Slides

Animal Kingdom Construction Photos

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Animal Kingdom opened 23 years ago today so we pass along birthday greetings to the nature themed park.  It is a remarkable place — many people have remarks about it. As our look back period at Lake Buena Vista HIstorical Society loosely adheres to a “25 years or older” period of time, Animal Kingdom hasn’t gotten much attention from us (yet).  However we recently acquired hundreds of Disney internal photographic slides mostly from the 1990s and...Read More...

Slide Carousel: Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress in November 1984

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One of the missions of the Lake Buena Vista Historical Society is to preserve the history of not just the Walt Disney World resort but some of the ancillary developments surrounding the resort.  When a set of photographic slides taken in November 1984 of the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress recently became available to us we jumped at the chance.  The gallery appears at the bottom of this post. When it opened in February 1984 the Grand...Read More...

Restored 35mm slide show: An Evening at the Magic Kingdom SHOW PAC

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We are pleased to share with you another in the series of souvenir “SHOW PACS” which are 35mm slides with an audio soundtrack. This set, released in 1975, was sold in the theme park as well as by mail order. The sets came with a cassette tape and 40 numbered slides. A viewer would load the slides into their projector and then put the cassette in a tape player and a clanging bell would indicate when...Read More...

Rare Glimpses of December 1971 Walt Disney World

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Sometimes one or two images will pique my interest in a set of slides.  This particular dual set of 35mm slides were from different film brands, were individually numbered and included some hand-assembled slides (literally film glued into a slide holder) that were photographs of images from the 1971 book The Story of Walt Disney World.  The slide set and its order indicate it was part of a presentation given by a professor or enthusiast to...Read More...

WDW Restaurants Photo Gallery – April 1975

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A remarkable set of slides dated April 1975 capture a necessary and notable part of any theme park: The dining establishments. When we get a set of slides like this with no context as to their origin we are left to speculate or create our own backstory. At RetroWDW we choose to believe this set of slides was taken by a person doing research on how Disney does counter service and buffeteria-style dining. You’ll notice photos...Read More...

Oldman Slide Collection Returns! – 1980 slides of WDW

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Today we return to the Oldman Collection – A set of slides chronicling 5 visits to Walt Disney World of a couple in 1978, 1980, 1981, 1983 and 1985. You can see the previously released 1978 visit here: https://www.retrowdw.com/pictorial-souvenir/brians-slide-carousel/wdw-september-1978-gallery-brian/ Some things you’ll see in this December 1980 visit: Lake Buena Vista & the Empress Lily decked out for the Holidays Brer Fox violating OSHA regulations A series of photos of Big Thunder Mountain because it had...Read More...

Slides of the Magic Kingdom from November 1979

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This slide set from November 1979 features the Magic Kingdom in all its autumn splendor. As always we’re treated to lots of pictures of the afternoon parade. Back then each year ushered in a new parade and “Dumbo’s Circus Parade” was the 1979 theme. It features scary clowns in a miniature fire engine, Donald Duck in his fortune telling getup, Dumbo in a burning firehouse and plenty of other interesting and unique parade floats not seen...Read More...

Over 130 unique Magic Kingdom Slides from 1979

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Recently Brian has been scanning hundreds of slides to add to our pictorial souvenir. This latest set comes from January 1979 and has a few interesting things to see: Interior of the Town Square Barber Shop Interior of the Main Street Clock Shop Interior of Crystal Palace Interior of the Main Street Ceramics Shop Interior of King Stefan’s Banquet Hall (now Cinderella’s Royal Table) On-ride photos of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride On-ride photos of Snow White’s...Read More...

Amazing slides that show a brand new Walt Disney World – October 1971

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Another fantastic addition to Brian’s Slide Carousel This set of slides labeled Walt Disney World and dated October 1971 came to us by way of an estate sale in Michigan. Because of the date stamp from Kodak we knew the slides were from Walt Disney World’s first days of operation. Thanks to @Gulopine , we think we’ve narrowed the date down, as he wrote the following to us: “The extreme cloudiness got me wondering. Looking back through...Read More...