Freedomland Tickets & LP - Part 2

How about some more Freedomland? Jed over at the somewhat dormant but always excellent blog “Vintage Disneyland Goodies” sent in these awesome scans of some Freedomland Tickets – Thank you Jed!

The tickets are on Globe Safety paper, similar to Disneyland’s but the pattern looks a little different. The tickets are colored "Visa's" instead of Disneyland’s lettered "Coupons" (Which Knott’s copied, in reverse order, minus the “E”, but I digress.).












The back is very similar to Disneyland also, except I see Freedomland had a release of liability for any personal injury sustained while in the park, a result of the stage coach accident possibly? Thanks again Jed for these scans!






Jed's great contribution got me in the mood to play and record the Freedomland LP, just listing to the LP got me feeling better, what a time capsule.

The LP is not dated, but several sources date it as 1960. 1960 is the year of by Johnny Horton’s “hit” that’s the first song on side two - “Johnny Freedom”. It’s excellent as is most of the LP. The LP has its high and lows, the Chicago fire sequence at the end of side two is a total downer. “Ashes and black earth are all that remained, nothing standing, nothing growing, nothing green remained” fun times.






Freedomland LP Side 1 - 12mb






Freedomland LP Side 2 - 12mb

Freedomland Ticket Book & LP - Part 1

Welcome to Freedomland U.S.A. As if Freedomland itself wasn’t a complete and blatant copy of Disneyland, even the ticket book was quite similar. This rare book is missing the tickets (anyone have any????) but you can still see the obvious resemblance, even the “Welcome to” font on the front message sheet is the same as Disneyland’s!






I’m guessing the two red lines represent the Santa Fe Railroad tracks and the Ore Buckets path. Let’s see Freedomland had; a Santa Fe Train, a sky ride, a horse drawn trolley, a miniature car ride, a Pepsi Cola Music Hall, a fort, a sternwheeler, a river cruise, a mule pack ride, a horse drawn wagon and a futureland. Sure sounds familiar…






No mysterious date codes here, in fact, no date at all! The price for a child book is right in line with Disneyland’s early 1960’s pricing. New York City Amusement Tax? New York is about as amusing as Los Angeles.







My vintage collection is VERY light when it comes to Freedomland. I’ve got the ticketless book you see above, I’ve got a great 16mm amateur home move from 1961 that you’ll see someday, and I’ve got this neato record.

This LP was actually still sealed and yes I just removed the 50 year old shrink-wrap and it felt great, if not a little crispy.






They claim Freedomland is even larger than the fabled Disneyland. Maybe, but where are you now Freedomland? Apparently the music on the LP is the actual music that was heard on each ride.






I love this inner sleeve - it's all in the details.






The LP itself is in fine shape, having never been played. It doesn’t appear to be warped or damaged. I would have recorded the LP for you, but I’m feeling a little under the weather (cue the violins) so it will have to wait until Bonus Sunday.

"A Fun Party" at Disneyland - January 25, 1974

How about a “Fun Party”? Exclusively for all of you San Diego County Families, January 25, 1974 is your private party night at Disneyland. Private parties are great, usually low crowds and short wait times; however San Diego County is pretty big! Look who found their "Happy Place" in the tea cup!






Free parking too! Refund will be allowed on if cancelled due to inclement weather? That will never happen at Disneyland (link).






Here’s the cover to a mint condition Vacationland from Fall/Winter 1973-74. This photo also appears on the Fall/Winter 1973-74 Disneyland in park Guide (future link, I haven't posted it yet!).






The Wildest Show indeed, sorely missed.






Sara Lee was the sponsor for Café Orleans, I never knew that! “The Showboat” dessert sounds yummy – “a delicious butter pound cake with a scoop of creamy vanilla ice cream smothered in hot fudge sauce and topped with whipped cream and walnuts”! I see the practice of putting a sign up listing the food with no prices isn’t new to the park. I guess if you have to ask, you can’t afford it.






Is there still a crystal shop on Main Street? Oh boy, I should know this, having loitered about on Main Street for hours on end. I’m going to say yes; at least I know they sell fragile glass type things somewhere on the east side of Main Street.

Camping and Trailering Guide - January 1971

Welcome to Magazine Monday. From deep down in the obscure stack it’s the January 1971 issue of Camping and Trailing Guide. Nice 1971 Chevy Suburban, I bet it’s got a 454 with the LS5 option; 365hp – 850cm carb, dual exhaust – pulling that trailer you’d get about 6mpg, maybe.






An RV Traveler’s Guide to Disneyland is an odd article. I hope you enjoy this picture of the Castle; it’s the one photo of Disneyland in the entire article.






As you’ve probably guessed, this article has very little to with Disneyland other than telling you it doesn’t open until 10am. Trailerland at 1211 S. Harbor Blvd is now a hotel (map).






Lots of talk about Vacationland (nice name!) campground opening in the summer of 1971 at 1441 S. West Street, which is now 1441 S. Disneyland Drive and is part of the Disneyland Hotel parking lot (map).






The Cover story is all about America’s Top Ten Tow Cars, no Toyota Tundra’s in 1971! I’m am loving that Two door Pontiac Catalina.






Check out Chevy’s Disappearing Tailgate!






I had one of those Clamshell station wagons (GM produced them from 1971-76) mine was a 1976 Buick. The Glass slid up in the rood and the tail gate slid down under the floor, all at once with the turn of a key.








How about a few vintage Camping/Travel Advertisements? Airstream Trailers always seemed so cool to me, very purpose built. However, I’m not sure you should drive it up that close to the river! That area looks familiar?






Here’s a photo I took in October of 2003 at Slide Rock, which is part of Oak Creek Canyon just north of Sonoma Arizona. If you turned around in this photo it looks remarkably similar to the Airstream photo above.






Those fold-away campers always seemed flimsy to me. The “bed supports” don't look very strong.






Alaska looks like Camper's Paradise!

Bonus Sunday

Welcome to Bonus Sunday. From Friday's post, here is the complete issue of Disneyland Holiday Winter, 1957-58


Disneyland Holiday Winter, 1957-58 - 80mb






You can "fly to the moon"...






Vintage color photos in the centerfold.

Disneyland Hotel - 1957

Time for a vintage look at the Disneyland Hotel. From November 1957, this brochure tells the tale of one neat hotel, the pride of ownership sure shines thru on these pages.








"Disneyland Park… Now open 7 days a week". Huh? I thought the park was closed on Monday’s and Tuesday’s during the winter well into the 1980’s???






Look at this size of the “Sport Fish” that guy caught - WOW!






“A planned trip is a more pleasant trip” and $10 for a room is sure sounds pleasant to me.






To go with our vintage Disneyland Hotel brochure here’s the cover of the Winter 1957-58 edition of Disneyland Holiday.






More explanation of “Disneyland Now Open Every Day” – I wonder how they explained why they went back to being closed Monday’s and Tuesday’s in the winter months for the next few decades?






This panorama shot reminds me of Major's fantastic April fools post from 2008 (link).





Come back Bonus Sunday for the entire Winter 1957-58 issue of Disneyland Holiday.

1997 Disneyland Publicity Photos

For today’s post we’ve got some semi-vintage Disneyland publicity photos from 1997. Light Magic “A Spectacular Journey” certainly had a great logo, just a small part of the big $$$ Disney spent on this “Nighttime Street Extravaganza”.






Normally you could argue this “concept art” is awful, but compare it to photos of the real thing and suddenly this looks great!






Speaking of lots of money spent, didn’t Disneyland carve out an entire attraction sized area for this show and now it sits rarely used? Is Phoebus played by Peter Scolari? Don’t laugh, he was working for the mouse in 1997 (link).






Back to sanity, here are a few “normal” photos. Where is the “Raging Waterfall” on Big Thunder, don’t tell me it’s that weird dripping thing on the first lift-hill?






“Sail past… cascading waterfalls” only for one more year (link).






“Fun & Sun”, hey those huge beach balls do look like fun!

Castle View's - 1960

We’ve got a few interesting vintage snap shots to look at today. These first two I suppose could be described as “before and after” of “after and before”. The first photo is dated December 1960.






The second photo is (scream it with me) undated. It appears to show quite a bit more overgrown landscaping than the December 1960 photo above; this must be “after”?






This close up of the Castle is also undated.






The Castle as viewed from the left side, dated August 1960. I like how this set of photos is nearly devoid of people, my kind of photographer!