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By Michael - May 9th, 2011 Germany, at a distance
When planners at WED Enterprises were selecting the initial lineup of pavilions for Epcot Center’s World Showcase, they knew that Germany would be included. This decision might seem obvious, considering the nation’s prominence on the world stage, as well as its familiarity to American audiences. Disney’s key reasons for including [...]
By Michael - May 8th, 2011 Sponsors were critical to the creation of Epcot Center, and some of the very first corporations to sign on for the park were German companies. One of the earliest was Goebel, who sponsored the Glas und Porzellan shop in the Germany pavilion. It remained an Epcot presence until 2010, when the shop closed to make [...]
By Michael - February 1st, 2011 In his recent Imaginerding review of Steve Alcorn’s excellent Building A Better Mouse: The Story Of The Electronic Imagineers Who Designed Epcot, George Taylor linked a number of fantastic snapshots on Alcorn’s site that depict the creation of EPCOT Center.
You should head over to Alcorn’s site posthaste to investigate, but I’m going to reprint [...]
By Michael - October 26th, 2010 Concept art for shopping street in the Israel pavilion at EPCOT Center by Herb Ryman
Another press release from the sad file of fruitless announcements, this excited blurb comes from November of 1981:
ISRAEL JOINS COMMUNITY OF NATIONS AT EPCOT CENTER
Representatives of the State of Israel and Walt Disney World signed an agreement for [...]
By Michael - August 4th, 2010 Herb Ryman at work on EPCOT Center’s Mexico pavilion
Herb Ryman’s work on EPCOT City for Walt Disney ended well before Walt Disney World’s debut in 1971. Ryman departed WED Enterprises that year, and set off on another round of world travels. He returned to the halls of Imagineering in 1976, though, in order to [...]
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Four Decades of Magic

Essays about the first forty years of Walt Disney World, including two pieces by yours truly. Available in print and for Kindle.
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