Good Walt Disney books?

[Minnie Lor]

Spinning Disney's World: Memories of a Magic Kingdom Press Agent by Charles Ridgway

Realityland - True Life adventures at Walt Disney World
and
Mousetales - a Behind the Ears Lokk at Disneyland by David Koenig

The Complete Walt Disney World by Julie and Mike Neal

Kevin

I've read Charles Ridgway's book. It was ok. I'm reading Realityland by David Koenig right now. Fascinating! I got to walk thru Future World with David a few weeks ago and I learned so much.

The Complete Walt Disney World is the best planning book that I own (I own alot)

 

[robertgp124]

Has anyone read Team Rodent by Carl Hiaasen? I was just looking at it as a download from Audible. I know the podcast members have said the Florida media love to beat up on Disney. Any thoughts on if it's worth reading?

 

[clombardi]

I loved Spinning Disney's World, The Imagineering Field Guide to the Magic Kingdom, and The Complete Walt Disney World. Also, we have read the novel The Kingdom Keepers, a fictional children's story set in the Magic Kingdom. It is written on about a fifth grade level and is filled with references to the Magic Kingdom. It was really a hoot to read! If you read it, you'll never look at the dolls in IASW the same again!

 

[pschnebs]

Hmmm... my favorite Disney books... got a couple of hours?

I don't have a lot of books on my shelf specifically about Walt, but there are some books out there that I've found interesting. I just finished the Neil Gabler biography "Walt Disney and the Triumph of the American Imagination" a couple of months ago; it's really detailed and you may not necessarily agree with all of his conclusions, but it's a fascinating book. Just be prepared to devote a LOT of time to it - it's about 800 pages plus!

The Bob Thomas books, "Walt Disney: An American Original" and "Building A Company" (which was Tomas' biography of Roy) are both fascinating; if you have the time, consider reading Bob's book on Walt first, then follow up with the book on Roy. I read "Building A Company" first; you gain a real appreciation for everything Roy did to make what Walt wanted to do financially possible.

I also enjoyed Steven Watts' "The Magic Kingdom: Walt Disney and the American Way of Life"; the book concentrates more on the people around Walt and how Disney's work influenced American culture and vice versa.

Another book I'd recommend would be "Remembering Walt" by Howard and Amy Booth Green; this book was fascinating to me because it's a collection of recollections of people who worked with Walt. The recollections don't always paint a picture that is consistent with our image of "Uncle Walt" from TV - he could be very difficult to deal with and a hard taskmaster as well as inspiring and brilliant - but you can see that the folks around him were very devoted to Walt and what he created in spite of his flaws.

While the next two books I'm going to mention are more about aspects of Walt then general biographies, they're fascinating in their own right, because they provide some insight into the passions of Walt that created the parks. First off, there's "Walt Disney's Railroad Story" by Michael Broggie. The first section of the book goes into the history of Walt's love of trains and how that love of trains inspired him to create his first backyard railroad, the Carolwood Pacific, and Disneyland; the second section talks about the railroads found at all the Disney theme parks and resorts. Some folks may find the technical discussions about aspects of railroads and railroading to be a bit much, but it's an interesting book overall.

The scond book I'd like to mention is "Walt Disney and the Quest for Community" by Steve Mannheim. This book deals with Walt and his ideas about EPCOT - not the theme park, but the city that was his reason for coming to Florida to begin with. This book's probably intended more for an academic audience than a general audience, but it's interesting to read about Walt's ideas for the city of the future and how the Imagineers and the other folks around him tried to flesh out those ideas into practical concepts. It also gives you a feel for how much Walt left unsolved as far how his vision would be made real; after you read this book, you can't help but wonder how much more likely EPCOT the city would have been if he had lived a few years longer, or whether even Walt could have inspired the people around him to surmount the challenges he faced with EPCOT.

I'll get to books about WDI that are my favorites in my next post...

 

[pschnebs]

Now, as to books about Imagineering. I love books and magazines about the making of the Disney theme parks, I notice that most of the books I have tend to lead toward the visual aspects of Imagineering than the nuts and bolts process - although I'm not sure that it's because of some bias on my part or because of a tendency by the Imagineers to want to share the art they've created in building the parks rather than the nuts-and bolts of how they create the parks! In any case, here are some of my favorite books...

"Walt Disney Imagineering" by the Imagineers: A great introduction to the process of and the elements involved in creating the parks and the attractions in them. Not much text, but the illustrations are wonderful.

"Designing Disney's Theme Parks: The Architecture of Reassurance": This book accompanied an exhibition of art and models from WDI a few years ago. The text is really academic and more than a little dense in some places, but the illustrations are wonderful and include a lot of pieces you may not see anywhere else.

"Designing Disney: Imagineering and the Art of the Show" by John Hench: John's book is a discussion of some of the things he learned while working as an Imagineer as far as design, use of color, visual storytelling and bringing the characters to life in three dimensions in the parks and resorts.

"Walt Disney's EPCOT" and "Disneyland Paris: From Sketch to Reality": Two books that cover the creation of the attractions in the theme parks. Fascinating descriptions of the design process and some wonderful artwork.

Another book that I thought was interesting and touched on the porcess of Imagineering a theme park was "Once Upon An american Dream: The Story of Euro Disneyland". The book's focus is more on the early years of the park and reactions to it, but the section on the creation of the park was fascinating.

 

[danv3]

Got Realityland for Christmas and am reading it now. Very interesting.

Read Neil Gabler's Walt Disney earlier this year. It was good, but as some one else mentioned, dense.

 

[dphoto]

I have over 100 books on Walt Disney and Disneyland and there are many good books. Below are will give some of my favorites.

The Animated Man by Michael Barrier one of the best books if you want to understand the real Walt Disney. It is much better IMO than the Gabler books that seemed to many made up theories/speculation about Walt. The Magic Kingdom by Watts is also pretty good. The Bob Thomas biography on Walt glosses over too much and thus does not give a very true picture of the man.

Walt Disney's Railroad story by Michael Broggie is among my favorite books. While it focuses on trains, there is a lot of first hand information about Walt and what led him to build Disneyland. If it is not available on Amazon, you should try carolwood.com.

Inside the Dream, the Personal Story of Walt Disney is a companion book the documentary about Walt done by the Disney Family Museum. While nothing earth shattering the book and the documentary are worth getting. The book “Hand Behind the Mouse” is a biography about Ubbe Iwerks is also a good read and the related documentary is included as bonus material in the new Oswald Treasures CD. Walt Disney's Missouri is a lot better than it might sound. It gives a lot of information about the places were Walt grew up.

Another book that is a very fun read and cheap if you can find it is Bill Peet’s autobiography. He had a love/hate relationship with Walt. He was a very good writer for Disney and was also an illustrator (he had a second very successful career as a children’s book writer after leaving Disney in the early 1960’s).

The book Walt Disney's Imagineering is pretty light on information but has a lot of good "eye candy" (pictures). Designing Disney's Theme Parks, The Architecture of Reassurance by Karal Ann Marling has a lot of good information on the buildings of Disneyland and WDW.

Another one of my favorite books is The Nine Old Men by Canemaker. This will give you mini-biographies of the most famous Disney animators, many of which worked on the theme parks.

The best two books on Disneyland are going to be hard to get. They are Disneyland, the Inside Story by Michael Bright, and Disneyland, the Nickel Tour by Gordan and Mumford. Unfortunately neither of these is still in print and they can be quite expensive to obtain these days.

Some of the best information on Imagineering are in fanzines (published by fans). The E-Ticket is still available and they have CD’s that cover many of the back issues.

 

[pschnebs]

Totally agree with your recommendations of "The Nickel Tour" and "Inside Story", dphoto. Both are hard books to find, but both are absoultely indispensible if you want to create a good library on the Disney theme parks.

Another good source of "eye candy" on the parks is "The Art of Disneyland" by Jeff Kurtti and Bruce Gordon. Absolutely wonderful illustrations.

 

[fakereadhed]

Just a tip: I was able to find out of print Disney books at my local library doing an online search of surrounding libraries and putting them on hold. Off to search for some of these titles!