Treasures of Yesteryear, vol. 3
Two futuristic icons of Disneyland's early Tomorrowland
Treasures of Yesteryear is a series that showcases and salutes Disney items and memorabilia of decades past. Be sure to check out the archives for previous posts.
Happy Wednesday, readers! I mentioned in my last post that I was taking a break for the holidays but, uh, I didn’t anticipate it lasting for (checks notes) two months. Oops.
I want to extend my sincerest apologies for leaving y’all in the dark for a lil’ bit. I am, however, feeling recharged and refreshed, so I’m back with a third installment of Treasures of Yesteryear that is — dare I say? — out of this world.
But before we dive into today’s post, I want to begin with a couple quick updates:
Magic Badges for paid subscribers have continued to be mailed out, and January’s stickers will be dropped off the first week of February! If you want to check out this month’s design, I saved a photo of it to my Instagram highlights.
I’m so close to getting voiceover recordings of my posts set up. It’s something I’ve been working on this week so if you’re interested in this feature, I’m hoping to have it done soon!
Alright — with all that out of the way, let’s blast to the past.
For the third installment of this series, we’re taking a look at a picture-perfect icon of Disneyland’s early Tomorrowland, the TWA Moonliner, through a selection of vintage postcards.
In the age of space exploration and discovery, this prominent feature represented so much of what Tomorrowland set out to evoke in park guests both young and old — curiosity, excitement, and a ceaseless pursuit of the future.
The Moonliner was produced in partnership with Trans World Airlines (TWA) for the Rocket to the Moon attraction, which debuted at the park’s opening on July 17th, 1955. The 76-foot tall, red and white rocket was designed by legendary Imagineer John Hench and Dr. Wernher von Braun, the rocket scientist behind the “Man in Space”, “Man and the Moon”, and “Mars and Beyond” episodes of the Disneyland television series.1
At the time of the Moonliner’s conception, TWA was a leading manufacturer of commercial aircraft (such as the “Connie”) that made air travel much more accessible for regular ole folks. This partnership was a natural choice and allowed guests to view the Moonliner not as a rocket that carried astronauts, but one that might transport civilians to out-of-this-world destinations in the not-too-distant future. If commercial air travel was attainable, why couldn’t space travel be?
Until the completion of the Matterhorn in 1959, the rocket was the tallest structure in the park. It had roughly eight feet on Sleeping Beauty Castle.
In 1962, TWA abandoned their sponsorship of the Rocket to the Moon attraction. Douglas Airlines took over shortly afterwards, and the rocket was repainted and rebranded as the Douglas Moonliner (shown in the postcard above). However, it was removed only five years later to prepare for the construction of a new Tomorrowland. Those with a good eye, however, would still be able to spot the fuselage in the “boneyard” at Disneyland’s backstage storage facility up until 1981.
In total, there were four different iterations of the Moonliner. The first version was the rocket that debuted on opening day and was eventually rebranded. The second iteration, the Moonliner II, was a 22-foot-tall model of the Disneyland Moonliner and stood atop the southwest corner of the TWA Corporate Headquarters building near downtown Kansas City, Missouri beginning in 1956. Once the company dissolved their partnership with Disney, it was removed and sold to a local RV company who displayed it alongside a major interstate for more than 25 years. It wasn’t until 1997 when a lawyer and collector of Disney memorabilia from Columbia, Missouri purchased the deteriorating rocket and began a lengthy restoration process to eventually return it to its full glory. The Moonliner II is currently on loan to the Airline History Museum at the Charles B. Wheeler Downtown Airport in Kansas City.
The Coca-Cola Moonliner III was installed in 1998 as part of a Tomorrowland revamp. The rocket was about one-third the size of the original version and could be found at Redd Rockett’s Pizza Port, which was built where the Rocket to the Moon attraction once stood. A Pizza Planet decal (from the 1995 film Toy Story) was added in 2018 as a temporary overlay but became a permanent feature the following year so that the rocket could more closely resemble the iconic symbol from the film.
The most recent, and final, iteration of the Moonliner was built and introduced in a historic restoration of the TWA Corporate Headquarters building in 2006. The Moonliner IV is a fully-illuminated replica of the second model and, to this day, can be found atop the same southwest corner of the building.
Another Tomorrowland icon is shown in two of the postcards above, and it just wouldn’t be right to not mention it. Plus, it’s super cool.
I’m referring to the Clock of the World (sometimes mentioned as the “World Clock”), a stunning fixture that welcomed guests to Tomorrowland and stood at the crossroads of the Monsanto Hall of Chemistry, America the Beautiful in Circarama, and the Avenue of the Flags.
With the help of heavyweight Imagineers John Hench and Herb Ryman, Walt Disney had an assortment of impressive designs mocked up for the entrance to Tomorrowland. Due to time and budget constraints prior to the park’s opening, he was forced to settle with a more simplistic gateway featuring a prominent icon that could be seen and identified at a distance — one heckuva large clock.
Much of the early publicity for Disneyland stated that Tomorrowland represented the world of 1986 when Halley's Comet was due to return. Shaped like an hourglass, the Clock of the World was intended to suggest the countdown to that event. It was a perfect solution given the historical context of the time.
The Clock of the World functioned in two ways. First, it was a fully-operational clock.2 Second, it showed a map of the world with designated time zones. Any guest could glance up at the fixture and be able to determine the time of any place in the world to the nearest minute, and the sun and moon atop the clock and changing color scheme of the numbers would indicate whether it was currently day or night in each time zone.
Most observers of history might associate the Moonliner as the official icon of an early Tomorrowland, but the Clock of the World was actually used more frequently within guidebooks, maps, and publicity materials (i.e. postcards) as being the foremost feature of the land.
Much like the Moonliner though, the clock was removed in September 1966 to make way for a new, futuristic entrance that reflected the rapidly-evolving times. It will, however, always remain part of Disney history as being the largest and coolest clock to ever operate in the parks.
That’s all, folks! I hope you enjoyed this blast to the past. No matter which American coast we find ourselves on, Tomorrowland — in all of its various states and evolutions — is such an interesting topic to discuss and reflect on, especially as it relates to the progression of science and technology in the latter half of the twentieth century.
Today, though, we get to experience it as the future that never was and never would be. After all, “there’s really nothing like today in Tomorrowland!”
If you enjoyed today’s post, be sure to smash that lil’ heart icon below! As always, thank you so much for reading. I appreciate you being here.
See ya real soon,
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Dr. Wernher von Braun was a key figure in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany. He later became a pioneer of rocket and space advancements in the United States where he was referred to as the "father of the American lunar program". He is widely seen as a highly controversial figure for his role in the Third Reich, as well as his lack of awareness and apathy toward escaping justice for his documented war crimes.
Disney historian Jim Korkis mentioned that the clock’s accuracy was a lil’ iffy at times but as long as you weren’t using it to figure out when to show up for a first date, it did the job.