Special Exhibit "Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln" Walt Disney once remarked, "If you could see close in my eyes, the American flag is waving in both of them and up my spine is growing this red, white, and blue stripe." He was an impassioned patriot with a steadfast faith and conviction in the American way of life. Moreover, he felt that a great deal could be learned from history. As early as 1956, Walt was discussing different concepts with his Imagineers for an American history show at Disneyland. One of the ideas involved a new land called Liberty Street, which was to be located to the east side of Main Street. The key attraction of this new area was to be a show titled "The Hall of Presidents" which at that point was barely more than a wishful idea in Walt's head. With the arrival of Audio-Animatronics, which became the new storytelling device that would dominate Disneyland attractions for the next decade, the show evolved into an Audio-Animatronics portrayal of the Presidents of the United States. Problem was, however, there was very little, if any, money for research. Early Audio-Animatronics centered on the simple robotic birds for the Enchanted Tiki Room. It was a long, long way from a wise-cracking parrot to a respectful and believable American President. Walt needed something to prove his concept before he could get corporate cash to help him realize the full dream. He settled on his favorite president, Abraham Lincoln as the star. Walt and his team worked diligently, but the technology and time needed to build and finish Mr. Lincoln didn’t seem to exist. Then, in April of 1962 the president of the Fair, Robert Moses, just happened to come through the Disney Studio for an update on the Ford and General Electric exhibits. "I had the first model of Mr. Lincoln out there," recalled Walt. "I took him [Moses] to ... see Lincoln and he shook hands with him–Mr. Lincoln’s got a terrific grip. Well, this really thrilled Mr. Moses, and before I knew it he had all the forces working to get Mr. Lincoln in the Fair." Considering that Walt’s Imagineers felt that another ten years of research and development was needed to complete Walt’s vision, it’s a small miracle that the Fair did, indeed, open with Mr. Lincoln. Moses found a willing sponsor for Walt’s Lincoln in Illinois, home of the 16th President. Pairing of the Illinois Pavilion with the Audio-Animatronics, Mr. Lincoln was the proverbial "match made in heaven." With a home for Lincoln at the Fair, work on Lincoln ratcheted up substantially. Walt trusted his Imagineers and was confident that the technical troubles faced would be solved. With the confidence that Lincoln would be ready, Walt began to consider the words that the mechanical Emancipator would speak. There was a large contingent that thought the 16th President should give his most famous speech, The Gettysburg Address. Walt, however, disagreed. Walt loved the ideas and words professed by Lincoln, and he felt that this great American’s words were as profound today as when Lincoln originally uttered them. Thus, the speech carefully and painstakingly put together by gathering segments from a collection of five different addresses given by Lincoln. Walt had strong feelings that Americans in any time can learn from the past, and he wanted the speech to indirectly allude to the problems of the day. When it came to the voice of Lincoln, Walt’s unerring attention to details came to the forefront again. He wanted an accurate voice, a real voice, for the 16th President and not an actor’s voice. "We polled a lot of the authorities on Lincoln, and they all said we should have Raymond Massey do the voice," acknowledged Walt, "but in researching and everything else, we found that Abraham Lincoln was not what you would consider an orator. What he said was important, but the way he said it–he just got up and said it. He wasn’t a fellow that beat his chest or anything like that. Some of the research showed that he’d start out rather high and as he got into his speech he’d modulate his voice a little more. At moments he’d be very emotional with his voice, but with very few gestures. The voice you are hearing is as close as we could get to Lincoln’s real voice." The individual who Walt selected to portray Lincoln was a lean, lanky, unassuming New Yorker, Royal Dano, who had made his Disney debut in the film "Savage Sam" (1963). Walt had a unique approach to getting the performance he wanted, as explained by Disney Imagineer Bob Gurr: "I was working on the Lincoln figure, when Walt came in and asked me if it would help to film an actor as Lincoln, in order to help visualize the body motions. I said, `Yeah, that's a neat idea.' He said, `Come over to the Studio Saturday morning, and we'll set it up.' What I didn't know, was that he had an ulterior motive a plan. When I went in, Walt had about five people a cameraman, a technician, a grip or two, and a sound boom guy and he also had actor Royal Dano, who was dressed up as Lincoln. So we all sat there and watched Dano go through his speech. "When he finished, Walt jumped up and said, `No! No! No! You don't understand. Do it again.' I thought it was fine. Well, after the second time, Walt said, `No! You don't understand, this is not Abraham Lincoln do it again!' Well, Walt had Dano really upset, but he did it again. After Dano finished the third one, Walt jumped up and started leading us in the `Battle Hymn of the Republic.' It didn't make any sense at the time. Then, later I found out that Walt had used Dano's speech from the soundtrack on that film, for the soundtrack of Lincoln's speech in the show. All of a sudden I could see what Walt had in his mind. He had got himself a really angry Lincoln, and if you ever hear that show, the guy is really weary. Walt told us later that Lincoln was having an extremely bad time in his Presidency the man was really suffering. Walt wanted that to come through in the show and it did but that was the way Walt did stuff." Not everyone was happy with the Illinois-Lincoln-Disney union. Negative publicity began surfacing that the Lincoln Audio-Animatronic figure would be a "macabre effigy" or no better than a carnival show midway attraction. This criticism in Illinois began to take hold and then people began to question the cost: "A million dollars. What could you do with a million dollars in your school district?" retorted one antagonistic editorial. Something needed to be done to stop the uproar, and so Walt Disney was brought in. Walt spoke to an assembled audience at the Illinois State House, stating "I have more at stake in this than the State of Illinois. I’m staking my reputation that this will be a dignified production." "I’m not a carnival operator," Walt told them, responding to one of the more spiteful editorials. Walt came across brilliantly, and public opinion changed in favor of Lincoln. In the end, Lincoln was one of the big hits at the World’s Fair. A survey of audiences attending Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln showed 85% of those polled praised Lincoln as "inspiring, educational, entertaining, and utterly realistic." Moreover, the Associated Press proclaimed, "The individual star of the World’s Fair is Abraham Lincoln. Some audiences he holds in spellbound silence; others he sets wildly cheering" (The Associated Press). At the end of the Fair’s two-year run, Robert Moses was asked what he saw as the highlights, to which he responded "My two greatest accomplishments at the Fair were Michelangelo’s Pieta and Walt Disney’s Lincoln." * * * * * Be sure to also visit the other exhibits on the World's Fair: Introduction The GE Carousel of Progress The Ford Magic Skyway It's a Small World