Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Jan 15: A Space Port Comes To Florida

On this day in 1975, the Space Mountain attraction officially opened at Disney World's Magic Kingdom. The very first Space Mountain in any of the Disney parks worldwide, it was sponsored by RCA (until 1993) and was the world's first completely dark indoor coaster!
Space Mountain originated in the early 1960s when Walt Disney himself came up with the idea of a high-speed attraction called SpacePort (intended for Disneyland's Tomorrowland).
On January 15, 1975 retired astronaut James Irwin (a member of the Apollo 15 mission & the 8th man to walk on the moon) took the first official ride on Space Mountain.
While the blue and white color scheme of this Tomorrowland structure remains the same today, back in 1975 the entrance and exit building were also white and blue. The left entrance wall displayed the name "Space Mountain" in bold blue letters with the RCA logo appearing above it.
The entrance and exit buildings also featured overhead speakers which played the big band and orchestral portion of RCA's song "Here's to the Future and You."
The post show, in which guests board a moving walkway, is unique to Disney World as no other Space Mountain attraction has such an extensive post presentation.


Click HERE for more January 15 Disney history.

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