The Evolution of The Haunted Mansion

Disneyland's haunted mansion is widely considered to be one of the greatest dark rides in the world utilizing a bunch of different illusions and at the time of its opening groundbreaking technology it's no wonder the attraction has managed to survive as long as it has but what most people don't know is that the ride we see today is very different than what it was supposed to be as little as 3 years before it opened and how the very idea of what the attraction would be evolved countless times throughout the 12 years it spent in development so with this video I wanted to explore the rides history leading up to its open and really figure out how it went from a traditional 1950s walkthrough ghost house into one of Disneyland's most iconic attractions to date so to do that let's take the story all the way back to its beginning the earliest version of what we know is the Haunted Mansion can be traced all the way back to 1951 but the drawing done by Disney artist Harper Goff this was back in the days before Disneyland even existed as an idea when Walt was interested in opening a smaller Mickey Mouse park across the street from his studio in Burbank some of the first sketches of which were done by Gogh the first piece of concept art involved a church graveyard and creepy old house on a hill overlooking them at the time this wasn't more than just a basic idea for some kind of haunted house attraction no real plans for it beyond that of course when the Mickey Mouse Park idea grew and eventually became Disneyland in Anaheim haunted house concept came with it now set to be at the end of the parks Main Street a new version of the house was drawn up by Dale Hennessy that still looked very similar to golf's original design just now without the church and graveyard attached to it this new Main Street house could also be seen in the first mock-up of the park's layout in 1953 by herb Ryman but at this point its development the mansion wasn't more than just a creepy-looking house and considering the fact that Disneyland was set to open in only two years new Main Street plans were then drawn up now without the haunted house because it just wouldn't be ready in time for a while after Disneyland's grand opening in 1955 the house was still planned be a main street attraction only now a little behind the rest of the street on a creepy more isolated offshoot but none of these ideas were ever officially put to paper it wouldn't be until around 1956 that the house saw another design this time done by Sam McKim initially has just a very basic sketch he later fleshed out the idea bit with a more detailed version of the building that now appeared much more dilapidated than any of the previous versions this new idea was also created around the same time Disney was considering expanding the park with its first brand-new land called the New Orleans square a tribute to the real New Orleans but with more of a focus on the historic aspects of it specifically its pirate lore which would be represented by a rogue's gallery wax museum of famous pirates the same idea that would later evolve into the Pirates of the Caribbean boat ride but that's its own story with those plans in mind the redesign McKim haunted house was now set to be a part of this new expansion located on the far left side of the land near the waters of the Jungle Cruise and with a more permanent spot now settled on for the attraction work finally began on what would actually be inside the house really the first Imagineer who can be credited for coming up with scene ideas for the haunted mansion is Ken Anderson who walled himself put on the project in 1957 initially he was tasked creating some kind of storyline for the attraction and ended up creating a couple Anderson envisioned the ghost house as a walk through attraction where groups of 40 guests would be led through the house by a tour guide going through different scenes that would showcase ghostly effects if you then drew up a bunch of concept art to go with this story along with an actual layout that we'll be using to get a better idea of the original walkthrough the story begins outside the mansion where you go through a small courtyard and loop your way back into the house where after entering you fight yourself in the portrait gallery now accompanied by your tour guide named Beauregard who explains the history of the mansion and that its previous owner Bartholomew was a retired sea captain rumored to actually be an X pi rrett along without him and his wife Priscilla eventually both disappeared under mysterious circumstances the house they lived in is said to be haunted from there a hinged bookcase would open revealing a secret pathway into the next few scenes including a pirate at a table which likely would have been the reveal that Bartholomew was indeed the deadly pirate captain Gore and the next scene after that titled wife at chest where we probably would have seen Priscilla discover the truth about gore it's also explained by the tour guide at this point that gore killed her once she found out about his past fearing that she might tell the rest of the town past that now at the back of the house we can look at a large window into a swampy Bayou and see a ghost of a Gore ship out in the distance the next scene after that would have included the captain sleeping in a bed with our tour guide now explaining that he doesn't get too much sleep ever since his wife's passing as a ghost of Priscilla appears and gore shoots at it finally you would enter into a room and look up to see that gore eventually hanged himself after years of being haunted by his wife while this storyline was the most solid out of Anderson's early ideas there were a few miscellaneous other ones too like how in those same floor plans you can see something labeled hands this was actually related to another of his concepts where recurring characters throughout the house would be hairy the arm a disembodied arm that would reach out and occasionally grab at the tour guide and guests there were some plans at one point to maybe tie the arm into the attraction storyline with it being the cause of Priscilla's death but that idea was ultimately scrapped by the time Andersen came up with the captain Gore backstory over the next few months Anderson's concepts evolved a bit more as well expanding with new scene ideas all of which later culminated in another new layout for the walkthrough now much larger than the original this house featured all kinds of new scenes like a grand entry hall with a spooky winding staircase a revised Portrait Gallery a much larger graveyard scene that was visible through a window and a Great Hall / ballroom area with a ghost playing the piano but none of these were really attached to a real cohesive storyline like before mostly because of the fact that at the time two more ideas were then suggested by wall that Ken was now trying to somehow incorporate one of which being a tie-in with the 1949 movie The Adventures of Ichabod and mr. toad wherein you would see the Headless Horseman somewhere in the attraction and also another tie-in featuring the lonesome ghost from the classic Disney cartoon an idea that you can still catch some glimpses of in a few of the layouts for the house but ultimately none of these ideas are really stuck around this time he was also facing the issue of capacity with Disneyland's quickly rising attendance throughout the late 50s a walk through attraction would have been especially difficult to pull off given the fact that it doesn't move guests through it like a ride would so Kent began to drop some ideas for a conveyance system that would car people around the house at a set pace to get a higher number of people through it per hour this also spawned another idea for the attraction where in Walt Disney purchased a real house called the blood mere Manor from New Orleans and relocated it from Louisiana to Disneyland with hopes to repair it only to find out that the house was actually haunted and any repairs they made to it were undone by angry spirits that same night leaving a decrepit and Ghost filled mansion right in the middle of the park that you could explore this new storyline coincided with a redesign done by Andersen based off the real-life Shipley Lydecker house the building now had a classic antebellum style to it with an overgrown front lawn and boarded up windows this sketch was later turned into a full-color painting by Sam McKim and presented to Walt who surprisingly rejected the idea of a run-down house instead wanting the mansion to appear pristine and fit better with the rest of the New Orleans square not long after that Ken ended up leaving the project altogether in 1958 to help with animation on the upcoming Sleeping Beauty film but development on the mansion wouldn't necessarily stop there as a couple of other Imagineers Roley Crump and Gale Gracie were still hard at work creating all the effects for the attraction with a rough idea of what the mansion's storyline would be based off the concept art that Andersen left behind they were now working on ways to bring those same scenes to life most notably using a centuries-old theatre effect called Pepper's Ghost which in practice is basically the reflection of an offstage figure onto a piece of glass creating a transparent version of that figure that looked pretty convincing if presented as a ghost in effect they had been toying around with in model form for a few years now and since Anderson's captain Gore concept was generally thought to be the walkthroughs final storyline at the time rolling Yale began to play around with that idea in the process tweaking the backstory a little and also creating a pretty elaborate new show seen using Pepper's Ghost that I'll just let him explain now we also had a storyline of the captain sea captain that had been that had supposedly drowned at sea and but he had murdered his wife before he went to sea and her she and he bricked her up in the fireplace so we we hooked up this whole thing to where we had this skeleton in a behind the fireplace because she was offstage you know reflected and she had a big kind of a she's not a sheet but some real sheer piece of material on her then we would bring the lights up on the captain who was also off stage we actually had him in a pan of water and we had a shower that poured over the top of him so all of a sudden in the middle of this room you you saw this old sea captain up here and then all of a sudden the water starts dripping off of him and he had seaweed on him and everything and then you would see hit the ghost of his wife behind the bricks light up and then she would scream and come out with her arms and then they both would disappear and it was the creation of scenes like that that really solidified ye'll Gracie is the real mastermind behind the houses effects while he was originally just trying to bring anderson's concept art to life through different technology he eventually began his own sort of experimentation and in turn ended up spawning a bunch of new ideas for the mansion storyline stuff like creating frozen shadows of guests on walls with luminescent paint making talking skulls equipped with microphones so they could speak with people and even figuring out that he could make multiples of a ghost by projecting it onto a disco ball just all kinds surprising little effects and throughout the mansion's history yeah shockingly prolific when it came to creating special effects as he ended up making dozens of them during his time on the project but we'll get more into some of those later by the time 1961 rolled around Disney was fairly confident that the attraction was in your completion with the majority of its storyline already created by Ken and effects now in practice from Yale all I would take were some final preparations before they could begin construction and have it ready in 1963 a date they were so certain of that it appeared on multiple visitor handbills at the time from there a final cleaner-looking version of Anderson's mansion was redrawn by Marvin Davis and shortly after that construction began on the house's facade along with the rest of the New Orleans square in 1962 but they would eventually run into an issue in the form of the upcoming 1964 World's Fair you might be wondering how an animation studio like ours got into the World's Fair business and frankly I've often wondered about that myself with Disney now involved in the fair by signing on decree several attractions for it a huge chunk of wed was now focused on developing those attractions and with a set deadline of 1963 pretty much all Disneyland projects were put on hold for the next few years however since a it already began construction on the mansion's exterior by then that part did get finished by 1963 of course the actual show building where all of its scenes would take plays wasn't there yet and the house itself just sat empty for the next two years as Imagineers were still working on finishing all their World's Fair attractions it wouldn't be until after the fair was over that work would resume on the mansion and with Walt eager to finally finish up the now 13 year old ghost house he would put another animator turned Imagineer Marc Davis on the project in part to re-envision some of Anderson's older ideas but also to come up with new storylines for all of the Yael Gracie effects towards the beginning of Davis's time on the attraction you can tell that most of his sketches were really just rehashing zuv old anderson concepts whether it be a new version of the tour guide Beauregard who is now envisioned as an old Butler or even his ver be captain Gore character all of his sketches really drew from the old walkthrough idea with even the semi-retired Harry the arm making a brief comeback that was just as quickly forgotten again it wouldn't be until a while later that mark the same way Yale did kind of broke off from the old walkthrough storylines and started creating original stuff that would eventually take the attraction in a whole new direction but at the time Walt Disney was still heavily involved in the project and also dead set on keeping it a walk through attraction not having to convert it from one into a ride like they were doing with Pirates of the Caribbean in his mind keeping the house something you walked through yourself was still integral to the experience so when plans for the houses show building were being drawn up around 1964 that was still the idea and since capacity was still likely going to be an issue they plan to create two identical walk throughs in that same building that were side by side obviously allowing twice as many people to go through it per hour it was around the same time that we can begin to see some elements of the final Mansion begin to pop up one of which being the actual name Haunted Mansion which was now what the attraction was officially known as and Mark Davis is the master in charge of our house of illusions or what do we call it a haunted mansion haunted mansion and and supernatural along with that we can also see the first appearance of the attractions opening scene the stretching room what is tell her about this thing here well this is a long meeting stretching room initially devised by Yale Gracie as a way to get people from the mansion's facade into its show building the effect is are really quite simple guests would enter in through the front of the house which itself is just the shell for a giant elevator then they get lowered down to the parks basement level leave the room and walk through a hallway that conveniently goes underneath the tracks for the Disneyland railroad and into the main show building and this is where Mark Davis really started to make an impact by taking what was originally just a necessary conveyance system and turning it into its own scene specifically with the creation of these stretching portraits of paintings that would elongate with the room revealing that the characters were in more sinister situations of course they all had a slight sense of humor to them a real staple of mark Davis's work and some that could be seen quite heavily and all his art for Pirates of the Caribbean where most of the drawings featured gags and were generally pretty light-hearted along with that he also worked on the subsequent hallway into the show building now turning it into a Portrait Gallery an idea that was likely lifted from some of the original walkthrough layouts where a gallery was meant to precede the rest of the attraction and this is also where you can see another of his contributions the changing portrait a painting that would morph into something a bit scarier the longer you were in the room for his first few months on the project Davis was mainly just creating different versions of all these portraits really just trying out a bunch of random themes and hoping to land on a few that stuck while also designing the look of both rooms but he wasn't the only one throwing a bunch of stuff at the wall as Roli Crump in the illusions Department was also taking the mansion in its own very weird direction [Music] the same way many of the other Imagineers on the project did Raleigh began to put some of his own ideas for the mansion to paper by sketching out a bunch of strange drawings including stuff like an aquarium with ghost fish chairs that would stand up and talk to people and sentient gypsy wagons if it wasn't obvious enough Rollie was really going out on a limb with all these drawings introducing a distinct surreal quality that nobody else really knew what to do with nevertheless he still continued making new sketches and eventually presented some models of them to Walt who at first also had no idea what to do with them but would later come up with something called the Museum of the weird an exhibit functioning is the mansion's post show where people could spend some time looking through Raleigh's collection of strange artifacts really allowing him to go off the walls with all his creations which he continued to do and with all these sudden changes coming about and new people now working on the attraction the concept for its backstory began to shift little from the original Captain Gore storyline that everyone was still kind of loosely holding on to into something a bit more vague as described here by Walt Disney where you're gonna meet the ghost this is a little scale model now that of the 15 land area you've seen this many times but we haven't got the ghosts in there yet but we're out collecting the ghosts we're gonna bring ghosts from all over the world and we're making it very attractive too I'm hoping you know they'll want to come and stay at Disneyland so we're putting in wall while cobwebs and we guarantee on creaky doors and creaky pores now nobody is entirely sure where this idea for ghosts from all over the world came from but it's largely thought to be inspired by the recent advancement of audio animatronics a technology that Disney had really taken to the next level during the World's Fair by creating one of their most lifelike figures yet with Abraham Lincoln in a show that was so impressive and popular that it prompted the Pirates wax museum they were developing a Disneyland to now turn into a ride featuring these new kinds of figures and not wanting the Haunted Mansion to be overshadowed technologically by that attraction it too was now going to include animatronics that would be blended with the same older illusions that Yale had been working on plus by generalizing the story beyond just the sea captain the mention could include a bunch of different characters something Mark Davis took full advantage of while drawing some of the new concept art now featuring everything from historic figures like Caesar to ancient Egyptian mummies and even Rasputin who would have had his own changing portrait and it was the creation of these first few pieces of concept are reflecting the ghosts from all over the world concept that really started Marc Davis on the path of creating more characters for the mansion that were just random with some being humorous visual gags like the ones he did for pirates and others just being various spooky or supernatural situations at this point they had pretty much dropped most of Anderson's original ideas and Marc Davis was now forging something of a new path for the mansion's theme through all these different drawings of course that's not to say he didn't borrow a couple of ideas in the process but before any of these new concepts could be presented to Walt for final approval he would unfortunately pass away on December 15th of 1966 leaving the project and everyone on it in a kind of limbo state for a while with no real clear path forward that was until 1967 when Disney had finally finished and opened Pirates of the Caribbean allowing most of the Imagineers on that project to transfer over to the mansion finally infusing the attraction with some much-needed new blood some of the more noteworthy characters including people like Claude coats who did all the set and background work for pirates and ex Atencio whose story boarded and wrote the actual script for the ride and with weds new management wanting to get the ride completed as soon as possible almost the entirety of Imagineering was now put on the project in some way or another resulting in a veritable flood of new ideas for it and a particularly interesting one coming from Claude coats Claude felt that the mansion should be a truly frightening experience and live up to people's expectations of what a haunted mansion would be by taking it in the direction that Davis wanted with mostly humorous scenarios it just felt too much like pirates and wouldn't give the house its own unique feel the mansion Coates envisioned was dark and ominous with haunted graveyards and dusty abandoned attics not scenes that you were meant to laugh at something Mark Davis quite obviously disagreed with leading to one of the most famous splits in imaginary history with people on both sides of the project debating what the House's tone should be funny or scary causing even more ideas to now pop up with artist Dorothy Redman being one of the first to try and combine all of them representing Claude's moody atmosphere and darker scenes while also allowing room for levity or a Mark Davis concept could easily fit even attempting to incorporate some of these surrealism that Roley Crump was so fond of but beyond just the attractions theme there was an even bigger issue to deal with that being the fact they still hadn't figured out a real solution at the attractions capacity issue and while the double walkthrough idea might have barely worked before Disneyland's annual attendance was higher than ever by the late 60s really cancelling out the likelihood of that or even Ken Anderson's moving platform idea actually working so Imagineers turn to a ride system they already knew was reliable boats and as crazy as it sounds the idea did make sense by using that same system from Pirates it would not only allow for higher capacity but also give the mansion a new theme with scenes now set in the flooded remains of an abandoned house half submerged right in the middle this creepy looking bog something that fit quite nicely with the broader Louisiana theme of the New Orleans square kind of representing the inverse of all the classy shops and restaurants in that area by having this dark ghostly presence and the surrounding swamps but this concept was quickly abandoned with the creation of the Omni mover ride system a new type of conveyance that moved continually on a track giving the mansion its necessary capacity while also distinguishing it from pirates and keeping the whole thing dry with a reliable ride system in place exit n Co began to put all of these loose ideas that everybody had thrown out together and started to shape them into some kind of storyline deciding what scenes to include in its blueprint based off most of the recurring ideas obvious stuff that have been around since Andersen's time like a ballroom graveyard and seance scene would all be included especially since every single one of those ideas had been reinvigorate order of doors and endless hallway based off some of the more ethereal ideas that we saw from people like Roley and Dorothy plus some of the old characters would also make a comeback like the bride for example now lacking any real story like before she would now find place inside coats's spooky attic and her c-captain husband would only live on through a portrait and the ship weathervane on top of the house and now with a better idea of the actual layout ex organised whose ideas would go where famously combining both Mark Davis and Claude coats's concepts together but the first half of the ride starting with the load area being the foreboding eerie experience that Coates wanted and the latter part with the ballroom and graveyard being the more comedic version that Davis wanted from there all the best pieces that everybody's concept art were compiled and used as the basis for a model version of the mansion where the attraction really started to take its final shape allowing everyone to get a better idea of what the ride scenes would look like and using that animatronic figures based off mark Davis's characters began to be assembled and had all their faces sculpted by Blaine Gibson who had previously brought mark Davis's concept art to life for pirates with the bulk of all these figures created and ready to be installed inside the newly constructed show Building exit nco took some time to add a few more finishing touches to the concept while everything was being assembled still wanting to draw from a few of the older ideas that everybody else had left behind take for example something like Gale Crazy's idea of a pop-up ghost with the mechanical side of that effect already in place EXO just have to finalize the design and get someone to sculpt a real version of it and bam you've got another new piece of the attraction and that same process happened with many of the abandoned ideas that were previously only drawings like Ken Anderson's hanging man concept X initially played around with a redesign but ultimately just took the original version and put it in a stretching room adding to the scene that Mark Davis had already created even the moving bust effect which had mostly been forgotten about would suddenly find new life inside the Portrait Gallery really it was the inclusion of leftover concepts like these that really gave the ride its eclectic vibe that people loved so much had Davis or Coates gotten their way and the attraction might be more so centered around their ideas and not as random and interesting as it turned out to be even Roly Crump's Museum of the weird which had since been thrown out by Disney's new management would still have a few elements of it incorporated into the mansion mainly through certain design elements once all these pieces were in place X began to assemble a script that would reflect the rides new backstory deciding it would feature some kind of host that narrated each scene as he went through it with one of his initial ideas for the host being a demonic one-eyed cat all happy horns except for that unnatural and dreadful one-eyed black head watch out for him he detests mortals especially happy mortals eventually that idea was replaced by a raven narrating the ride which most would argue was not one of the better ideas and I have found very early soundtracks that have the Raven as narrator well it's really obnoxious whoever did the voicing it it was almost as though it was a human voicing a raven so it was as though you're reading and said caw caw he took the coward's way out CAW [Music] and even though the talking Raven was ultimately scrapped in favor of the disembodied ghost hosts the actual bird can still be seen throughout the ride presumably where he would have talked X would then go on to work with voice actor Paul frees on all his lines for the ghost host slowly reworking the original script into what the final narration would become lurking at your side is an unseen ghost gently pushing you back into your carriage urging you to stay I would actually encourage any hardcore haunted mansion fans out there to listen to the full recording session if you haven't since there are tons of little differences between it and what we can hear today plus it's always fun to hear what people were saying back in 1969 how much time more do I have oh oh that's like giving whiskey to an Indian you've got bless you I don't want to even want the money today well Paul come on you can't say that hashtag not my ghost host strike that last part glad we're recording that last line it was around the same time that all of the other music and audio elements of the attraction were recorded everything from Gaylord Carter's iconic organ playing that can be heard throughout the attraction to all of the sound effects created by Jimmy McDonald were finalized giving the mansion its signature sound which was just as important in setting its tone as all the visuals were but one of the more important pieces of music was the song for its graveyard scene since the ride was planned to end on a musical note like pirates was the ride would then have its famous Grimm's granny ghost song written and composed by ex Atencio and Buddy Baker who also unintentionally spawned another great piece of the attraction the singing busts an effect they decided to include after seeing how well the actual singers look together as a group now we're using the same effect that was previously only used for Madame Leota where they would project each of their faces onto a bust now with just about everything finally set up for the attraction and the actual construction of its scenes completed the ride would officially open on August 9th of 1969 it's funny to think about now but at the time of its opening the mention had been one of the most anticipated attractions ever since it had just been mysteriously sitting there for the past six years the response when its gates did open was bigger than anything Disneyland had seen before really solidifying it as a park favorite and that same sentiment can still be seen today more than 50 years later honestly we wouldn't know just how much the attraction of all if it wasn't so popular since fans of the mansion's have spent years digging through its history to piece together all these abandoned concepts especially websites like long-forgotten Haunted Mansion and doom buggies both of which were great help in making this video so be sure to check them out and while it might be sad to think about everything that was left behind good ideas for the mansion never really die a great example of that happening only a few years later with the Magic Kingdom's version of the ride where some older concepts got repurposed for example Claude Coates got the opportunity to redesign its facade with more of a Gothic style that better matched his first half of the ride and Mark Davis was able to use some of his extra changing portraits in the form of a new scene where they follow you with their eyes so don't lose hope Disney does have a tendency of reintroducing abandoned ideas and they've done so recently who really knows what could be coming back to the ride over the next decade either way thanks everybody for making it to the end of this video a little bit longer than normal so I do appreciate you hanging in there and if you like these longer format videos and want to see more of them on a regular basis you can help by supporting the channel either directly through patreon or by getting yourself one of our great new t-shirts featuring some of the fathers of the mansion a nice little way to pay homage to some of the Imagineers behind the attraction so with that said don't forget to subscribe if you haven't already and I should be seeing you all a little later [Music] well there you have it our fromage de Halloween Scott that Celeste be homage thank you

Channel: Park Ride History

Views: 645,319

Rating: 4.9421034 out of 5

Keywords: disney, disneyland, haunted, mansion, the haunted mansion, history, the history of, evolution, evolution of, walt disney, ken anderson, marc davis, yale gracey, claude coats, rolly crump, museum of the weird, walkthrough, abandoned, park ride history, ride, attraction, the evolution of

Id: iX93Gk923uo

Length: 32min 8sec (1928 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 26 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Curious6George]

Lol ride turned movie