The Walt Disney Company and its theme parks have a long and storied history. From stories of Walt himself down through his legendary imagineers, the creation and evolution of each of the company’s films, characters, and theme parks have a cavalcade of tales surrounding them.
Magic Kingdom
However, for every astounding true story, there are myths and legends that, despite being oft-repeated, have no truth to them. We polled our readers and members of the DFB team to get their takes on what myths they or others have believed for way too long.
Walt’s Frozen
Several readers, as well as team members, shared that either they themselves or others they’ve encountered clung to the belief that Walt Disney was “frozen” just prior to his death, and was currently in stasis at one of Disney’s parks (often rumored to be Disneyland or EPCOT).
Walt Disney
According to PBS, the genesis of the rumor stemmed from incident week’s after Disney’s death, when “a reporter for a tabloid newspaper called The National Spotlite claimed he had snuck into St. Joseph’s Hospital in Burbank, directly across the street from the Disney studios and where he was treated during his final illness. As the story went, the reporter disguised himself as an orderly, broke into a storage room, and saw the deceased Disney suspended in a cryogenic metal cylinder!”
No, Walt isn’t frozen under Dreamer’s Point
There is zero truth to this myth. Walt was cremated two days after his death, and his ashes were interred at the family mausoleum in the Forrest Lawn Cemetery of Glendale, California. Disney’s daughter Diane bluntly refuted the rumor in the early 1970s, saying, “There is absolutely no truth that my father, Walt Disney, wished to be frozen. I doubt that my father had ever heard of cryonics.”
Disney’s Weather Dome
There’s a longstanding belief amongst some park goers that Disney is able to control the weather around Disney World, either through advanced environmental manipulation or even some sort of dome.
A rainy Hollywood Studios
Suffice it to say, there’s no truth to this. Beyond its general implausibility, think about it: If Disney could control the weather, why would they allow summer heat, winter cold, daily rainstorms, or even occasional hurricanes to interfere with resort operations?
River of Poop
For several decades now, a persistent story — perpetuated at times by Cast Members and tour guides — is that the brown sections of pavement in the Magic Kingdom’s Liberty Square were meant to emulate a “river of poop” as colonial Americans would supposedly dump their chamber pots in the middle of the street.
Poop?
The truth is much less interesting. The section of walkway now described as the poop river was actually cobblestone or flagstone paving at the time of the park’s opening in 1971. However, it was really hard on the parade floats and on the performers in the parades, so in the early 90s it was replaced with a very fine pebble, like a flatter smoother representation of cobblestone or flagstone.
Liberty Square
As per most sources, it was not the original intention to replicate feces being thrown into the street when the land was designed and highly unlikely it ever became the intention due to the historical inaccuracy of the poop, running down the middle of the road, and the fact that the poop takes up the entire walkway as that strip of pebble widens at the entrance to frontier land.
Furthermore, a “river of poop” in that area of the square wouldn’t even be historically accurate. Most colonial homes and businesses used chamber pots, which were emptied into back alleys, gutters near curbs, or privy pits (outhouses) behind the home. People sometimes threw waste into the street, but they did it from upper windows or porches, and it ran into side gutters, not down the center.
Liberty Square
While some Imagineering sources have still claimed that the “river of poop” was intentional, we’re ruling this myth as a case of fan/cast lore evolving into “accepted canon”, not because it was designed that way, but because it sounded plausible, fit the theme, and stuck.
“Andy’s Coming”
One of the more modern Disney myths is the viral story that Cast Members portraying Toy Story characters will fall to the floor and lie still to mimic the characters from the films, if someone says “Andy’s coming!” While there is some photographic evidence to show this may have happened in isolated incidents, it was never the case across the board, and Disney’s since put a stop to the practice completely for safety reasons.
©Theme Park Insider
Despite being disproven ages ago, these Disney myths still live on in the minds of tourists and the mouths of some Cast Members to this day! Stay tuned to DFB for more on Disney’s history and mythology!
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The worst Walt Disney World myth for me is that castmembers will behave any nicer if you scream at them. Any time I watch an adult have an entitlement meltdown at a castmember, I want them to suffer the same fate as the dragon at the end of Fantasmic!