliest role was scooping ice cream at the Carnation Ice Cream Parlor on Main Street, U.S.A. One day on his break, he spied from the back of the cast member cafeteria the prison scene of the new Pirates of the Caribbean attraction being built. Imagineer Claude Coats caught the young Tony and offered a personal tour of the half-built attraction. Years later when Tony would become an Imagineer, Claude became his mentor. After working at the Carnation Parlor for a few years, he transferred to Tomorrowland operations.

During this time, Tony was also going to school. He tried a few different areas of studies such as architecture and urban planning, but when he created concept art for a Mary Poppins attraction, his teacher encouraged him to go into art instead. On this Mary Poppins attraction, guests would ride carrousel horses around London and out into the countryside. Inspiration for the ride system came from the newly opened Carousel of Progress. He created another project modeled after Island on Top of the World; since the film had not be released yet, Tony based his project on what little information he had from the public Disney annual reports. After bringing in a few of these projects to a friend in Imagineering, Tony Baxter was hired in 1970 when he was 23 years old. His first project was at Walt Disney World working on the Magic Kingdom attraction 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea. He was the field art director of this Fantasyland submarine ride.

Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (1979)

The first major project that Tony headed up was a little runaway mine car attraction called Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. Big Thunder first opened in Disneyland in 1979 and was soon replicated in Magic Kingdom in 1980, Tokyo Disneyland in 1987, and was an opening day attraction in Disneyland Paris in 1992. The look of the Disneyland version was based on the hoodoos of Bryce Canyon National Park in Utah where the other three were based on Monument Valley. Disneyland’s Big Thunder replaced Mine Train through Nature’s Wonderland and many parts of the previous attraction were reused. The idea for this attraction was actually conceived in 1972 but was put on hold due to the building of Pirates of the Caribbean in the Magic Kingdom and Space Mountain on both coasts. Inspiration for Big Thunder was taken from Marc Davis’ Western River Expedition, a pavilion that was supposed to take up the space of where Big Thunder and Splash Mountain are now in the Magic Kingdom, but the finances went into building Pirates of the Caribbean instead. A touchy subject for a future blog post.

The backstory is very similar between all four versions of this attraction. Gold was discovered in the western mountains and a mining town was set up and boomed overnight. But unknown to the miners, the area was cursed. A natural disaster occurred, which differs from park to park. Big Thunder in both Disneyland and Disneyland Paris experienced an earthquake, Magic Kingdom had a flash flood, and a tsunami hit in Tokyo Disneyland. The town was abandoned, but the trains still raced through the mountains on their own. The name of the town differs as well. In Disneyland the town is Rainbow Ridge, which is homage to Mine Train through Nature’s Wonderland. In Magic Kingdom it’s the town of Tumbleweed and in Paris it is called Thunder Mesa. I could not find the name of the town in Tokyo Disneyland anywhere, so if you know it, please let me know in the comments. The name of Big Thunder comes from the waterfall on Mine Train through Nature’s Wonderland where there was also a smaller waterfall called Little Thunder.

The Land Pavilion (1982)

Tony worked on the original concept for the Land Pavilion in the brand new EPCOT Center. The showbuilding was going to have seven towering crystals that were to each feature a different environment guests could walk through. The original sponsor of the Land was a logging company and they wanted the focus of the pavilion to be about the ecological use of the earth’s resources. The main attraction was a suspended balloon ride through the towering crystals called Blueprints of Nature. But the logging company pulled out and Kraft took over sponsorship, making the pavilion more food production focused instead.

Imagination Pavilion (1982)

Tony then moved onto the Imagination pavilion instead, taking with him the design of the towering crystals. Construction on the pavilion began only about 15 months before the opening of Epcot. The sponsor was Kodak and part of their contract was that one of the three planned attractions had to be ready for Epcot’s opening day. However, all three attractions, the Journey into Imagination dark ride, the Image Works interactive playground, and Magic Journeys the 3D show, were having troubles. So the Imagineers made a backup promotional film instead to show audiences. This film was not used as Image Works and Magic Journeys were completed right on time. The Journey into Imagination dark ride was opened in 1983. Tony Baxter is credited with the creation of the beloved characters Dreamfinder and Figment, and he cites an episode of Magnum P.I. as inspiration where a goat who chewed up a lawn was said to be a figment of imagination. However, a large part of the origins of Dreamfinder and Figment come from the unrealized Discovery Bay land which is talked about in Part 2 of this post.

New Fantasyland (1983)

Prior to 1983, Disneyland’s Fantasyland had a medieval fair look to it, similar to where It’s a Small World and Peter Pan’s Flight are in the Magic Kingdom. Walt’s original plan was for Fantasyland to be reminiscent of a Bavarian village, but due to lack of funds, the cheaper plan B option was created. There were small parts of Fantasyland that showed this Bavarian look such as the Skyway to Tomorrowland station and the Matterhorn Bobsleds’ queue. Finally with Tony’s redesign of Fantasyland in 1983, this vision was realized.

Peter Pan’s Flight exterior was given a London look complete with a clock tower. Snow White’s Adventures became Snow White’s Scary Adventures and the Evil Queen was added above the entrance as she opens and closes the curtains, peering down at guests. The exterior of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride was made into Toad’s Hall and the garden was added as part of the queue. Aside from the new look of all the showbuildings in Fantasyland, many attractions were physically moved around as well. King Arthur Carrousel was moved further back from behind the castle to create more flow for the growing crowds. The Mad Tea Party, which was where the carrousel is now, was moved closer to Alice in Wonderland for better storytelling. Dumbo Flying Elephants became Dumbo the Flying Elephant and was moved from near the entrance of Casey Jr. Circus Train to its current location. This location previously was home to Captain Hook’s Galley and Skull Rock. The brand new attraction to open with New Fantasyland was Pinocchio’s Daring Journey, which took the place of the Fantasyland Theatre, formally known as the Mickey Mouse Theater. The Village Haus Restaurant was also added to this location.

Captain Hook’s Galley, which was formally the Chicken of the Sea Pirate Ship, was going to be moved closer to the entrance of Storybook Land Canal Boats but fell apart due to the rotting away of the wooden planks. Though an old urban Disney legend was that it was purchased by Steven Spielberg to be One-Eyed Willy’s pirate ship in The Goonies. This is my new favourite Disney legend and I’m going to try to get it going again!

The Living Seas Pavilion (1986)

Tony again designed the original concept for the Living Seas pavilion in Epcot and though planned to open with the rest of the park, it was delayed. The Living Seas was originally sponsored by United Technologies. The original dark ride was going to explore the underwater world in a bubble-shaped omnimover that showed Poseidon taming a stormy sea. The pavilion was also going to include a shark tank and restaurant with a viewing level. The pavilion had to be scaled back and more research and development was needed so the Living Seas did not open until 1986. At the time of opening, it featured the largest saltwater tank in the world. The dark ride ended up only showing views of the tanks, but guests would take hydrolators to the omnimovers. The pavilion also included a film about the ocean and a model of the Nautilus from 20 000 Leagues Under the Sea. 20 000 Leagues tends to be a theme throughout much of Tony Baxter’s work.

Star Tours (1987)

Tony was tasked with coming up with a new attraction to replace Adventure thru Inner Space. An original idea was to base the attraction off of The Black Hole, but since the film did not perform well, George Lucas was approached to collaborate on the attraction. The result was the first non-Disney I.P. attraction. Tony and his team’s original idea for a Star Wars attraction was a roller coaster where guests boarded at Dagobah where Yoda would levitate their vehicles. The journey would be a choose-your-own-adventure type ride and guests would end up blowing up either the first or the second Death Star. Imagineer Randy Bright, who did a lot of work on Epcot, suggested the idea of a motion simulator and their ride system ended up being based on military-grade flight simulators. It was George Lucas’ idea for the starspeeder to go the wrong way because he loved seeing the backstage portions of Disneyland. This way, guests would see the “backstage” portions of the Star Wars galaxy. It was also his idea to have a crazy pilot who had never flown before for a more exciting storyline. This idea was pitched to Michael Eisner, who then pitched it to his 14 year old son who thought it was a fantastic idea. So the StarSpeeder 3000 was launched to take 40 guests on a flight to the forest moon of Endor. Disneyland stayed open for 60 hours straight to accommodate the massive crowds! The film was planned to be changed every once in a while to keep the attraction fresh, but it proved too difficult to regularly access the projector. Another Tony Baxter theme was to reuse props from previous attractions so some of the maintenance droids in Star Tours were reimagined audio-animatronic geese from America Sings. Star Tours was later replicated in Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Tokyo Disneyland in 1989 and was an opening day attraction in Disneyland Paris.

The Disney Gallery (1987)

For many years Imagineers wanted a place in Disneyland to showcase their artwork and models from the various past, present, and future attractions of Disney. Above the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction in New Orleans Square sat an empty space that was meant to be an apartment for Walt and Roy back when the land first opened. Their initials were even put into the wrought-iron railings around the balcony. Tony not only turned this space into the Disney Gallery in 1987, he also redesigned the queue for Pirates for better flow of the crowds. In 2008, the Disney Gallery was turned into the Dream Suite, based on newly found designs of what Walt and Roy wanted for their apartment and the gallery was moved to Main Street, U.S.A.

Splash Mountain (1989)

In the mid-eighties, very little traffic was heading to the back corner of Disneyland. This land, Bear Country, was home to the Country Bear Jamboree but was in need of a new E-ticket attraction. During this time, Dick Nunis, president of attractions, wanted a log flume ride in Disneyland, but other Imagineers did not think this ride system was “Disney” enough because it could be found at any simple county fair. Also at this time, America Sings was closing, leaving many Marc Davis audio-animatronics homeless. Tony Baxter was tasked with the project of solving all of these factors and Splash Mountain was born. One thought was to unify the space between New Orleans Square and Bear Country as Dixieland, but ultimately, as the story goes, he thought up the entire idea for a log flume attraction that would draw crowds to Bear Country, that would use the Marc Davis beloved audio-animatronics, and that would keep true to the Disney reputation of immersive storytelling while stuck in traffic. In an interview with Tony Baxter, he said that the first film he remembers seeing was a reissue of Song of the South.  Despite Song of the South having a controversial response, Tony loved the animated soul of the film which was based on the folklore of the south. The name of the attraction was going to be Zip-a-Dee River Run to feature the Academy Award winning song from the film. Michael Eisner was all onboard with this new attraction but thought he had an even better idea. Instead of Song of the South, he wanted this log flume attraction to feature mermaids to promote the very first Touchstone film Splash. This idea was rejected by the Imagineers, but the name Splash was kept. Another name change was the name of the land itself to Critter Country since Splash Mountain featured more animals than just bears. Splash Mountain opened on Disneyland’s 34^th anniversary and was an instant Disney classic! It was so popular that Splash Mountain was soon duplicated in both Magic Kingdom and Tokyo Disneyland in 1992.

Disneyland Paris (1992)

Tony Baxter was the Executive Producer / Senior Vice President for Concept Design, Development, and Creation of Disneyland Paris. What a job title! Disneyland Paris opened with, and still only has, five lands. Tony wanted the entrance of the park to open with a sense of arrival, something unique to welcome guests. Designer Eddie Sotto, who was the Show Producer for Main Street in Disneyland Paris, designed the Disneyland Hotel which stands beautifully at the entrance to the park. Disneyland Paris’ town square features a gazebo, which is something Walt wanted in Disneyland. This original gazebo was removed for the large flagpole, but since an American flag would not necessarily fit right in the middle of a European park, the idea of a gazebo was brought back. The original concept for Main Street had many different ideas including a complete covering similar to World Bazaar in Tokyo Disneyland. This was scrapped because Main Street was the main parade route and also to respect the French culture’s love of eating outside in cafes. But to compromise, long arcades were built along the sides of Main Street that were attached to each shop for guests to take cover in bad weather. Main Street was also going to be based in the 1920’s Jazz age instead of the turn of the century because Tony found that Europeans found America more interesting after the advances in technology during the early 1900’s. There was also thought that Victorian architecture would be less interesting as it originated from Europe (sounds similar to the lack of Pirates when Walt Disney World opened.) But Michael Eisner vetoed this idea in order to not stray too far from Walt’s original vision of Disneyland. Instead, Imagineers put up many billboards to give Main Street a “brash and young country look.” There was a lot of emphasis put into making the shops of Main Street very elegant to compete with the actual historic shops in Paris. Another unique aspect of Disneyland Paris’ Main Street is Walt’s Restaurant where each dining room is themed to a different land of the park.

Le Château de la Belle au Bois Dormant is the gorgeous centrepiece of Disneyland Paris. Similar to the shops on Main Street, the castle needed something extra from the U.S. parks. Tony’s take on this was that “Sleeping Beauty Castle at Disneyland was inspired by the Neuschwanstein Castle in Southern Germany. This European influence was fine for building a castle in Anaheim, but the fact that castles exist just down the road from Disneyland Paris challenged us to think twice about our design.” Something very special to Tony is the fire-breathing dragon who lies underneath the castle. One of the projects that he brought to the Imagineering executives when he was first hired featured a concept for an attraction with a fire-breathing dragon. The dragon of Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty had really resonated with Tony, so much so that over 30 years later, he made her an important part of the park he was overseeing. This audio-animatronic was the largest ever built at the time of opening.

Frontierland is located to the front, left of the park. It features the much darker version of Haunted Mansion, Phantom Manor. The word Phantom was used instead of Haunted because it was easier to translate into multiple European languages. Regarding the original Haunted Mansion in Disneyland, Walt is often quoted in saying that he wanted to take care of the outside and let the ghosts take care of the inside; therefore from the outside it is difficult to tell the nature of the darker attraction. But in Paris, since again there were so many different cultures coming to visit the park, Tony wanted to make it obvious that Phantom Manor was a scarier attraction and so the Imagineers made sure that it looked that way from the outside. This was also the first time Big Thunder Mountain would be opening with a Disney park and since this attraction was so special to Tony, he really wanted to showcase it. And he succeeded! Big Thunder Mountain is literally the centrepiece of Frontierland as it is located on an island. The mine trains zoom underneath the water through tunnels before racing around the tracks on the island. I love the uniqueness of this!

The entrance to Adventureland in Disneyland Paris is different from the other Adventureland entrances because it has an Arabian theme to it. Tony wanted an exotic-to-Europe fairytale to be featured so they went with One Thousand and One Nights; it also did not hurt that Aladdin was currently in production! They did a little bit a research into if a Tom Sawyer Island would be popular there but found that young guests were more interested in pirates. A large portion of Adventureland was then dedicated to a pirate theme including Pirates of the Caribbean. Even Peter Pan’s Flight in Fantasyland was moved closer to the Adventureland boarder to keep with the theming.

Tony was finally able to use many of his unseen concepts from Discovery Bay in Disneyland Paris’ version of Tomorrowland. Here it is called Discoveryland and celebrates a very inspirational part of French culture, writer Jules Verne. Discoveryland is a great marriage of Discovery Bay and Tomorrowland because here dreams fuel the future.

Indiana Jones Adventure (1995)

Indiana Jones Adventure is my absolute favourite attraction in the entire world! So I am not going to spend too much time talking about. I know that sounds counterintuitive, but I have two reasons for it. One is that once I start talking about Indy, I have really hard time stopping and this post is already super long. And the other is that I’m planning on writing an entire blog post about this attraction because I have so much to say on the topic!

Tony Baxter saw Raiders of the Lost Ark when it hit theatres in 1981. He thought it would be amazing to have rights to a great adventure film like Raiders to base an attraction on. A few years later, Disney teamed up with George Lucas and many Lucasfilm attractions were built all leading up to Indiana Jones Adventure.

Indiana Jones Adventure is well known for its use of Enhanced Motion Vehicles. This brand new ride system was invented for this attraction and each jeep used hydraulics to allow it to move around the six degrees of freedom. This was an entirely new ride experience unlike any other dark ride. Early concepts of this attraction showed that it was going to be integrated with the Jungle Cruise and the Disneyland Railroad where the Jungle Cruise boats would drop guests off at the entrance to the temple showbuilding. Unfortunately one major flaw with this concept was that if the Jungle Cruise was to break down, Indiana Jones Adventure would not be able to operate either.

The ride opened on March 3, 1995 and was used to promote the 40^th anniversary of Disneyland. This attraction has quite the elaborate backstory to it. Set in 1935 in the lost river delta of India, Indy has discovered the Temple of the Forbidden Eye and tourists have flocked there to claim one of the three gifts offered by the temple deity Mara. The gifts are eternal youth, earthly riches, and visions of the future. The only catch is that no one can look into the eye of Mara. Indy’s friend Sallah charges the tourists to go into the temple in order to fund the expedition. Soon the tourists start to disappear so Indy ventures back in to find them. He then disappears so Sallah sends more tourists in to find Indy. This just seems like a vicious cycle, Sallah; maybe we should find a better solution!

New Tomorrowland (1998)

Tony Baxter’s next project was the redesign of New Tomorrowland, or New New New Tomorrowland as I like to call it after the 1959 and the 1967 updates. The 1998 overhaul of Disneyland’s Tomorrowland was, well, an interesting time in Disney history. The original concept was a project called Tomorrowland 2055, which was aimed at solving the problem of Tomorrowland seeming to always catch up with today. The land was going to be set in 2055 and would be designed as an alien spaceport instead of being a location on earth. An entire second floor to Tomorrowland was going to be added as well as attractions from Magic Kingdom such as Timekeeper and ExtraTERRORestrial Alien Encounter. The Disney Gallery in 1997 even had an entire display dedicated to Tomorrowland 2055, which I actually remember seeing when I was a kid. But due to, you guessed it, financial troubles Tomorrowland 2055 was cancelled.

Disney still needed an updated Tomorrowland though but was now on a time and financial crunch. Many ideas from the new Discoveryland were borrowed but just didn’t quite fit as well in Disneyland as they did in Paris. The overall look was very steampunky which included painting Space Mountain bronze. Redd Rocket’s Pizza Port and Innoventions opened where Tom Morrow was introduced as the mayor of Tomorrowland. Honey I Shrunk the Audience replaced Captain E.O. The Rocket Jets were replaced by the Astro Orbiter and was moved to the main entrance of the land. And the Rocket Rods were opened on the old PeopleMover track. The Rocket Rods are a very sore subject in my family because when they opened, I was tall enough to ride them, but my brother was not. And by our next trip a year later, they were gone.

Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage (2007)

The original Submarine Voyage which opened in 1959 was closed during this redesign of Tomorrowland in 1998 to make way for a new theme. It was originally going to reopen in 2003 with an Atlantis: The Lost Empire theme, but this idea was scrapped due to the film doing terrible at the box office. So next, Submarine Voyage was going to be themed to Treasure Planet, but this film turned out to be another box office bomb. Finally after Pixar’s hit with Finding Nemo, the new Submarine Voyage opened in 2007. The opening of this attraction was announced as part of Disneyland’s 50^th celebration. This is said to be one of Tony Baxter’s favourite attractions that he worked on, most likely due to its 20 000 Leagues connection.

Sleeping Beauty Castle Walkthrough (2008)

The original Sleeping Beauty Castle Walkthrough opened in 1957 after Walt challenged his Imagineers to do something with that “wasted space.” These original dioramas were designed after Eyvind Earle’s unique artistic style of the Sleeping Beauty backgrounds. These backgrounds are often said to have a moving tapestry look to them. In 1977, the dioramas were completely redone to resemble the look of the Main Street, U.S.A. window displays. Tony Baxter was then tasked with again redesigning the walkthrough in 2008. Instead of creating something completely new, he went back to the original style of Eyvind Earle, though added some updated technology to the dioramas. He also added a viewing area with an HD film of the walkthrough so guests with mobility restrictions could still enjoy the story of Sleeping Beauty.

The Disneyland Story presenting Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln (2009)

Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln has received many updates over the years since the attraction first appeared at the 1964/1965 New York World’s Fair. Each time, the audio-animatronic was upgraded with the latest technology. For Disneyland’s 50^th celebration, the theatre housed a film about the history of the park called The First 50 Magical Years starring Steve Martin and Donald Duck. In 2009, Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln was brought back, but this time the previous hydraulic audio-animatronic was replaced with an electronic one. The show was edited as well. The First 50 Magical Years film is still shown in the lobby of the Main Street Opera House and the lobby is combined with the Disney Gallery to house artwork and models of Disneyland.

Star Tours – The Adventures Continue (2011)

An updated version of Star Tours opened in 2011 in both Disney’s Hollywood Studios and Disneyland. This same attraction then opened in Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris in 2013 and 2017 respectively. In 2005 George Lucas announced that Star Tours II was underway. This updated version contains randomized scenes featured from every Star Wars saga film, with more scenes being added as the films are released. One ending scene is even from the planet of Batuu which will be the planet featured in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. Star Tours – The Adventures Continue contains countless hidden details throughout the queue and ride experience that reference the original attraction, the Star Wars galaxy, and even Adventure thru Inner Space. Which Easter egg is your favourite to spot?

Fantasy Faire (2013)

A subland in Disneyland’s Fantasyland opened in 2013 called Fantasy Faire, which was Tony Baxter’s last major Imagineering project. This area is unique to Fantasyland because it is located on the Main Street side of the castle instead of behind it. It occupies the former Carnation Plaza Gardens. Tony designed this new part of Fantasyland to be seamless with the Bavarian village look to the rest of the land. Fantasy Faire contains the Royal Hall where storytelling takes place daily with Mr. Smythe, Mr. Jones, and Sir Samuel from Morocco. Current stories told here are Beauty and the Beast and Tangled, and previously Frozen was told as well. I think this is still a hidden gem of Disneyland; it is definitely a show for guests of all ages and I recommend checking it out! Fantasy Faire is also home to Fantasy Hall where rotating Disney princesses meet and greet guests.

That is quite the list of Disney projects led by one Imagineer! Which Tony Baxter attraction or land is your favourite?

Check back for Part 2 of this Tony Baxter series which takes a close look at some of his projects that never came to fruition including Discovery Bay, Dumbo’s Circusland, and WESTCOT Center!