Original EPCOT Center

History of EPCOT Center’s World of Motion – Up the Waterfall Episode 31

10 July 2020 by Suzannah Otis Leave a Comment

We have now polished off 30 episodes of our passion project – Up the Waterfall podcast! To mark this milestone, we decided it was time to bring in a guest to share some further insight and commentary. After covering our personal memories and EPCOT Center’s history back on episodes 5 thru 9 (be sure to check them out if you haven’t already watched or listened), we thought it was time for our first “deep dive” into one of the original EPCOT Center attractions: the World of Motion. Who better to help us navigate the history of this great attraction, than EPCOT Center fan, historian, and generally great guy, Michael Crawford.

For those unaware, Michael has been sharing his love and historical facts regarding the original Walt Disney World Resort, EPCOT Center, and more, on his Progress City, U.S.A. blog for years. He also has had a great presence on the original “Disney twitter” where is how I personally came to know him. We shared fond and obscure memories of our time in the parks when we were just tiny fans.

Additionally, Michael has presented at D23 events such as the EPCOT 30th Anniversary Celebration and written the Progress City Primer, all about the creation of the Walt Disney World Resort. We are very grateful to have Michael join our modest podcast, and the timing is great, because he’s just recently started up his own Progress City Radio Hour podcast after a short 10-year break in between episodes 3 and 4. We urge you to check it out for more great discussions with Michael and his brother Jeff Crawford.

In this episode, we take a quick rundown of our favorite bits and pieces of the iconic World of Motion. We then take a deep dive into this original EPCOT Center attraction; including its storied history reaching back to the 1964 World’s Fair in New York. We then go over each section from boarding the ride vehicle to exiting the Trans Center. Michael shares some fun facts along the way so you may learn a thing or two as well.

Do you have memories of the World of Motion? We’d love to hear them below! Did you love the music, the sets, the animatronics? Or just checking out the new cars at the end of the ride? If you haven’t ever been on the ride, be sure to check out Martin Smith’s Ultimate Tribute video, which is the next best thing. We hope you enjoy this week’s episode! You can watch it below:

As always, we thank you for watching and listening! If you enjoyed, please share with a friend so more folks can learn about our growing podcast! Thank you!

Listen to Up the Waterfall:

You can listen anywhere you download and listen to podcasts, including:

(If there’s a podcast service where you can’t find our show, let us know and we’ll add it here!)

Watch Up the Waterfall:

Head to our Up the Waterfall YouTube Playlist – where you can see our opening sequence and see some unique images during some episodes.

Up the Waterfall The EPCOT Center Episodes – Part 4

20 October 2019 by Suzannah Otis Leave a Comment

Happy Sunday! Another Up the Waterfall episode is up to listen to or watch! We are wrapping up our EPCOT Center series with the remainder of the World Showcase countries, and some nighttime entertainment options as well.

If you haven’t been following along, be sure to listen to/watch the Up the Waterfall

EPCOT Episode Part 1: we discussed the original Future World east, including Spaceship Earth, Universe of Energy, World of Motion, and Horizons, along with a bit of CommuniCore East.

EPCOT Part 2: we share our thoughts and memories of The Land, The Living Seas, and of course Journey into Imagination. We also head back over to the east side and bring up the Wonders of Life pavilion.

EPCOT Part 3: we finish up Future World with CommuniCore discussion, and make it from Mexico to Equatorial Africa.

The EPCOT Center Series Part 4: we finish our loop around World Showcase, including a round up of all the nighttime shows as well. In next week’s episode, we’ll round out what has turned into EPCOT Month with our thoughts on the future of EPCOT, and a bonus episode with our promised Show and Tell from Scott showcasing all of his original EPCOT Center books and ephemera. Whew!

Whether you are an original EPCOT Center visitor like us, or a fan, or new to Disney parks, we hope you’ll listen in and get a feel for what it was like Growing Up EPCOT. We thank you for listening in or watching, and hope you enjoy our little corner of the Disney podcasting world. As always, we encourage you to subscribe to our podcast wherever you normally listen, rate us (5 stars would be amazing!) and even comment so hopefully more people can discover us too.

You can also watch us on YouTube to see all of our silly facial expressions, and the books we reference in each episode. We’d love to hear from you, let us know what you think of the podcast, your favorite EPCOT Center memories, what you want to hear us discuss, just say hi, we welcome all feedback!

For these episodes, we wanted to give a guide of sorts to where you can learn more about the original EPCOT Center we describe, if you didn’t get a chance to experience it yourself, or if you’d just like to take a stroll down memory lane.

Zannaland’s Love Letter to EPCOT

Zannaland’s 1983 EPCOT Trip Diary

ProgressCityUSA’s Examining Epcot: The Germany Showcase

Martin’s Vids – Martin Smith has been chronicling Disney parks for decades, and compiling incredibly detailed complete history tributes to extinct attractions. We’re linking to his entire EPCOT Future World playlist, where you can experience EPCOT Center as it once was.

Here are some of the books we discussed, since they are out of print, these are all from 3rd party Marketplace sellers on amazon, but still, some good options and prices are out there. I’m just linking one of the Pictorial Souvenirs, but all of the ones from the 80’s are great fun to flip through. We’ll be doing a little EPCOT Books guide soon, so stay tuned for that as well. Click the photos below to get to the amazon^* page for these books.

FOLLOW THE ZANNALAND TEAM ON SOCIAL MEDIA, WATCH OUR VIDEOS, VLOGS AND PODCAST TOO:

Twitter: @zannaland, @otisney, @tikibirdz
Instagram: @zannaland, @otisney, @tikibirdz
Zannaland’s facebook page
Zannaland on YouTube
Listen to Up the Waterfall podcast

We thank you for your support and for sharing the love!

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases

Up the Waterfall – The EPCOT Center Episodes Part 3

13 October 2019 by Suzannah Otis Leave a Comment

It’s Sunday, so another Up the Waterfall episode is up to listen to or watch. We hope you listened to/watched the Up the Waterfall EPCOT Episode Part 1 and EPCOT Part 2. In Part 1 we discussed the original Future World east, including Spaceship Earth, Universe of Energy, World of Motion, and Horizons, along with a bit of Communicore East. In Part 2, we share our thoughts and memories of The Land, The Living Seas, and of course Journey into Imagination. We also head back over to the east side and bring up the Wonders of Life pavilion.

This brings us to Part 3 (video version at bottom of post), where we thought we’d finish up Future World and make it at least halfway round the World Showcase, but alas, we made it to Equatorial Africa, and had to stop there. But never fear, Part 4 will wrap up World Showcase, including a round up of all the World Showcase nighttime shows as well. We’ll then round out what has turned into EPCOT Month with our thoughts on the future of EPCOT, and a bonus episode with our promised Show and Tell from Scott showcasing all of his original EPCOT Center books and ephemera. Whew!

zanna Mexico EPCOT 1984 — My sister, me, and my brother in the Mexico pavilion, in I believe 1984.

Whether you are an original EPCOT visitor like us, or a fan, or new to Disney parks, we hope you’ll listen in and get a feel for what it was like Growing Up EPCOT. We thank you for listening in or watching, and hope you enjoy our little corner of the Disney podcasting world. As always, we encourage you to subscribe to our podcast wherever you normally listen, rate us (5 stars would be amazing!) and even comment so hopefully more people can discover us too. You can also watch us on YouTube to see all of our silly facial expressions, and the books we reference in each episode. We’d love to hear from you, let us know what you think of the podcast, your favorite EPCOT Center memories, what you want to hear us discuss, just say hi, we welcome all feedback!

Zannaland’s Love Letter to EPCOT

Zannaland’s 1983 EPCOT Trip Diary

We didn’t mention this by name, but LostEpcot.com is a great place to see some original photos and details about the original EPCOT Center as well.

FOLLOW THE ZANNALAND TEAM ON SOCIAL MEDIA, WATCH OUR VIDEOS, VLOGS AND PODCAST TOO:

Twitter: @zannaland, @otisney, @tikibirdz
Instagram: @zannaland, @otisney, @tikibirdz
Zannaland’s facebook page
Zannaland on YouTube
Listen to Up the Waterfall podcast

We thank you for your support and for sharing the love!

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases

Up the Waterfall – The EPCOT Center Episode – Part 2

6 October 2019 by Suzannah Otis Leave a Comment

We hope you listened to/watched the Up the Waterfall EPCOT Episode Part 1, where we discussed the original Future World east, including Spaceship Earth, Universe of Energy, World of Motion, and Horizons, along with a bit of Communicore East. In this next episode, Part 2, we share our thoughts and memories of The Land, The Living Seas, and of course Journey into Imagination. We also head back over to the east side and bring up the Wonders of Life pavilion.

I really thought I’d fill an entire episode with my thoughts on Journey into Imagination, but I managed to keep it under an hour for that part. What we did realize is that we needed yet another episode to properly cover the entire original EPCOT Center experience. Watch for Part 3, where we will discuss the remainder of Future World, and head into World Showcase. If you have any EPCOT memories you’d like to share, comment below, or on any of our channels below to share your thoughts with us too! Below we’ll include more links and info discussed in the podcast as well as places to subscribe and listen or watch.

Whether you are an original EPCOT visitor like us, or a fan, or new to Disney parks, we hope you’ll listen in and get a feel for what it was like Growing Up EPCOT. We thank you for listening in or watching, and hope you enjoy our little corner of the Disney podcasting world. As always, we encourage you to subscribe to our podcast wherever you normally listen, rate us (5 stars would be amazing!) and even comment so hopefully more people can discover us too. You can also watch us on YouTube to see all of our silly facial expressions, and the books we reference in this episode. We’d love to hear from you, let us know what you think of the podcast, your favorite EPCOT Center memories, what you want to hear us discuss, just say hi, we welcome all feedback!

Dreamfinder and Figment EPCOT Center — Dreamfinder and Figment with me around 1984 when we first moved to Florida. Fun fact, this photo was used in the “Dreamfinders” fan made documentary that came out a few years ago without my permission or credit so…yay? 😛

Zannaland’s Love Letter to EPCOT

Zannaland’s 1983 EPCOT Trip Diary

FOLLOW THE ZANNALAND TEAM ON SOCIAL MEDIA, WATCH OUR VIDEOS, VLOGS AND PODCAST TOO:

Twitter: @zannaland, @otisney, @tikibirdz
Instagram: @zannaland, @otisney, @tikibirdz
Zannaland’s facebook page
Zannaland on YouTube
Listen to Up the Waterfall podcast

We thank you for your support and for sharing the love!

*As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases

Up the Waterfall – The EPCOT Center Episode – Part 1

29 September 2019 by Suzannah Otis Leave a Comment

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

journey into imagination 1983 — Zanna with the original Figment topiary and mini jumping waters

When we talked about actually creating a podcast for the past 5 years, I knew that one of the main things I’d want to discuss is the original EPCOT Center. I knew that for me personally, that was where my love of Disney parks originated, and the effect that EPCOT Center had had on me growing up. I also knew that my husband, Scott, had an equally passionate love for the original EPCOT, and that we could both probably talk about it for hours on end. And boy did we.

I initially thought we’d maybe have 2 parts to this episode, Future World and World Showcase, but it soon became apparent that we’d need at least 3 episodes to properly discuss and share all of our EPCOT memories. In this first episode, Scott and I talk about how we first heard about EPCOT, and our first visits, and made it around to most of Future World east. We discuss the attractions in that section, the music and atmosphere of the original EPCOT Center, and of course, what we miss about that.

Whether you are an original EPCOT visitor like us, or a fan, or new to Disney parks, we hope you’ll listen in and get a feel for what it was like Growing Up EPCOT. We thank you for listening in or watching, and hope you enjoy our little corner of the Disney podcasting world. As always, we encourage you to subscribe to our podcast wherever you normally listen, rate us (5 stars would be amazing!) and even comment so hopefully more people can discover us too. You can also watch us on YouTube to see all of our silly facial expressions, and the books we reference in this episode. We’d love to hear from you, let us know what you think of the podcast, your favorite EPCOT Center memories, what you want to hear us discuss, just say hi, we welcome all feedback!

Journey into Imagination 1984 — This is a terrible quality picture, but I referenced this in the episode. I’m the one clinging to my dad’s arm because I don’t want the ride to be over… 🙁

For this particular episode, we wanted to give a guide of sorts to where you can learn more about the original EPCOT Center we describe, if you didn’t get a chance to experience it yourself, or if you’d just like to take a stroll down memory lane.

Zannaland’s Love Letter to EPCOT

Zannaland’s 1983 EPCOT Trip Diary