833 · The Boy Who Became Tom Sawyer – Disney Legend Tom Nabbe - From the Archives - WDW Radio: The Disney Podcast for Walt Disney World, Disneyland, and More

Episode Transcript
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(00:23):
How did a 12 year old kid talkWalt Disney into creating a job just
for him and end up becoming aDisney legend with his window on
Main street usa? Welcome toanother episode from the WW Radio
Archives. I am Lou Mangelloand this is show number 833. And
each week I'm going to selectan evergreen episode to share that

(00:44):
maybe you haven't heard beforeor one that you haven't heard in
a long time. From interviewsto top tens relevant reviews, guides,
Wayback machines and more,it's a great way to visit or revisit
some of our favorite episodes,including ones that you have suggested
I share from the archives. Andthis week I'm going into the WWE
Radio Virtual Vault for aspecial edition from the archives

(01:06):
originally recorded back in2018 on show number 511. And I think
that the timing of thisepisode couldn't be more appropriate
and maybe even a littlemeaningful because as you know, Tom
Sorry island in Magic Kingdomis going to close forever on July
7th to make way for a new Carsthemed land called Piston Peak national
park, which is part of alarger transformation of Frontierland

(01:30):
and really the Magic Kingdomas a whole. And so I wanted to go
back and revisit really aheartfelt conversation with Disney
legend and all around nice guyTom Nabbe, the real life Tom Sawyer
who not only worked with Walthimself, but helped bring Disneyland,
Walt Disney World andDisneyland Paris to life. From telling

(01:50):
newspapers outside Disneylandon its opening day, to influencing
Walt to give him a job as TomSawyer, to managing the monorail
and opening Epcot to become aDisney legend. His story is funny,
fun, emotional and a littleinspiring. And you're going to hear
what Walt Disney was reallylike in the parks. How Tom literally

(02:10):
helped shape Tom Sawyerisland, what it was like opening
Magic Kingdom and Epcot fromthe inside, and the legacy he left
behind, including his ownwindow on Main street usa. So whether
you are nostalgic for theisland, fascinated by Disney history,
or just love a great feel goodstory, I invite you to sit back,

(02:31):
relax and enjoy thisconversation with the true Disney
original Tom Nabi. And thenshare with me what's your favorite
memory from Tom Sawyer islandand how do you feel about this piece
of Disney history beingreplaced? I'd love to hear your thoughts.
So come share your memorieswith me and the rest of the Clubhouse
family at www.radio.comclubhouse or better yet, call the

(02:54):
voicemail at 407-900-9391.That's 407900, WDW1 and let me know
and I will play it on the air.And if you are planning your next
Disney vacation, maybe youwant to get to Magic Kingdom before
Tom's Royal island closes.Whether you're coming to Walt Disney
World, Disneyland, DisneyCruise Line or anywhere on the planet,
let my friends over atMousefan Travel help you with expert

(03:17):
planning at no cost to you.You can visit them over@m MouseFanTravel.com
and the best way to stayconnected by getting weekly updates,
special offers delivered rightto your inbox and my free 102 things
to do at Walt Disney World atleast once Book subscribe to my newsletter
over@wwradio.com and whileyou're there you can find out how
you can support the show andunlock exclusive members only Rewards

(03:39):
over at www.radionation.com.watch and chat with me live every
Wednesdaynight@wwradiolive.com and check out
the Events page for grouptrips, cruises and in person events.
And don't forget, if you are acreator or solopreneur and you want
to turn your passion into yourprofession, I have courses, coaching
and live events like Momentumthis Fall in Walt Disney World over@lou

(04:01):
mongello.com and if you arelooking for a keynote speaker for
your business, conference ororganization, I speak literally around
the world sharing Disneyinspired lessons on leadership, customer
service, storytelling and howto create real magic in your business
and brand. Thank you again forlistening for being part of our WW
Radio family. Pleasesubscribe, share the show, tell a

(04:23):
friend and join me here againnext week. And as always, sit back,
relax and enjoy this week'sepisode from the archives on the
WW Radio Show.

(04:45):
Sitting here in the lobby ofDisney's Polynesian Village Resorts,
I am reminded of a quote froma very, very wise man who talked
about how you can design andcreate the most magical place on
earth. But it really does takepeople to make those dreams a reality
and I believe thatwholeheartedly and I am so incredibly
honored and thrilled to besitting with someone who I have known

(05:07):
for years and whose story I'mexcited to share with you. In his
own words, he is formerDisneyland and Walt Disney World
cast member. More importantly,he is a Disney legend. He is Mr.
Tom Nabbe. Tom, welcome to the show.
Nolan. Thank you very muchLou. Looking forward to it. We've
been planning this for almostfour years. I think of getting together

(05:27):
after a couple of events thatwe've had and he said oh, you need
to get together so I can do aninterview. And I think we played
tag on several occasions. Iguess we have to go back and start
a little bit at the beginning.I was born in Santa Barbara, California
and we lived there for awhile. And my mother married a gentleman

(05:53):
by the name of Eddie Mora. Andin turn we moved from Santa Barbara
to Anaheim just in the late40s and 50 time frame. I was just
starting elementary school andI had dreams of grandeur, of having

(06:18):
a paper route. And I found away that I could ride the bus up
to the Coliseum in LA for thefootball season, sell newspapers.
And I was able to earn enoughmoney sell selling newspapers at
the Coliseum to buy a bicycle.And once I bought a bicycle, then
I could have a paper route.And so I ended up getting a paper

(06:41):
route there in la. And I grewup in Florence, Los Angeles, which
is right downtown Slauson andAlameda area, if some people know,
just right around the blockfrom Watts. So right in that area.
And during this time frame in,it was when Disneyland came on television

(07:06):
on Wednesday evenings. And youknow, television was relatively a
new, new thing. You know, hada little black and white TV with
the, with, with the, with thebig fish tank in front of it to magnify
it and that. But my, my motherwas a little bit of a, a starlet
wannabe. And she used to go upto all the premiere openings up in

(07:30):
Hollywood and she's that ladythat you see standing, standing behind
the barricades with theautograph book looking for everybody
to get autographs and, and sheused to take us to any, anything
that she could get into tv,new TV shows, premiere openings,
anything along that line. Andshe got very enamored with, with

(07:53):
Walt and Walt's discussion ofDisneyland and where it was being
built in Anaheim. And she sortof looked at it and my, my stepfather
was a, was a, a G.I. and, andeligible to get a, a G.I. uh, home
loan. And so she went down toAnaheim and checked it out and found

(08:16):
a place in, In Anaheim about7/10 of a mile from Disneyland. And
she could qualify to buy thehouse on the GI Bill. So in December
of 1954 we relocated fromAnaheim, from LA to Anaheim. And
when I got to Anaheim, theproblem that I found is Anaheim was

(08:39):
a very rural community duringthis time frame. And I couldn't get
a newspaper out. Okay, I hadmy bicycle, but I couldn't get a
newspaper route. You had tohave a driver's license. And I was
only 12 years old, so I wasn'table to drive a car, but I could
get a Sunday paper app. And soI developed around neighborhood.

(09:00):
I had about 20 to 25 peoplethat deliver the Sunday Herald examiner
to. And I had a deal with themanager, newspaper manager, that
any papers that he had leftover, he couldn't drop off. And what
I did is I tried to get overto Disneyland. And they were working

(09:21):
three shifts, the constructionpeople. And I'd get over there early
on Sunday morning and sell tothe third shift of people that were
going home Sunday papers. AndI met a gentleman by the name of
Ray Ahmet. Joe and Ray AhmetAhmet had the concession on Main

(09:46):
street called Castle News. Andthey also were going to do a publication
called the Disneyland News,which was going to be a monthly newspaper.
It told the history ofDisneyland to a little bit of upcoming
events and what was going onin that month. And all the lessees

(10:06):
that had businesses inDisneyland would advertise in this
paper. When Disneyland firstopened up, there was only about 600
people that actually workedfor Walt Disney. There's a people
in the administration, peoplethat in the rides and attractions
area, the people inmaintenance. But all the food locations

(10:29):
and all the merchandiselocations and everything were run
by these lessees. And Joe'shad had the concession. He also had
wheelchair and strollerrentals to go along with that. And
it was one of those where.Where you could get your. Your name
put in the headline of thepaper or they did wanted posters

(10:51):
and that type thing. So he hada. Had a very lucrative business
going at that time frame. Buthe would. He would show up every
morning after the park opened,I guess getting a little, little
ahead of it. I watchedDisneyland grow out of. Out of nowhere.
When we moved to Anaheim, theywere just starting to build the Santa

(11:12):
Ana Freeway. Still wasManchester Boulevard. And they had
just finished building theoverpass for Harbor Boulevard over
the Santa Ana Freeway. Andthey were working on the overpass
for Ball Road that went overthe Santa Ana Freeway. So you could
get up on the top of theoverpass and actually look down into
the construction site atDisneyland. And you're looking in.

(11:36):
On the. On the backside ofTomorrowland, you see some of Fantasyland.
And you could see the back ofthe buildings on Main street and
you could see the trainstation and then Castle.
You literally watch Disneylandbeing built, you know, from the outside
in.
Oh, yeah, yeah. Well,especially every Sunday morning when
I'm riding up there, stop onthe top and see it. And then as it

(11:59):
progressed, then they builtthe berm and that restricted a little
bit of the view. And then theylandscaped the berm and that walked
a little bit more of thatview, but it was able to watch it.
I remember myself and a coupleother guys chasing the TWA rocket
down Harbor Boulevard. It wason a flatbed truck, and we were sure

(12:20):
we chased it all the way tothe Harbor Gate. And then it went
inside the park. And so werode back up to the top of the overpass
because we were sure they weregoing to stand that rocket right
up. Well, it took about aweek, week and a half before they
stood up the rocket inTomorrowland. So once the. Once the
park opened up, Ray told me,he says, you know, come over every

(12:45):
morning and I'll be out infront of the gate. And if you sell
100 newspapers outside thegate, then you can sell papers. Continue
to sell papers through theday. Just come to the office and
pick them up. Okay? So thatwas a pretty good deal. So on July
17th, guess where we were. Wewere at Disneyland, and my mother

(13:07):
had her autograph book. Andthat was a press opening, so all
those celebrities were there,and she was getting those autographs.
I was sort of down around thecorner staring through the fence
at the Autopia because Iwanted to drive them Utopia cars.
Now, realize I'm 12, okay? SoI really wanted to drive those Autopia
cars. And back during thistime frame, Highway Patrol was a

(13:29):
very popular TV show. And theyhad six cars on the Utopia, were
done in black and white andlooked like the Highway Patrol. And
they have flashing red lightsand a siren, and they didn't have
any governor on it. And I'lltalk about that a little bit later
here. So ran over there. Well,what happened is Danny Thomas was

(13:50):
coming out. My mother askedDanny Thomas for an autograph, and
he very cordially gave her anautograph. And he sort of leaned
forward and he said, hip, haveyou been in the park? And my mother
said, oh, no, we weren'tinvited. He says, well, I got a couple
extra tickets, okay? And so hegave my mother two tickets. And sure
enough, boy, she come down meand we went into the park as guests

(14:12):
of Danny Thomas on the pressopening of Disneyland. Now I have.
I have my ticket still. And ifyou look at the ticket, there's no
serial number on the ticket.So if anybody ever asks you, Tom
Navy, as ticket number one tothe press opening of Disneyland.
Now, they were sort of brokedown in. In time frames. My tickets

(14:32):
say 5. 5:30pm I think on them,and the ones in the archive say 2:30pm
so there were sort of juststagger people coming in and you
can sort of go back and say ifthey didn't number the tickets, you
probably didn't know how manytickets they have. That gets back
to that, that, you know, theBlack Sunday analogy of working at

(14:55):
Disneyland. So we got insideand I, I remember we did ride the
carousel and I know we wentto, to Carnation Gardens and we got
a, we had a soda. CarnationGardens. Not Carnation Gardens, but
Carnation on Main Street. ButI think that's the dirtiest or trashiest.

(15:16):
I think it'd be a better word.The trash is I've ever seen a Disney
park in my 50 year career. AndI think Walt's all the same thing
because from that pointforward, cleanliness was right on
top of the list. And that'ssomething he preached to everybody.
And if you ever walked thepark with Walt, you know, he bent
over and he was picking uptrash as he went through. And that's

(15:40):
something you learn. My wifethreatened to divorce me one time
because I was picking up trashin the Florida mall. But it's just
one of those things that youcan get conditional.
My wife says I pick up moregarbage at Disney World than I do
at my house.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it'sfunny how you get conditioned on
those things. So on the 18th,my, my neighbor across the street,

(16:03):
Doug Harmon, and I, we wentover and sit in line and bought tickets
to go in the park. Cost us 50cents. And that was a child's admission
at that time frame. The nextday, on the 19th of July, I went
to work as a doozy, okay? So Imet, I met Ray Ahmed out in front
of the gate, got my hundredpapers, sold those, that was a slam

(16:25):
dunk. All those peoplestanding in line waiting to buy tickets
and they wouldn't need you.And people read newspapers back at
that time frame. So I sellthose hundred papers and then I was
able to get inside the park.Well, those of us that sold all our
papers out early, we getinside the park and we run over to

(16:46):
Tomorrowland, okay? Becausewhat they needed was to get all the
cars driven around and linedup for when the guests would come
in on the Utopia, okay? Sowe'd all run over there to drive
the cars around to get themlined up. And every once in a while
you get to drive one of thempolice cars. So that was, that was
sort of neat.
You had dreams coming trueliterally on day one. Like you were

(17:08):
in Disneyland, working atDisneyland, and you got to drive
the Car that you wanted to.That you were looking at 48 hours
earlier through the fence.
Yes. Yeah. And it was the endof the first summer. And I don't
remember who, but somebodymentioned to me that Walt was going

(17:28):
to build Tom Sawyer's islandon the rivers of America and that
you look just like Tom Sawyerand you should ask Walt for a job.
Now, had anybody told you thatbefore that you look like Tom Sawyer?
It was only because this waswhen we come into the park.
No. Well, my, my mother would,you know, the star that wanted me
would dress me up in a costumeanyway, so, so I was. I had cut off

(17:52):
Levi's and a straw because mycomplexion. I had a straw hat and.
And she puts suspenders and Ihad a blue and white checkered shirt
and, and that was the costumethat I wore to, to sell newspapers.
Okay. And people would say,oh, you look like Huck Finn or you
look like Tom Sawyer, thattype thing. So it wasn't unusual

(18:13):
for this, this person to tellme that you, you know, you look like
Tom Sawyer said as well, for ajob. And so what was in the park
quite frequently back duringthat time frame, I think everybody
where, you know, he had theapartment above the, the fire station.
He'd drive down on Fridayevenings from the studio and spend,
you know, Friday evening,Saturday, Sunday morning, then he

(18:36):
drive back up to the studio inthere. So, so it's pretty available.
And Walt used to walk aroundthe park quite a bit and he didn't
look anything like the WaltDisney that you saw on tv. You know,
he usually had a couple daysgrowth of beard. He had a white panama
hat and a pair of graytrousers and, and a blue jacket.

(19:00):
And he sort of walked around.So if you didn't really know it was
Walt Disney, you wouldrecognize Walt Disney. But, but I
in turn, I recognized Walt andI approached him and introduced myself
and told him I had heard hewas going to build Tom Sawyer and
I looked just like Tom Sawyerand he should hire me. Well, he didn't

(19:20):
because if, if, if he, if hehad said no, we wouldn't be here
talking. But what he said is,I'll think about it. And I. And you
know, I sort of reflect alittle bit back on that and sort
of realize that he may nothave thought he was going to have
a Tom Story. He was going tobuild Tom Sawyer's island. But sort

(19:43):
of that the guests that wentthere were going to be Tom Sawyer.
Sort of like the people wenton, on Snow White. Okay. That you
were actually Snow White. Youdidn't see Snow White in the attraction.
So I think I convinced himinto hiring a Tom Sawyer. So. So
he said he'd think about it.And so for almost. For the next year,

(20:04):
anytime I could find Walt, andI asked him if he's still thinking
about hiring me as Tom Sawyer.I remember one conversation that
we had that he told me that hecould. He could probably put a. Was
it a dummy or mannequin? Ithink it was a mannequin over on
the island that wouldn't beleaving every five minutes for a
hamburger, a hot dog, or aCoke, that type thing.

(20:26):
So I want to stop you for asecond because I think there's something
really interesting andprofound about what you said was,
you know, on day one, youapproached Walt, and throughout the
year you approached Walt. Ithink the fact that not only was
he present, but that he wasapproachable and that you, as a young
boy, didn't look at him assomebody who was on tv, that you
felt comfortable enough toapproach him, I think says a lot.

(20:48):
Not only about you, but Ithink about Walt himself, in that
he allowed himself to not beremoved from the cast members, but
to be accessible.
Well, but you look at thiswhole time frame. Walt had a lot
of child actors and actresses.Mickey Mouse Club was very strong.
He had two daughters, okay.And so he was fairly comfortable

(21:10):
talking with kids. The otherthing is, he'd listen to you, okay?
He wouldn't cut you off, hewouldn't boo, boo you, shoo you away,
or what? He'd listen to whatyou had to say, and then he'd address
what you said. And that's likeI say when I asked him to hire me
Tom stories? No, but I'llthink about it. You know, it's. It's
not one of those.

(21:30):
And so is that something thatwas like, you woke up in the morning
and like, today I'm going tofind Walt and I'm going to ask him
to hire me. Or was thatsomething that just sort of came
to you on the spot?
I don't remember waking upwith and having it strike me as.
As the something that I neededto do that day. It just materialized.

(21:52):
I was in the park and what wasin the park, and I pretty much had
a goal. I accomplished one ofthose just recently when I was made
a Disney legend. That's thesame time that Peter Jennings passed
away and Bob Iger went toPeter Jennings funeral and Marty

(22:12):
Sklar hosted the Legendsprogram. And so I didn't get a photo
op with him, but I went on mybucket list. And it took me 12 years.
But this last D23 atDisneyland, I got my photo op with
Bob Iger. We were walking.Walking up to Legends luncheon, and

(22:34):
I saw Bob and I said, bob, youknow, I didn't get my picture with
you back when I was made alegend. Would you pose with me now?
He said, absolutely. And so Iended up getting. So I'm sort of
tenacious along that line.I've been that way all my life. And,
you know, maybe if it isn't agood thing this week, in two weeks
from now, it's a good thing.So you always keep those things in

(22:56):
the back of your mind so youcan in turn inject those a while.
I think we talk over lunchabout a couple of those things that,
you know, we did that back inthe 50s or whenever.
So you go to Walt and you sortof plant this seed in his head that
he. It wasn't an idea that hehad. You know, you really came up
with the concept. How does itgo from seeing him in the park and

(23:19):
planning that idea one day to,you know, him? How does it go to
you actually becoming.
Well, I was in the pennyarcade. I remember this vividly,
spending my hard earned papermoney playing the baseball machine
in the penny arcade. Because Iabsolutely love that baseball machine.

(23:40):
And a gentleman by the name ofDick Nunes came up and tapped me
on the. And Dick, at that timeframe was the supervisor of Frontierland.
And Dick said, I know you knowDick, but. But, you know, when Dick
says, come with me, you don'targue with Dick. You go with. So
Dick says, come with me, Tom.And so I went with Dick. And.

(24:01):
And you're probably notthinking this is something good at
this point. When Dick Nootersays, you guys should.
Throw me out of the park, heusually accuses me of sneaking in.
I didn't sneak in, but I gotin there illegally, But. But in turn.
So I'm. I'm walk. And we weregoing over to Frontierland. And this
is when the chicken plantationwas still there in the Indian village.

(24:23):
You walked over this littlebridge, and a Frontierland train
station was there. Chickenplantation. And the Indian village
was all compacted back in thatarea. And Walt and Morgan Evans,
Bill Evans, the landscapearchitect for Disneyland and Walt
Disney World, were coming offthe island on a rack. And Walt said,

(24:47):
you know, when he got to thedock and. And Savvy says, you still
want to be Tom Sawyer? And Isaid, Absolutely, Mr. Dilly, I do.
And he says, well, super. Youneed to get a work permit and a Social
Security card. And okay. Andhe says, once you do that, I'll put
you to work as Tom Sawyer. Sogetting the Social Security card
wasn't any problem. I justwent to the office of Santa and fill

(25:11):
out the form and got SocialSecurity card. Okay. Now, the work
permit was a little bit moreof a challenge. I had to go to school
and I had to get a form. ThenI had to take that form to the employment
office. And then theemployment office had to fill out
the form and answer all thequestions. Then I had to return that
form back to school. And thenin turn, they would issue me a work

(25:32):
permit. Okay? So in turn, Igot my form and I went in. The employment
office for Disneyland was inan old house on west street, just
opposite of the DisneylandHotel, and that was the employment
office. And I went inside andlady there and I told her my story
that Walt had hired me to beTom Ture. And she gave me one of

(25:56):
these nods. Oh, yeah, okay.And asked me to have a seat. And
this side of the story I hearfrom Dick is that she went and told
Chuck Whalen, who is themanager of employment, that, you
know, I have this kid out hereand that Dick Nunes knows all about
it. And so Chuck picked up thephone and called Dick and said, dick,
I got this kid over here thatsays that Walt hired to be Tom Sawyer.

(26:20):
And Dick said, yeah, I took alittle bit of a deep breath and told
Chuck, I says, chuck, youknow, Walt did hire him. Let your
conscience be your guide. Andat that point, all my paperwork got
filled out and I went to workas Tom Sawyer. Now what did Tom Sawyer
do? Okay, well, first of all,they assigned me to Entertainment
to work for Tommy Walker, whois the director of entertainment,

(26:44):
back that time and only lastedabout two weeks because they didn't
know what the hell to do withme. So they gave me back to the rides
and attraction side, back toDick notice. So under him, one of
the conditions of employmentwas I had to bring in my report card.
And if I didn't maintain a Caverage, I was no longer employed.

(27:04):
And I know Dick reviewed my. Ithink Walt assigned Dick to. To review
my report card. But so inturn, you know, I posed for a lot
of pictures. We had stockedthe rivers of America with bluegill
and. And catfish and. And sunperch and had the area. There was

(27:28):
two piers right across fromthe landing for the Mark Twain. And
they had that area netted off,and that's where the fish were stocked
in that Area people could.
You could actually fish atthat point. And it wasn't catch and
release, right?
Oh, no. At this point, it wascatch and clean. And part of Tom
Sawyer's job was to clean thefish if the guests wanted to clean.

(27:51):
And I had some plastic bags,and in turn, I cleaned the fish.
Well, that didn't last verylong either. Maybe, maybe two months,
if it lasted that long. FromJune, July. By August, old smelly
fish had showed up in placeswhere you didn't want old smelly

(28:12):
fish. So we went from a catchand clean to a catch and release.
And I went through anddebarbed all the, all the hooks.
But there was two fishingpiers. I'd have 25 fishing poles
on each of the piers, hadworms for bait, had little cans nailed
up around the. The railing andwould put a topsoil in the, in the

(28:36):
cans, and I'd put the. Theworms actually came packaged in smart
pills. Rabbit poop. Yeah. So.So you had to take them from there
and put them into. To the.
So you were doing a little bitof procurement as well as sort of,
you know, guest. Becausereally, what was your, what was your
title? I mean, did you have a. I.
Would call the guest aid.Sound like.

(28:59):
I didn't know what else to call.
You're right. Sounds like agood job description. And like I
say, I posed for a lot ofpictures, abated a lot of fishing
hooks, repaired a lot offishing poles, and I was either Tom
Sawyer or Huckleberry Finn,whatever the guests wanted me to
be. When you really look atit, Huckleberry Finn had the fire
red hair and the freckles. Tomwas sort of more of a sandy blonde

(29:22):
kid. But.
So wait, so while, whileyou're sitting there and you're deboning
fish in the middle of thesummer, de gutting. I'm sorry, de
cutting. When you're de.Cutting these fish in Disneyland
in the middle of summer, areyou like, yeah, this is exactly what
I hoped I was going to bedoing when I walked up to Walt.
No, but, but, but it was. Idon't think I ever went through my.

(29:46):
It was part of his job. Thatwas explained to me as part of the
job. So that was acceptable.You know, back in those days, you
did a lot of things that, youknow, you were just told, you know,
you know, that's the job. Do it.
You want to pose for pictures.You're also going to clean some fish.
Yeah. So. And I, I wouldrespond either Huckleberry Finn or
Tom Sawyer. I didn't respondto Becky Thatcher or India joke.

(30:08):
And I did that all throughjunior high school and high school.
I remember one time Walt cameover to the park and early, early
one morning and he said, youknow, Tom, I'm going to rehab. Tom
Sawyer's island, let's walkthe island. And I want you to tell
me what you think the islandneeds. And I'm going, okay, that's,

(30:32):
that's pretty good. Now, laterin my life we were told, thou shall
not art direct. But duringthis time, I hadn't had that, that
speech yet. So we were walkingthe island and I told you, well,
that we had lookout point,okay? And I told Wallace, well, we're.
Lookout point is we need atree house, okay? And then we have
Fort Wilderness. And you know,we needed an escape tunnel from Fort

(30:55):
Wilderness. And so when theisland came back up from, from rehab
in 1958, okay, we had anescape tunnel from Fort Wilderness.
We had a tree house up on thetop of the island. We also had Merry
Go Round Rock, Teeter TotterRock, Castle Rock. But those weren't
part of my ideas. I thinkthose were Walt's ideas. Okay, so

(31:19):
in turn, I'll take credit forart directing the treehouse and the
escape tunnel.
But did it sink into you then?I mean, obviously, certainly now
that you, you know, Waltdidn't dismiss you as a 12 year old
boy with silly ideas. Heactually took ideas and he executed
on them. So when the islandreopens and you look at it, was there
that sense of pride, like Idid that, like that was all my idea.

(31:43):
I was very impressed that wehad a treehouse at escape tunnel.
But I think Gwalt's philosophyall through his life has always been
employee involvement. All thepeople that worked at WED was people
that he'd go talk to and say,you know, what would you like to

(32:04):
do? And then he'd say, okay,well, you're going to go to work
for WED and you can go do whatyou want to do. Like the, like the
Bob Gurs and Waitha Rogers andall those people out there. And Walt
listened to a lot of people.You know, when he was in there in
the morning, he was talking tothe landscape people, he was talking

(32:24):
to the security people. That'sanother one. When the park opened,
security was a, was a lessee.It was Burns Detective Agency. And
I hear the story on one ofthem that Walt got up one. And I
walk in the park one night outof the apartment and one of the Burns
Detective Agency guardsapproached him and said, you know,

(32:45):
who are You. And he said,well, I'm Walt Disney. And he says,
I don't care who you are, youknow, you can't be out here at this
time of night. And at thatpoint is, we no longer have Burn
Detective Agency. We had Walthad Disney Security. So those are
those stories that goes alongthat line. But Walt listened to the
guests, Walt listened to thepeople. He was always asking, how

(33:09):
can we do it better? What dowe need? And trying to get a whole
feel for what was going onduring that timeframe.
And I think just as a quickaside, so much about the story you've
told so far from a businessand entrepreneurial perspective.
So you were the. The young,consummate entrepreneur from a young

(33:31):
age. You had that hustle, youhad that drive. You certainly had
the courage to be able to gofor the thing that you wanted, whether
it was the paper route to getto the bicycle, to get to Disneyland,
to get to become Tom Sawyerslash Huck Finn slash Fish Cutter,
to being able to go tosomebody who was the head of this
company, who not just pacifiedyou by listening, but actually paid

(33:56):
attention and took therecommendations that you and others
made to heart. I mean, I thinkthere's a lesson to be taken away
from there, not just as anemployee, but certainly as an employer
that, you know, you are notthe end all. Be all that. That sometimes
the people who work for youand with you, you know, are able
to contribute in remarkable ways.

(34:17):
Yeah, well, I think part of,you know, Lou, what you have to understand
is I didn't go. Yeah, I wentand found Walt, but Walt came to
me also. So it's. It was. Itwas one of those. It was sort of
a. Sort of a two way street.So. So he was soliciting my input
versus me, soliciting him tohire me. So. So it was. It was even

(34:39):
more impressive, right? Yeah,yeah. It was sort of a mutual relationship
there. You know, the last timeI remember seeing Walt was one of
the deals that YOW is lookingfor is that if Walt got totally inundated
with people wanting autographsand that type of thing, he wasn't
that familiar with on how toget out or backstage in the park.

(35:02):
And I remember it was in theearly, early 60s. It was after Mary
Poppins. It was in the early60s, it was in Frontierland, and
he was sort of inundated. Andwe were in between the Oaks Tavern
and the Malt Shop there wherethe Silver Banjo. And so I helped

(35:24):
Walt get backstage and I toldme, I'm Tom Navy, you hired Me to
be top sergeant. I said ohyeah, I remember that. And so we
talked for a little bit. Butthat was my last encounter with Walt
was back at that time frame.
Did it as a kid, did the scopeand the magnitude of not just who

(35:44):
you were working for, but whoyou were able to have such personal
contact with, did it impactyou then or. It wasn't until maybe
later on that the importanceand the magnitude of who he was and
the relationship that you hadwith him kind of sunk in.
Well, you saw him every nighton Wednesday night on television.
So he's very much a celebrity.And you know, understand my mother

(36:06):
was enamored with celebrities.
Is he asking for Walter? Didhe ask you to get his autograph?
She tried a couple times. Shedidn't have, she didn't have that,
that, that all those autographbooks ended up with my younger sister.
So I, it was one of the thingsthat I really wanted, but that didn't
materialize. But yeah, youknow, a lot of it is being at the

(36:30):
right place at the right timeand knowing what the opportunity
is and seizing thatopportunity. You know, I look at
today's world and, and there'sa lot of people out there that are
very focused. I was, I wasvery open to change. A lot of people

(36:51):
have their, their entire goalslaid out for them and they know if
they don't. Do you know, if Idon't make director in five years,
I'm going to go someplace elseand try. Okay, so. So those are those
things that you learn anddealing with the people. I think
that's part of, part of. Oneof the things that I really feel

(37:13):
so satisfied out of, out of myyears of employment is the folks
that I've worked with, thatI've watched and mentored and watched
them grow and mature intoprofessions either within the Disney
experience or outside in thereal world. Just, you know, back

(37:36):
in the, in the. Every day wasa, was a new record, a new learning
curve, a new way of doing it.There wasn't a college of hospitality
like there is today. You can'tgo to UCL and go to Rosens College
of Hospitality. There wasn't acollege of hospitality back there.
And you learned as you wentforward and, and you have some great
teachers and great mentors. Ithink one of my, my stepfather took

(38:01):
off when I was fairly, fairlyyoung. So a lot of the people at
Disneyland filled in that voidfor me and became my, my surrogate
fathers and, and mentors to.Through my life. That's how I ended
up in Florida. Is, is one ofthose, one of those guys was going
to be the, the operationsmanager for the transportation operation

(38:26):
here in Florida. And he wantedme to open the monorail system for
him. So.
Because after, after being Tomin Disneyland, you stayed in Disneyland
for a while. You had otherroles and responsibilities there
too, right?
Oh, yeah, yeah. That, thatfirst summer was a slam dunk. I turned,
I turned 18 and in, in 1961, Iwas right operator. And I had learned

(38:54):
how to drive a raft longbefore I became a. I used to come
in early in the morning andthe guys would teach me how to drive
and that type thing. So, so Iwas a very experienced raft operator
before I was old enough totechnically drive a raft. And so
I started out very, veryquickly on Tom Sawyer's Island. And

(39:16):
actually I was a workingforeman four days a week, what they
call relief foreman. The, the,the day foreman had two days off,
the night foreman had two daysoff. So I would fill and cover, cover
their shifts. And so I, I wasin a leadership role fairly, fairly
early. And then thatDisneyland was closed on Mondays

(39:40):
and Tuesdays in thewintertime. So on a, on a Sunday
evening, my supervisor thattime Jim Hot and Jim came over and
handed me a script and hesays, memorize this. You go to work
on the jungle on Wednesdaymorning and so show up at the jungle
on Wednesday morning. And so Istopped by wardrobe and got. Changed

(40:04):
my Tom Sawyer's costume for aJungle Cruise costume and, and showed
up and made three or fourtrips. And then from that point forward,
I was a jungle skipper. Andthere were two attractions that you
knew you were going to work asa male operator that had the largest
manpower was the submarinesand the Jungle Cruise. Okay, Those

(40:28):
two attractions had the mostamount of male employees. So you
were going to work those asyou worked up through the seniority
list. Then you were able towork on other attractions with Disneyland
being closed on Monday andTuesdays. So you had a, you had a
schedule on Saturday at aschedule on Sunday, you had a schedule
on Wednesday. So it wasusually eight hours, eight hours

(40:49):
and four hours. And ifWednesday was busy, they would extend
the shift down. So I washaving trouble making my rent on,
on, on 20 hours a week. Sowhat I would do is I would come in
on, on Thursday mornings andon Friday mornings and sit in the
operations office and wait forpeople calling sick. Okay? So in

(41:14):
turn, a lot of attractions Ididn't know because I was there,
they went out and trained me.So the next time somebody called
in sick, I was trained andReady to go on that.
So you sort of made yourselfthe relief pitcher that just sat
there on deck. You know,whenever somebody was going to be
sick, you were going to be theguy that they went to.
Oh yeah, yeah. Well that inorder to get the dollars to do that

(41:37):
too. And so I learned a lot ofattractions that that first year
very, very, very quick and,and worked. Almost every attraction
in the park were the exceptionof the monorail and steam trains.
And the reason being thatthose two attractions were run by

(41:59):
Retlo and Retlaw is Walterspelled backwards. And Retlaw was
a company that the Disneyfamily owned. Okay. And they actually
ran the monorail and steamdrains and the situation. In order
to work on the monorail theywanted this image and you had to
be six foot tall. Well, I wasnever going to be six foot tall.

(42:23):
So that's why I never workedon the monorail.
I feel your pain. Don't worry.So you are there for a number of
years. So you meet your wifeeventually at Disneyland.
Yeah, well, yeah, we're rightabout that time frame. In 1965, all

(42:44):
the lessee contracts startedto expire. Some were five year contracts,
a good portion were ten yearcontracts. And all the fast food
operations at Disneyland wasrun by you upt United Paramount Theaters,
which was a subsidiary of abc.How things go around, they come around,
that type of thing. And theircontract ran out and they took about

(43:07):
oh, 50 of us and trained us inmanagement, in fast food operations.
And so I went to work in OaksTavern in Frontierland. And my wife
to be was elite counter leadin there. And right at the same time
frame I got an invite from myother uncle. Not Uncle Walt, Uncle

(43:30):
Sam. Uncle Sam wanted me toparticipate in a little bit of a
war in Vietnam. And there wasno way I wasn't going to pass a physical.
And so I sort of made we dosome dumb things in our life. But
I sort of said if I'm going togo to Vietnam, in my mind I want
to be the best train. And asfar as I'm concerned, the Marine

(43:53):
Corps is going to train me thebest to survive. So I went down and
enlisted in the Marine Corpsand I listed for a three year hitch.
And the reason, the reasonbeing a three year hitch. I had no
reserve time. It was threeyears active duty, three years inactive
duty because the people thatwere in active reserves weren't real

(44:16):
high on the schedules listbecause they had to go play soldier
one weekend a month and theyhad to had to do a summer camp and
that type of thing. So Ididn't want that obligation. And
so I ended up going in theMarine Corps and I had orders to
Danang and I had everythingall packed up and I had had. They

(44:41):
made an aviation radiorepairment out of me. Somehow my
aptitude was strongelectronics and I ended up going
to school by signing up for athree year hitch. I was eligible
for all the schooling that afour year hitch would have. So I
ended up going to radio repairschool. The incentive to graduate
from radio repair school wasthat if you failed, they made a radio

(45:05):
operator out of you. And thelife expectancy of a radio operator
was rather short. So he didn'twant to be a radio operator. So I
passed and I ended up gettingpromoted to corporal out of school.
And I had orders to Da Nang.And I had everything packed up and
going home on it was a St.Patrick's Day weekend. And on I.

(45:31):
I had the battle of Highway101, Pacific Coast Highway. A drunk
hit me head on and tried tokill me and put me in the hospital
for five months. And then fromthere I ended up going back to school.
And this is the same time theWalt passed away when the New York
World's Fair. And Walt'spassing happened all during the time

(45:53):
that I was in the MarineCorps. And so I end up getting mustered
out of the Marine Corps, wentback to Cal State Fullerton, dreams
of grandeur, of being anelectronical engineer. About a year
and a half into schooling atCal State Florida I realized I wasn't

(46:14):
going to be a goodelectronical engineer. And what I
really wanted to be was inrides and attractions at Disney.
And they started interviewingthere for all the people that come
to Florida. So I went througharound the interviews and I ended
up getting promoted intomanagement in 1970. And just prior

(46:38):
to that I was home on leaveand I ran into a mutual friend of
my wife and she gave meJanice's number and I called her
and we started dating and wegot married in June in 1968.
So everything that's the planeis literally in flight. In terms

(46:59):
of Walt Disney World cominginto being, how does it come to pass
that you. Because I want youto tell the story of not just how
you literally made your wayout to Florida, but how did it come
to pass that you were going tocome out here and be part of the
opening team for Walt Disney World?

(47:20):
Well, I only thought I wasgoing to be in Florida for three
years. I had the opportunityto interview to open the monorail
system here with PeteCrimmings who I had worked for off
and on through the years, andwas one of my mentors. And we were.

(47:40):
The company was going to builda ski area in Mineral Cake, which
was just south of SequoiaNational Forest, which is about halfway
between Los Angeles and SanFrancisco. So that was my goal and
to go to work intransportation and to make a name
for myself and transportation.And then the whole concept of Mineral

(48:04):
King was they were going tobuild a parking area in a village.
And everybody got transportedfrom the parking area up to the village.
So transportation was a verykey element in all there. So, in
turn, I came down to Florida.I'd never been east of Phoenix. My

(48:25):
mother tells me we went toChicago on the train, but I don't
remember that. But Janice andI made that decision. And I had two
Volkswagens at the time. Andso we, we decided to drive a Volkswagen
and tow a Volkswagen. Had a.Had a. A dark blue convertible and

(48:50):
had a yellow Volkswagen in theback of the yellow Volkswagen. Had,
uh, a sign put in a. Two morebooks for Florida. And so we drove
country, cross country. Tookus about six days to drive here.
It was. It was ratherinteresting. It was like 30 miles
an hour up the overpass and 70miles an hour down the overpass.

(49:12):
The one, the one that wasreally scary was coming through the
mobile tunnel. Okay. So comingdown in the tunnel, I'm click. I'm
staying up with the traffic.Well, coming up on the other side
of the tunnel, I'm running alittle slow, and I get over and clear.
And right there, there aretoll booths, okay. And I got. I got.
I got the brakes on. I got theemergency, and we're sliding through

(49:36):
and. And slow right throughthe tow block. I had to get out and
go back and pay for both carsto go back to get in. But that was
a little scary on that one.
So you're.
You're.
Again, this dream of wantingto operate the monorail comes to
fruition in a very. In adifferent time, in a different way,

(49:56):
in a different place, becauseit takes you coming out to what little
there was of Orlando at thattime to help sort of manage the monorail
operations and part of theconstruction, too.
Yeah. Well, there's a wholeconcept that was developed during
New York World's Fair calledpico Project installation coordination.

(50:19):
Okay. And what they do is theytake people out of the operating
side, and you get assignedinto the. Into the construction and
project side, and yourcoordinators sort of go first or
whatever needed to. To helpalong that line. And Then as you
hire people, you train thosepeople and then when the attraction
opens up, then you become themanagement group that operates that

(50:43):
rides and attraction. So thatwas sort of the philosophy on the,
and the monorail is my, myattraction. And the, the, we had
the two beams, the ExpressBeam and Local Beam. The contemporary.
And why we're sitting in herein the Polynesian were the two hotels
on the, on what we call theLocal Beam. And the Express beam

(51:05):
went from the TTC TicketTransportation center to the Magic
Kingdom. Okay. So that was theconcept up behind the monorail system.
So if the stories that I'veheard are true, you very much were
a hands on person when itcomes to your monorail. And when
I say hands on, I mean notboots on the ground, I mean boots

(51:28):
on the beam. Is it true thatyou used to walk the beams?
Well, US Steel built the twohotels in the golf resort and also
a, a complex called the Courtof Flags down on, on I4 and Sand

(51:50):
Lake right in that area. Well,they were very difficult to deal
with. Yeah, thank God that Roybought them out right after opening.
But they were very difficultto go. It would take me sometimes
as long as four hours just toget clearance. Okay. To get into
the hotel to check mystations. Okay. Pastor security people,

(52:13):
because I didn't work for USSteel, I worked for, for Disney.
Okay. So I found the easiestway for me to check the stations
was to walk the beam to thepolish. No big deal. Maybe, maybe
two city blocks to thePolynesia. Now the beam is 30 inches
wide. So it's, it's, it's,it's wider than this table. Okay.

(52:37):
So I mean, 30 inches isn't alot when you're, you know, 60ft above
the ground.
Well, yeah, and you know, youdon't do it in high winds and lightning
and thunderstorms. But inturn, I could get up into the contemporary
very quickly. The problem thatwe had was the two beams that were

(52:59):
on the north end of thecontemporary were all the beams that
you look that have the curvedbottom to them. Those were fabricated
in Tacoma, Washington andshipped here by rail to Taft. And
from Taft they were trappedover to property. Well, the two beams
that were the 110 foot longbeams were on the north end of the

(53:21):
Contemporary Hotel. The trainwent right and the beams went straight
ahead and had a snowstormright after that. So we couldn't
find the beams. So they had toin turn refabricate those beams.
So we're about almost threemonths late in closing the loop on
the Monorail to have a closedloop. So we did a lot of training

(53:44):
and a lot of shoveling goingback and forth. But in turn, I'd
check the stations out and ina very short period of time, just
by clicking up there and back.When we originally opened the monorail
system, the monorail, theparking lot, watercraft and the submarines

(54:06):
were all on the same radiofrequency. And what we didn't realize
is that the batteries on theradios in the monorail had a very
short transmit life on it. Soyou could only transmit maybe 2,
3 minutes and you were out ofbattery. You could listen, but you

(54:27):
couldn't transmit. And Iremember one, one breakdown I had
young lady in the, in a trainand, and she did her transmission
and then we couldn't talk toher. And so the easiest thing was
to walk out on the parallel,because beams are parallel. Walk
out on the parallel beams,have her open up the door. I talked

(54:49):
her through what she needed todo and had the work tractor come
out and tow her train in andget the guests off and that type
of thing. But it was one ofthose, those things that you did
without a harness.
You're not safety rigged.You're just, you just walk on the
beams.
Yeah, yeah.
It was a different day andage, right.
It was a different world backin that time frame. I would say if

(55:13):
the director knew that I waswhat, he'd probably be a little,
Little.
Right?
Yeah. A little upset with me.But, you know, yeah, those are, those
are things, you know, we, youknow, we rode in cars without seat
belts. We drank water out ofthe hose in the yard. You know, there
was a lot of stuff that we,that we did back there that you wouldn't
dare in today's world.

(55:34):
And they had, There actuallywere plans because people still to
this day talk about expandingthe market. I mean, there were plans
at one point, right, to expandthe monorail out to, to like 192,
like an industrial park,weren't there?
Well, if you look at theentire project, okay, you know that
the Magic Kingdom and what yousee today, I think was in phase 35

(56:00):
or 37 or whatever, but inbetween the Magic Kingdom complex
and what was proposed as theoriginal EPCOT project, there was
a whole industrial park and anairport, okay? So all those things
were, were in the, in themaster plan. Now, as you know, the

(56:22):
master plan didn't gettotally, totally built. But yeah,
I talked about. But when, whenyou're to the mine, rail is very
costly and the advantage herewas you have sort of a restricted
Everybody's got to either ridethe monorail back then or the Osceolas

(56:44):
or the trams. Okay. Didn'thave the bus fleet we have today.
Didn't have the ferries thatwe had today. Don't. Didn't have
10 monorails as we have today.And six car monorails versus six,
five car monorails. Yes. So,you know, things have changed, and

(57:04):
then going forward, and soyour role.
In Walt Disney World changed.So again, you know, it's interesting
going from a very onstagepresence as Tom Huck to sort of more
backstage with the monorails.But that was not your only role in
Disney. Right. You ended updoing more in terms of logistics

(57:25):
and whatnot.
Well, I. I sort of got taggedas a nuts and bolts guy and sort
of got tagged as. As the guythat you wanted on your team. New
construction and new openings.And so after. After we opened the
monorail up, I ended updecided to build Tom Sawyer's island
and Frontierland, LibertySquare and the Richard F. Irvine.

(57:49):
So I went on that project theminute we wrapped up that project
in 1973. Went on a project torebuild Tomorrowland. When Tomorrowland
opened up, it was prettyscarce of what was in the Tomorrowland
area. And so we put in theWedway, the Star Jets, Carousel of

(58:10):
Progress, and Space Mountain.So 73 to 75. And then once we opened
all that up, then the decisionwas to take 20,000 leagues down.
And when we originally opened20,000 leagues, all the art directors
that came out here went toSilver Springs and were enamored
with the clarity of the waterand everything. And so the decision

(58:34):
was to pump the water out ofthe aquifer through 20,000 leagues.
From 20,000 leagues, that wentinto the moat, and from the moat,
that went to the JungleCruise, and from the Jungle Cruise,
that went into the rivers ofAmerica. From the rivers of America,
went down the Lightboatchannel into the Seven Seas Lagoon.
And from the Seven SeasLagoon, they got distributed over

(58:55):
the 55 miles of drainagecanals that are on property. Okay,
well, that was great. The onlytrouble is you didn't have the volume
of water coming and beingpumped through 20k that you had coming
out of. Out of the springsthat silver shrinks. And they started
getting pockets of dead air inthat and algae started growing. So

(59:17):
it finally made the decisionto enclose 20k and chlorinate it
and filter it. And so we didthat in 1975. And so once we wrapped
that up and opened that backup and got that running, had the
opportunity to go back toFrontierland because we're going

(59:37):
to build this little trainover there called Big Thunder. Okay.
And so we, we built BigThunder and just right as we opened
up Big Thunder, there wasanother little project down the road.
They got funded and ready togo. And if you remember when I said
earlier I only came to Floridato be here for three years, well,

(59:59):
we were going to build anarea, a ski area in, in Mineral King.
Well, that sort of got shutdown by the Sierra Club because of
the roadway that had to bebuilt there. And the Sierra Club
didn't want that roadway builtand they petitioned. So, so that
one got. So that project movedto an area above Truckee, California
which is north, just north ofLake Tahoe. And that clicked along

(01:00:23):
quite well until there was alittle conflict of, of people going
on our board from the, inorder to get the permits and everything
going on there. And Cod WalkWalker @ that point basically said
no, we aren't going to buildany ski areas and all the monies
that we have, I'm going tofocus on, on the Epcot project. So

(01:00:47):
if you sort of look at it asDisneyland was Walt's park, Walt
Disney World Magic Kingdomwith Sir Royce Park. Yeah, you know,
Walt's Walt Disney dreams andideas and that type thing. But, but
Roy brought it into this worldand Card decided that, you know,
Epcot was going to be hispark. If you a little farther down

(01:01:08):
the road then you know thestudio and Animal King Kingdom ties
into Eisner and in his parksand Shanghai is, is uh, Irish Park.
So, so you say everybody and Isort of look and the company sort
of has a, a 20 year cycle. Soin the 20s, Disney was developed

(01:01:29):
in the 40s, went through WorldWar II and it almost cost the, the
company getting in the 60s.Walt passed away in the 80s, was
the end of the Eisner era andthe Eiger era and we're getting ready
for another one down the road.But I sort of look at big 20 year
cycles along that now I forgotwhere we were going in the conversation

(01:01:52):
that I went out into the NeverNever Land. Oh, I got, I got a call
and asked if I wanted to beinvolved in the Epcot project. And
I said oh absolutely. NormDurgis and Bill Sullivan were going
to be the guys out there. AndI thought I was going to be a pavilion

(01:02:13):
coordinator. But in turn Normwanted me to run a warehouse complex
that they had. We were in theprocess of developing what we called
an item tracking system forofi. OFI is owner Furnished Items
So anything that we bought forshow insulation, it was basically

(01:02:34):
going to be installed by BuenaVista Construction. Okay. Was called
ofi and we would tag and labelthat. So all the show set pieces,
all the props, all theanimation, all that stuff fell in
that category. And what wasgoing to happen was there was going
to be a warehouse. Thewarehouse, that project, it was scheduled

(01:02:57):
for later installation.Anything that came and could be installed
was directly to the site to beinstalled. And I had a crew of people
that were working for me, andthat's what we did. Okay. And so
in turn went through theopening of Epcot. That was, that
was a real, you know, had gonethrough the, you know, through the

(01:03:21):
opening of Disneyland as achild, went through the, the opening
of Walt Disney World as aMagic Kingdom as a young adult and
epcot. Now I had the chance touse all those skill sets to go forward.
And it just fit like a gloveright in there and, and headed. Headed

(01:03:43):
down the road. I adapted veryquickly to the warehouse operation.
I sort of took that in my mindand it's, it's sort of almost like,
like any ride or traction orrunning a parking lot. You got to
bring things in, you got topark it, you got to be able to get.
So that's the way. So I got.Was real easy to equate to that.
This owner furnished. We gaveeverything an item number. All the

(01:04:08):
shows were built and boughtoff in California and they were built
in to Hunga. Our directorswould buy them off and then they
would disassemble them, numberand label them, load them on a truck,
send them to Florida either tobe warehoused or to be installed.

(01:04:28):
And they get to Florida and agood portion of it is we handle about
$400 million worth ofmaterials through the warehouse.
You'd open the back of thetruck and you look and you go, God,
how did they get that inthere? Okay, then the next question
is, how are we going to get itout of there and not break it? Understand,
this is a one of a kind item.You can't go to Home Depot and buy

(01:04:50):
another one. So. So in turn,that was the challenge that went
along that. And we went allthrough that process. And I think,
you know, if you've stormingin the Magic Kingdom or that type
thing that, you know, EPCOTcome real close to bankrupting this
company and did not hit thereturn on investment. And so all

(01:05:13):
of us that went through thatopening that process and getting
through that relief all of asudden got into another of. You didn't
know if you're going to have ajob tomorrow. Okay. But you know,
thank God that, that RoyDisney went out and did his thing
and, and got the Bass brotherson board and made the decision to

(01:05:35):
hire Frank Wells and, andMichael Eisner and, and brought those
people on and got everythingcoming out of it. Right at that time
frame, I made a major careerchange. I went from being in rides
and attractions and guestsoriented to the support side of the
business. I like what I did inthe warehouse portion of it during

(01:05:56):
nabcot and I sort of enjoyedthat and had a job opportunity to
go into warehousing for WaltDisney World and I did that for the
last 22 years of my career.
So your three year stint atWalt Disney World did not just take
you from Anaheim to Orlando,but somehow your circuitous journey
also took you to Paris? Correct?

(01:06:16):
Yes. After, after we wentthrough that whole process of storming
the Magic Kingdom, gettingeverything back online and this property
just exploded with hotels andhotel rooms and the stock went from
Chunk Shang shipped up intothe hundreds again. And the whole

(01:06:37):
decision that Michael made wasto build a park and Paris. And so
we in turn, I had the directorof distribution for Disneyland Paris,
as it was called Euro Disneyback at that time frame over for

(01:07:00):
almost a year training withus. And he felt pretty comfortable.
And I had gone over there fora couple visits the warehouse operations
through some planning andconcept process. But I wasn't slaughtered
to go to Paris. In, in thelatter part of. Well, actually the

(01:07:26):
1st of January of 1992, I geta telephone call from my boss, Howard
Rowland. And Howard Rowland'sin Paris. And this is on a, on a,
on a Friday morning. AndHoward basically says, Tom, I want
you in Paris on Monday. I wantyou to meet with me in Balmale. And

(01:07:50):
I said okay. He says, I gotthe travel company working on tickets
and we'll see you Monday. Andsure enough, tickets showed up, went
to the airport, packed up abag and I got on an airplane and
came to Paris and got off inOrly Airport and found a car and

(01:08:17):
drove downtown Paris and metPaul and Howard. And Howard to Paul,
Paul Millay, who was, was the,the director of purchasing who had
run the warehouse system here,who I work for. Basically says Tom,
what I want you to do is, is,is via liaison and help John Lowick

(01:08:42):
get through opening and dopretty much what you did for Epcot,
okay. Here in Paris. And sothat's what I did. So in turn we
went. I finally left the endof April. The park April 12th is
hard to believe it's only onlythree, four weeks from now and we're

(01:09:04):
going to go through a birthdayfor repairs. But able to go through
that, that process and gotback here went to through Modern
Material Handling, which is apublication associated with warehousing
and that type thing came to usand wanted, and this is right at

(01:09:26):
Walt Disney World's 25thanniversary, came to us one do a
little short story on, on the25th anniversary. And so, okay, so
they, they came in and weshowed them what we did and they
got so involved in what wewere doing. Then in turn this little

(01:09:49):
2, 3 page article turned intoa 20 page article and was their lead
publication for that year andwon the awards that they, they just
didn't quite understand how wecould handle a city of about 250,000
people back at that time on adaily basis. So if you take everybody
that's staying on property,everybody that's coming in the property

(01:10:11):
as a day guest and all thefood and all the merchandise and
all the equipment to keep thatgoing on a daily basis comes through
the warehouse operation. Sothey were very impressed with that.
And even as a kid that wassomething that always impressed me.
How this place really is areal working city that operates 24
7, 365. And the, the logisticsof not just the manpower and the

(01:10:38):
guests, but other things thatwe don't think about as guests. You
know, all the things that needto populate the shelves and the stores
and the restaurants is anincredible undertaking. But eventually
your very long journey from,you know, 12 year old Tom Sawyer
and Huck Finn to coming backto Walt Disney World, you decided

(01:11:01):
it's time for it to come to anend and you retire. What year?
I retired in 03. I had hired afinancial advisor back when we did
a living trust and he did verywell and Mike Wickson and so I asked
him. My 60th birthday wascoming right around. June is a very

(01:11:24):
active month for me. My, mybirthday is in June. My company anniversary
date is in June, my weddingdate is in June, my retirement date
is in June. Father's Day is inJune. So June was a very active month
for me. And I, I basicallytold my, you know, I'd like to retire
in June. So if you ever retirefrom the Walt Disney Company, you

(01:11:47):
want to retire from the lastday of the month, okay. That way
you get your pay for that weekand then the first day of the next
month you get your retirementcheck. Okay? So, so I in turn made
that decision and, and so toldmy Boss, you know, that I had planned
on retiring. And he sort ofsaid, well, Tom, you know, what would
you like as a retirement gift?And I told him, I said, you know,

(01:12:11):
if I qualify, what I'd reallylike is a window on Main street at
Disneyland and one at WaltDisney World. And so, hey, but I
thought that just sort of wentthis way. So about two, three weeks
later, he comes back and hesays, look, couldn't do the Disneyland
thing, but it got your windowon Main street at Walt Disney World.

(01:12:31):
So if you ever come into MagicKingdom at Walt Disney World and
you look at the cinema, mywindow is right above it on the right
hand side.
And what does your window read?
It is Sawyer Fence Paintingand proprietor Tom Nabbey Anaheim,
California Lake Buena Vista,Florida So, yeah, super, it's, it's,

(01:12:55):
it's one of those things. SoI, I thought that was, that was,
I thought that was the, the,the height, the, the la crene de
creme, you know, type thingon. And my goal, every fifth anniversary
of Disneyland is to be on Mainstreet at Disneyland on July 17th.

(01:13:19):
And so we were out there forthe 50th anniversary. A couple previous
trips the mouse paid for, butmost all the trips, you know, I paid
for it. And so we were thereand the Disneyland Alumni Club was
having a dinner dance. And sowe went, I paid my admission, went

(01:13:41):
to this dinner, dinner danceand we were there. And a gentleman
by the name of Jim Cora, JimCora retired as a president of Disney
International and had workedwith Jim on opening here at Walt
Disney World and had worked alittle bit alongside Jim in Paris.

(01:14:01):
And he sort of said, hey Tom,I'll see you in September. And anybody
that ever worked with JimCore, he's one of these guys that'll
sort of toss out and see if,see, see if he can hook you on something
that if, if he cook you, he'llplay it to the hill. So I, and I
said, no, Jim, you know, I'llbe back here in five years, but I

(01:14:22):
don't plan on being back herein September. He says, oh no, you
know, you and Sully and I aregoing to be inducted as Disney legends.
I said, oh, okay, well, youknow, and, but it didn't bite on
then, you know. So when I gotback to the hotel room, I called
my sister who was housesitting for us here in Florida. I
said, is there a letter therefrom the studio? And she said, yeah.

(01:14:44):
And I said, would you open itup and tell me what it says? And
she says, oh, it's it'ssomething about you being inducted
as a Disney legend inSeptember. And so Cora wasn't pulling
my leg. Was a true thing. So.So in turn, the Disney legend program
was very much Roy Disney'sthing. He was just, just totally

(01:15:08):
enamored in that. And at the.I think I mentioned earlier in the
conversation that when, when Igot inducted as a legend at the same
time Peter Jennings passedaway. And so Marty Sklara and Roy
hosted the, the Legendsluncheon and induction. And I had

(01:15:35):
the opportunity to talk withRoy a little bit. I'm a sailor. Okay.
And Roy's a sailor. And so wetalked about sailing. And my boat's
16 foot long, his boat's 160,but, you know, you know, same thing.
Yeah, you know, sailing andsailing. So in turn, that one. And
it's really nice to be aliving legend. The alternative sucks.

(01:15:58):
But I had the opportunity.What they, what they do is, is they
have a clay mold there at theceremony and, and you do your palm
prints and you sign it andthen they cast a bronze plaque and
then that there's a LegendsPlaza at the studio and it gets hung

(01:16:20):
in the studio. So. So the nexttrip out for Disneyland 55th, I had
called the archives because Ihadn't seen my plaque and asked to
borrow his Legends award. Andwe went out to the, to the gardens
and took some photos out inthat area myself in my plaque, that

(01:16:43):
sort of date.
You know, you have seen somuch. You have done so much from,
you know, being there onopening day as a guest to 24 hours
later being there as a guestfacing cast member in a role that
you design and had created foryou. You knew Walt, you interacted
with Walt, you influencedWalt. You've done so much here in

(01:17:07):
Wurham. You are in Paris.You're a legend. You're a member
of the Disneyland Club. 55.You've seen and done so much. And
of all the things, when youlook back on your time with the company,
is there any one thing, anyone moment that you look back on

(01:17:30):
most vividly? I can't sayfavorite because I'm sure there's
so many. But most vividly ormost fondly, and the one that sort
of is most.
Meaningful to you working forWedding, being Tom Sawyer? Absolutely.
But, you know, I had, I had.
Because you were the only one, right?
No, they held a contest toreplace me. So they had one replacement.

(01:17:51):
And after that, then therewasn't any more Tom Sawyers. But
working in Wed, watchingthings come from a storyboard concept
to Reality, to build it, towatch guests actually appreciate
it and, and ride on it. Andthat, that thing is phenomenal. You

(01:18:14):
know, that was, that, that wasprobably the, the cream to cream.
The, the making the transitioninto warehousing. One of the things
that, the, the hardest thingwas trying to get the people in the
warehouse operation to feelpart of the show. And what I did
there is I went to theinstitute and we partnered with the

(01:18:38):
institute and we broughtpeople in to tour the warehouse operation
because they had enamored withthat just like the people from modern
material handling. So we wouldbring people in and tour them through
the warehouse. Well, I didn'tdo the tour in the warehouse. I in
turn had the warehouse peopletour the people in the warehouse.
I did do a Q and A, A on it.Some of the things I do, I, once

(01:19:03):
a month I, I do a Disneyheritage thing for rcid. Reedy Creek
Improvement District. Theydecided to go through and retrain
all their older employeesalong with new employees that were
coming on board. And themanager of HR for them, who's a drinking
buddy of mine, asked me if Iwould come share my story with them.

(01:19:26):
I said yeah. And that wasthree, three years ago. So, you know,
every third Friday of themonth I get to do that. I do a lot
of speaking for Disney events.I do the Disney Anna fan club several
times, the college program. Ido it for the ambassadors. I enjoy

(01:19:48):
that. Now one of the questionsI normally get at the end of my presentation,
and it's about an hourpresentation or little longer on
this one, but have you everthought about writing a book? And
so I did. So if you want tohear the real long version of the

(01:20:11):
story of Tom Nabi, then youcan pick up my book. It's available
on Amazon.com or you can go tomy website, tomnabbe.com if you want
to personalize an autograph there.
And I will link to that in theshow notes. And I have one last question
for you because I want to sortof flip things a little bit because

(01:20:32):
now you come to the parks, youcome to Magic Kingdom with your young
granddaughter. Give me yourimpression. Now, coming to the parks
as a guest versus when youwere here as a cast member, from
sort of helping to create thatmagic that we talk about to experiencing
it and sharing it with yourown grandkid.
Well, it's, it's phenomenal.She's just, just a little over two

(01:20:58):
right now and, and I'm going,you know, what is a two year old
gonna know? Well, I tell you,she Knows. She knows the characters.
The character breakfast is onproperty. She just. Jesus, loves
them, eats them up. All theexperiences in the park. You know,
one time here and we went toEpcot. Not met, but we went down

(01:21:20):
and she's, she's totallyinvolved in Anna and, and Elsa and,
and Olaf from Frozen. And towatch her, the, the, the interaction
of her and Anna and Elsa downthere is, Is just. And, and the kids

(01:21:40):
that play those characters doan excellent job also. But to. I,
I, I know now why I work whereI work. So I could get my main cake
pass, so I could get her inon. On a daily basis if I want to.
Except for blackout dates.
Well, look at that. Thathappiness and that pride that you

(01:22:01):
feel as a grandfather towardsyour granddaughter is the same thing
that you, when you were beingTom Sawyer, gave to those parents
and grandparents back in 1955.So, you know, as a guest, as a parent,
I thank you for everythingthat you've done to contribute to
this Disney magic that we knowand love so much. And I will tell

(01:22:24):
Tom you were worth the wait.You were worth waiting four years
to get this interview done,because I could listen to your stories
all day again. Your, your bookis fascinating and filled with so
many more. And I appreciateyou spending time today and certainly
for everything that you'vedone for us.
And I'm, I'm sorry you had towait four years, but. But I've been

(01:22:45):
practicing. So, so, so you gotthe best of the best.
Excellent, Tom. Thank you so much.
Really appreciate that.Reverend Wild that irresponsible
child I tried to teach him butwho can reach him? He never can be
found Leaves his trash aroundJust won't learn and he just keeps
turning away Tom Sawyer thedevil's got him in tow Tom Sawyer

(01:23:10):
he's grief and worrying Thoughhe's late for supper and late for
school and he's taking me fora fool I'll bet Tom Sawyer will be
the death of me yet.

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833 · The Boy Who Became Tom Sawyer – Disney Legend Tom Nabbe - From the Archives

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}833 · The Boy Who Became Tom Sawyer – Disney Legend Tom Nabbe - From the Archives