Stand by for a quick one post detour, we visited Marceline, MO yesterday...
Some of you may be familiar with Marceline, MO, but if not.... Walt was born in Chicago, but his family decided that it would be safer/healthier to move away from the big city when he was little. They decided to move to Marceline, MO. I don't recall the exact ages, but they lived there for 5 years while Walt was elementary school aged. Although he only spent 5 years there, the story goes that Marceline had the biggest impact on his early life and he always cherished the memories that he made there. Walt returned several times as an adult, and even had plans for a "Marceline Project" before he passed away. His passion for trains was born here and he developed his love for animals on the family farm.
Apparently, he wasn't old enough to do real farm chores, so he was often tasked with watching his little sister when the others worked. Story goes, that he also started his love for drawing, animation, and storytelling here as he drew flip book style pictures for his sister as they practiced "belly botany" under his "dreaming tree" (a giant cottonwood situated next to a spring.) Also, the Main Street in downtown Marceline served as inspiration for Main Street in
Disneyland.
Walt returned several times as an adult for various events and activities, and even purchased his boyhood home with the plans to develop it into sort of a working farm exhibit/park. (Unfortunately, it was still just an idea when he passed. His brother Roy came out of retirement to complete Walt Disney World, but didn't have it in him to see the Marceline project completed, so he sold the land to the current family who owns it today.) Some really interesting stuff here.
So Marceline, is in the middle of Missouri, about 3 hours NW of St. Louis (and probably about the same distance NE of Kansas City.) Not too far for a day trip.
This was our second visit. I wrote up a more detailed TR of our last visit in 2012. Check my signature for the link.
Anyway, this isn't meant to be thorough TR, but hoping to share a few highlights and maybe inspire a few to visit the lovely town.
We actually started the day at the General John J. Pershing Boyhood Home State Historic Site
http://mostateparks.com/park/gen-john-j-pershing-boyhood-home-state-historic-site It's located in Laclede, MO - about 20 minutes west of Marceline. I admit that I should have paid more attention in history class, because while Pershing was one of the nations most legendary generals, I really didn't know too much about him. Unlike Marceline, I'm not sure that this would be worth a day trip to visit (unless you are a serious military/history fan), but if you are already in the area, it was actually pretty cool.
So we visited the Pershing house and museum and then arrived in Marceline around 11 am. We wanted to visit the Walt Disney United States Post Office Building before it closed at noon, so we drove there first. The postal service issued a commemorative stamp there in 1968, which was a pretty big deal as Marceline one out over other Disney related towns such as Chicago, Kansas City, and LA. Apparently, there were cases to be made for each town but it couldn't be agreed upon, so they asked Walt's wife, Lilly, what she thought Walt would have preferred. She didn't hesitate to say Marceline because he always spoke so fondly of it. And later the building was renamed in his honor and is the only federal building to be named after Walt. Pretty cool... They have a special cancellation stamp, so we stopped in for a few cheap souvenirs. It's like 60 cents for a pre-stamped envelope that they'll cancel for you.
Pretty cool! And we had fun chatting with the postal worker behind the counter. I find myself wanting to share more than just the highlights here. Maybe I'll have to make a separate TR for the day.... after I finish this WDW one
Next we ate lunch at a Sonic. Not a lot of dining choices as it's a small town. And then we headed over to the farm that Walt lived at. The home is private (owned by the people who run the museum in town), but they have Walt's "Dreaming Tree" and a replica of his barn available to the public. So cool!
The house as it looks today.
And the dreaming tree.
Or at least what's left of it. It's been hit by lightning a few times in the last couple of decades and is pretty much dead and beyond saving. The cool thing is that Walt's grandson planted "the son of the dreaming tree" a while back (with soil from the Magic Kingdom and water from the Rivers of America) from a sapling that came from the original.
Walt visited the tree several times as an adult explaining that a lot of his daydreams and inspiration came from here.
The other cool thing on the site is the recreation of Walt's "Happy Place".
Without going into too much detail, Walt spent a lot of time in the family's barn. Playing with the animals, and even having a "barn circus" where he charged local kids a dime to come inside and see it. His first taste of showbiz, and apparently a valuable lesson learned not to disappoint his guests (which he did), and instead to exceed expectations.
The barn is a replica of the one that originally stood there. It has a longer story than I can share here, but in a nutshell... It was an inspiration for the barn in the movie, "So Dear to My Heart", and then became the basis for the barn that he had built at his home in LA. That barn was used to support his small scale train (Carolwood Pacific RR) and is known as Walt's Happy Place where he would go tinker and work on his train projects. It's accredited as the birthplace of imagineering. The barn was relocated to Griffith Park (not terribly far from the Hollywood sign) and can be visited today. Anyway, about 15 years ago or so, they recreated the original barn back at the boyhood home.
The secret bonus feature, is that there is nothing inside. Except for hundreds (if not thousands) of signatures. You are welcome to sign your name and/or leave a note to Walt. Seems like nearly every square inch is covered, but it's not too hard to find a fun place to leave your own signature
After exploring the barn and tree, and the lovely gardens and grounds, we decided to head towards the Walt Disney Elementary school.
Walt actually attended the dedication of the new school in 1960, and had special artwork commissioned from the Disney Studios to go inside. Additionally, he gave them a flag pole from the 1960 Winter Olympics in Squaw Valley (he was the Chairman of Pageantry.)
He also gave them a flag from Disneyland to fly. It's currently on display in the museum.
Notice the school desk in the case below the flag. I'll come back to that in a bit.
So, after the school, we headed over to the Disney Complex (park). It houses a playground, swimming pool, amphitheater, etc and is a mile or two outside of town. In 1956 Walt, Roy, and their wives came back to dedicate the pool. But the more interesting thing here is the site of the Midget Autopia 2.0 ride. A whole article could be written about this, but in a nutshell.... The Midget Autopia was originally included in Disneyland, but Walt was unhappy with it because parents and children couldn't ride it together. So he had it removed. Before he passed away, he decided to send the cars to Marceline and have his Imagineers help build the track. (Unfortunately, he was too ill from his cancer and couldn't attend the dedication when it opened.) It operated for several years until it fell into disrepair. They have plans and hope to eventually re-open Midget Autopia 3.0 in the future, next to the museum. In the meantime, the old site was turned into a playground and you can play on the old tracks. Pickle brought her Big Wheels and took a few laps.
They have one of the original cars on display inside the museum. Apparently it was never used on the track itself.
After that, we decided to head back into town. I didn't grab any photos of Main Street, as it was hot and getting late. Kids wanted the air conditioning of the museum, and we had about 2 hours left before the museum closed. It has a lot of old fashioned main street charm as you can imagine. Also, it has the "Uptown Theater". Walt Disney held the midwest premiere of The Great Locomotive Chase (starring Fess Parker) here in 1956. Walt, Roy, and wives, came to host the premier and had a lot of interaction with the local children.
So finally, we arrived at the Walt Disney Hometown Museum.
http://www.waltdisneymuseum.org/
This could be a long write up in itself. You'll have to go to the website above, or even better, visit yourself to get a better understanding of it. In another nutshell, it's located in the old train depot and opened about 15 years ago. It has beautiful gardens and a train exhibit too.
A few notes...
The museum was started by Kaye Malins, who had the opportunity to meet Walt several times as a child. She even got to go to Disneyland with Walt himself!!!! When he came back in 1956 for the pool dedication, Kaye's family had the only house in town with air conditioning, so the town folk agreed that Walt should stay at her house. Unless I misunderstood, he actually slept in her pink bed room. How cool is that! Kaye's father, Rush, purchased the Disney farm on Walt's behalf (to get it cheaper) and then sold it directly to Walt. As mentioned, they had a Marceline project planned. After Walt passed, Roy eventually offered to sell it back to Rush. And it's been in their family ever since. Kaye and her mother, Inez, both volunteer at the museum and give tours. I'm telling you... These ladies are amazing. So friendly. So many stories from their interactions with Walt and Roy. Truly amazing. If you can, you should get yourself out there and meet them before it's too late (Inez is 84)
The other note, is that many of the artifacts came from Walt's sister Ruth. Before she passed away, she decided that she wanted to donate it to Marceline in hopes of helping to make the museum. Inez said that Kaye flew up to Portland with an empty suit case - thinking she'd get a few old letters and documents. But she had to come back with a U-Haul because there was so much stuff!
Without going into too much detail, the museum covers a lot of history and artifacts from Walt and his family's direct interaction with Marceline. In addition other items included cover Marceline train history, artifacts from the Great Locomotive Chase, an amazing Disneyland diorama, Midget Autopia, and all kinds of misc. stuff related to the town and Disney in general. Really a treat for $5 an adult and $2.50 a child. They have a cool gift shop too
A few more photos and then we'll finish up...
Remember that photo with the flag and desk? In one of Walt's visits, he went back and visited his old elementary school. He told them that he wanted to find his desk. They said it would be too hard because there were hundreds of them. He said something along the lines of him not worrying about that... Because he had etched his initials in it.
Pretty cool!
Had to stop by the Mickey statue! Designed by Ollie Johnston, before he passed away. (Ollie was one of Walt's Nine Old Men and a huge train buff. If you haven't seen the Frank & Ollie movie, do yourself a huge favor and see it ASAP.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0113104/ ) A series of these were made in 2003 to celebrate Mickey's 75th anniversary.
I took a ton of photos of the artifacts and memorabilia, but this post is already too long. So only a couple more highlights.
Upstairs is a giant hand made Disneyland diorama made by the late Dale Varner. Pretty cool!
Also upstairs, is a train viewing area. Although trains no longer stop in town, about 70 of them pass through every day. Seems like that's every 5 minutes or so.
Looking out the window...
We stayed until the museum closed and had a wonderful time visiting with Kaye and Inez. Truly awesome ladies!
Marceline is a great place to visit. Nice small town atmosphere. Everyone we came across was super friendly. If you are a big Walt Disney fan, I strongly encourage you to make a pilgrimage to Walt's Happy Place
.
We will be visiting San Francisco, Yosemite, Anaheim, and Grand Canyon. We have the Yosemite and Grand Canyon rooms booked already, based on our plan to visit Walt's Barn. Haha
Kids sure are a blessing. It's exciting to think that baby Emma will be here in just a few more days. Looking forward to some cute baby photos on your PTR 
