You are hereby invited to a spirited tour via "buggy" of the home and estate of a prosperous yet departed sea captain whose elegant 19th-century mansion in the New Orleans Square was once the setting for some of the most prominent social gatherings this side of the Mississippi. Alas, the sea captain and his family long ago met an...untimely...end. Tended by faithful servants, the home has been inherited by its ethereal inhabitants who are eager to meet you. Several prominent ghosts have retired here from creepy old crypts all over the world. Your Ghost Host is happy to show you their humble abode.
Make your way through the ghoulish grounds, where gravestones mark the resting places of both pets and pests. Once inside the house, please step into the dead center of the octagonal room. Watch as the portraits stretch to reveal the macabre predicaments of their subjects. Is there a way out? When the secret panel opens, flee the octagonal room to the sinister portrait corridor. Watch out because the eyes have it! Then descend into your Doom Buggy, your only hope of escape. Your Doom Buggy whisks you into the darkest reaches of this mysterious madhouse packed with poltergeists and haunts of every hue! At the seance in progress, the medium Madame Leota invokes the 999 ghosts, ghouls and goblins that are just dying to meet you! They're looking to fill the 1000th spot in the mansion.
Attraction Experience
Entering the queuing area through a pair of ornate gates, guests find themselves in the mansion's well-tended gardens and courtyards. The queuing path leads guests past a pet cemetery, a mausoleum with pun names, and a white carriage hearse led by an invisible horse. The path leads guests onto the porch, where they are led into the mansion's foyer by somber house servants.
The guests are then ushered into an octagonal portrait gallery and encouraged by the staff to move into the "dead center" of the room. As the wall behind them slides closed, the Ghost Host (voiced by Paul Frees) introduces himself with an eerie voice: "Welcome, foolish mortals, to the Haunted Mansion. I am your host – your ‘ghost host.'"
With a sudden thunderclap, the lights go out and the ceiling vanishes, revealing the cupola above. Hanging from a noose tied to the rafters is the skeletal corpse of the Ghost Host, illuminated by flashes of lightning. After a few seconds, the room becomes pitch black and a dreadful scream is heard, followed by the sound of bones shattering. As the lights come back on, a wall mysteriously opens.
Guests are then led down a hall of portraits. As lightning flashes from the windows on the left wall, the portraits on the opposite wall transform into images of corpses and monsters. At the far end of the hall, two statuary busts depicting a man and a woman are stationed. As the guests move past, these two statues appear to turn and follow them with their gaze.
Next, guests step into a dark and misty loading area, where they are guided to their carriages, or "Doom Buggies." The Ghost Host lowers the safety bars, provides the safety spiel, and the journey begins. The Doom Buggies glide upstairs to the second floor and point guests toward a hallway with no apparent end. A candelabra can be seen floating in the distance of the misty passage. Near the entrance stands a haunted, moving suit of armor.
Turning away from the endless hall, guests travel past a conservatory filled with dead, withered plants and flowers. In the middle of the room is a coffin occupied by a restless "guest" attempting to get out. Perched near the coffin is a black raven with glowing red eyes.
The Doom Buggies continue down a corridor lined with doors. The sounds of pounding, screeching, calls for help, and maniacal laughter can be heard. Door knockers and handles are moved by unseen hands, and some doors appear to be "breathing." The walls, covered in demon-faced wallpaper, are adorned with daguerreotypes of corpses and a large painting of the Ghost Host. A demonic grandfather clock chimes 13 as the hands spin wildly backwards, and the shadow of a claw passes over it.
Next, guests pass onto the balcony of a magnificent ballroom where the happy haunts begin to materialize. A ghostly birthday party appears to be taking place at the dining table (a dinner plate and two saucers on the left side of the table combine to make a "Hidden Mickey"). Some spirits sit on the chandeliers, gorging themselves on wine, while other ghosts enter the hall from an open coffin in a hearse. A ghost wraps his arm around a woman bust, and two portraits of men with guns come to life, dueling with their pistols. A ghost plays an organ (Captain Nemo's original organ from 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea), while spirits float up out of the pipes and transparent couples waltz nearby.
The attic is an irregularly shaped room that the Doom Buggies enter immediately after the ballroom scene. It features a collection of gifts, personal items, mementos, and wedding portraits. In each portrait, a common bride is featured with a different groom, whose heads disappear to the accompaniment of a hatchet sound. Eagle-eyed guests may notice that with each successive photograph, the bride gains another string of pearls. Just before the Doom Buggies leave the attic, the same ghostly bride from the pictures is seen floating in the air, intoning twisted wedding vows. As she raises her arms, a hatchet appears in her hands.
The Doom Buggies drift out a window, turn around, and tip backwards down a fifteen percent grade surrounded by dark, ghoulish trees with knotted expressions. On a branch overhead, a raven caws at the guests.
The Doom Buggies reach the ground, and turn towards the gate of the graveyard. There stands a caretaker, one of the few living characters in the entire attraction, his knees shaking in fright and an expression of terror on his face. Beside him is his emaciated dog, whining and whimpering. Around the corner, a ghostly band of minstrels plays a jazzy rendition of "Grim Grinning Ghosts".
Ghouls pop up from behind tombstones, a king and queen balance on a teeter-totter, a duchess swings back and forth from a tree branch, and a skeletal hellhound howls from behind them. The Doom Buggies travel down a hill and turn to see five singing busts continuing the song of "Grim Grinning Ghosts."
Next, guests encounter a tea party of ghosts surrounding a hearse stuck in the mud. An arm protrudes out of a crypt with a wine glass in its bony hand, while banshees ride bikes in the distance. Nearby, the ghost of a hearing-impaired wise old man struggles to understand the words of an awakened mummy through a hearing horn.
The Doom Buggies turn to face two "phantoms of the opera," blasting their voices up into the night. Beside them are three other ghosts - a decapitated knight, his executioner, and a prisoner - who also join in the song.
Guests pass a spook bricking himself into his own tomb and enter a crypt where they encounter three ghostly hitchhikers. Passing by large mirrors, guests discover that one of the trio has hitched a ride in their Doom Buggy.
Touring Tips
- This is one of Disney's continuously moving/loading rides, so the lines usually move quickly. The ride system at Haunted Mansion is a continuous-loading OmniMover, which allows for a steady flow of guests. Although this is a slow-moving, smooth ride, each Doom Buggy vehicle is programmed to dip and turn at specific moments, thus directing your attention to important show elements. Be aware that at some points your Doom Buggy travels backwards as it goes downhill.
- Except on the busiest days, the wait for the attraction is usually not more than 30 minutes, and often shorter. During "Haunted Mansion Holiday", however, the lines can get very long, with wait times rivaling popular attractions like Indy and Splash Mountain. Fastpass is available during these periods, but by arriving at park opening you can ride several times in a row with little or no wait.
- The premise of the Haunted Mansion is obviously that of a creepy haunted house, but the ride is intended for the entire family. Many of the scenes are more humorous than frightening, but since every child has different fears, parents should be aware that the attraction features lots of dark rooms, spooky noises and voices, and a few potentially scary scenes with skeletons, bats, spiders, and lots of ghosts and ghouls.
- Take caution when bringing toddlers on this attraction. Some preschoolers find the mansion amusing while others find it terrifying. Before getting on the ride you are loaded into an elevator. Make sure to cover your child's ears, as there will be loud screaming.
- During Disney's Halloween Time the mansion is transformed into Haunted Mansion Holiday with scenes and characters from Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas. The decor is more of a Christmas theme than Halloween. If you are going to the park just before Halloween Time understand that the Haunted Mansion will be closed for decorating.
- There is normally no FASTPASS for Haunted Mansion, but there is a FASTPASS option for Haunted Mansion Holiday. Be sure to get a FASTPASS if visiting Haunted Mansion Holiday. It is a big hit and very popular.
- During Halloween Time at the park Jack Skellington and Sally can often be found posing for pictures and signing autographs near the mansion.
- This is a must see! If you have limited time in the park make sure to go through the Haunted Mansion at least once. There is no height requirement for this attraction so the whole family can ride, but again use judgment if your child is easily startled.
Facts
- The Haunted Mansion opened August 8, 1969, although work on the attraction actually began in 1957.
- The Haunted Mansion was originally planned as a walk-though attraction.
- Since 2001, The Haunted Mansion at Disneyland is transformed into Haunted Mansion Holiday during Christmas, based on Disney's Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas. The Haunted Mansion is closed in September for a few weeks as they revamp the attraction, replacing many of the props and Audio-Animatronics with characters and themes from the movie. Jack Skellington and his crew give the mansion a Christmas makeover that is sure to delight and fright even the foulest fiends. Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas inspires the great transformation from haunted house to Halloween Town. Don't miss the ginger-dread houses and blood-curdling pies as the Oogie Boogie Man and others scare up some extra festive fun. Season's Screamings, everyone!
- Each incarnation of the attraction features a ride-through tour of a haunted house in Omnimover vehicles called "Doom Buggies," preceded by a walk-through show in the queue. The attraction showcases a number of age-old tricks, advanced special effects, and spectral Audio-Animatronics.
- Years ago, the cemetery paid tribute to the Imagineers, much like the one at Florida and Tokyo, but was changed when the queue was expanded some time after the mid-80s, to make room for the handicapped entrance.
- When plans were being made for a Young Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular, Disney bought a hearse for the show. When plans for the show were scrapped, the hearse was given an invisible phantom horse and placed outside the Disneyland mansion.
- The foyer, stretching room, and ride narration was performed by Paul Frees in the role of the Ghost Host. For the Disneyland and the Magic Kingdom versions of the ride, different recording sessions were used in some places. The Magic Kingdom version of the ride includes a library scene, in which a unique piece of narration is used. At Tokyo Disneyland, whose mansion is a replication of the one in Florida, both inside and out, the narration is provided by Teichiro Hori, a movie producer from Toho Studios (Hori also provides the voice of the talking skull in Tokyo's version of Pirates of the Caribbean). In 2002, an imitation of Paul Frees (by Joe Leahy) could be heard in the Disneyland and the Magic Kingdom versions instead of the original safety spiel, giving a more detailed warning in the load area, followed by a Spanish spiel. In Tokyo, the safety spiel is done by the Ghost Host himself.
- The singing busts in the graveyard scene warble the attraction's theme song, "Grim Grinning Ghosts." Though sometimes mistaken for Walt Disney, the face on the bust on the left actually belongs to Thurl Ravenscroft, the song's soloist. Ravenscroft was best-known as the voice of Tony the Tiger, the mascot of Kellogg's Frosted Flakes cereal. In addition to Ravenscroft, the Singing Busts include Jay Meyer, Verne Row, Bob Ebright, and Chuck Schroeder.
History
The attraction's roots date back to even before Disneyland was built, when Walt Disney had just hired the first of his Imagineers. The first known illustration of the park showed a main street setting, green fields, western village, and a carnival. Disney Legend Harper Goff developed a black-and-white sketch of a crooked street leading away from main street by a peaceful church and graveyard, with a run-down manor perched high on a hill that towered over main street.
While not part of the original attractions when Disneyland opened in 1955, Disney assigned Imagineer Ken Anderson to make a story around the Harper Goff idea and the design of his new 'grim grinning' adventure. Plans were made to build a New Orleans-themed land in the small transition area between Frontierland and Adventureland. Weeks later, New Orleans Square appeared on the souvenir map and promised a thieves' market, a pirate wax museum, and a haunted house walk-through. After being assigned his project, Anderson studied New Orleans and old plantations to come up with a drawing of an antebellum manor overgrown with weeds, dead trees, swarms of bats, and boarded doors and windows topped by a screeching cat as a weathervane.
Despite praise from other Imagineers, Disney did not like the idea of a run-down building in his pristine park, hence his well-known saying, "We'll take care of the outside and let the ghosts take care of the inside." For inspiration, Disney journeyed out to the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose, California and became deeply captivated with the massive mansion with its stairs to nowhere, doors that open to walls and holes, and elevators. Anderson came up with stories for the mansion, including tales of a ghostly sea captain who killed his nosy bride and then hanged himself, a mansion home to an unfortunate family, and a ghostly wedding party with previous Disney villains and spooks like Captain Hook, Lonesome Ghosts, and the headless horseman. Some of the Universal Monsters were even planned to appear.
Rolly Crump and Yale Gracey, two Imagineers put in charge of the spectral effects, recreated many of Ken Anderson's stories. Disney gave them a large studio at WED enterprises; they studied reports of hauntings and Greek myths and monster movies, eventually making quite a show in their private studio. Some of these effects frightened the cleaning crews that came in at night to such an extent that the management eventually asked the crew to leave on the lights and to turn off the effects after hours. Defying this, Crump and Gracey connected all the effects to a motion-sensitive switch that, when passed, would turn everything on. The next day when the two returned to work, all the effects were running with a broom in the middle of the floor. Management told them that they would have to clean the studio themselves, because the cleaning crew was never coming back.
The duo made a scene where a ghostly sea captain appeared from nowhere. Suddenly a wretched bride emerged from a brick wall and chased the ghost around in circles. The frightened pirate melted into a puddle and flooded the entire scene only for the water to mysteriously vanish with the bride. "A ghost haunted by a ghost!" Rolly told Walt between chuckles. Walt and the Imagineers were amazed, but Walt still didn't like how the project was coming out. That put the mansion on hold for quite some time.
The decision was made to place the attraction in the New Orleans Square section of the park, and thus the building was themed as a haunted antebellum mansion. In 1961, handbills announcing a 1963 opening of the Haunted Mansion were given out at Disneyland's main entrance. Construction began a year later, and the exterior was completed in 1963. The attraction was previewed in a 1965 episode of Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color, but the attraction itself would not open until 1969. The six-year delay owed heavily to Disney's involvement in the New York World's Fair in 1964–1965 and to an attraction redesign after Walt's death in 1966.
Many Imagineers such as Marc Davis, X Atencio, and Claude Coats contributed ideas after the fair and after Ken Anderson left the project. Rolly Crump showed Walt some designs for his version showing bizarre things like coffin clocks, candle men, talking chairs, man-eating plants, tiki-like busts, living gypsy wagons, and a faced mirror. Walt liked this and wanted to make the proclaimed "Museum of the Weird" a restaurant side to the now named Haunted Mansion, similar to the Blue Bayou at Pirates of the Caribbean. Although the idea was never realized, some aspects of it lived on in the final attraction.
Marc Davis and Claude Coats, two of the mansion's main designers, were in a constant argument over whether the ride should be scary or funny. Claude, who had a life of a background artist, made moody surroundings like endless hallways, corridors of doors, and characterless environments, and wanted to make a scary adventure. Marc, who designed most of the characters and zany spooks, thought that the ride should be silly and full of gags. In the end both got their way when X Atencio put all the scenes together.
After Disney's death in December 1966, the project evolved significantly. The Museum of the Weird restaurant idea was abandoned, and the walkthrough idea was replaced by the Omnimover system used in Adventure Thru Inner Space, renamed the Doom Buggy, a promising solution to the problem of capacity. Imagineers had been fighting the low-capacity nature of a walkthrough attraction for years, even going so far as suggesting building two identical attractions to get double the number of guests through.
On August 12, 1969, the Disneyland version of the attraction was officially opened to guests, though there were employee previews on August 7 and 8, 1969, and then some "soft" openings when park guests were allowed to ride on August 9, 10, and possibly the 11th. The early opening to the public was advertised in full-page newspaper ads, creating the anomaly of either two official openings or an advertised "soft" opening. A special "Midnight" Press Event was held on the evening of August 11, and the ride opened to the public on Tuesday, August 12, 1969. The opening brought in record crowds and helped Disney recover from Walt's untimely death. In the early 1970s, the Imagineers gave some semi-serious thought to resurrecting many of the creatures and effects that Rolly Crump had originally created for the Haunted Mansion's pre-show as part of Professor Marvel's Gallery, which was "... a tent show of mysteries and delights, a carousel of magic and wonder". This was to be built as part of Disneyland's Discovery Bay expansion area.
At the time of its release, the original Haunted Mansion was considered somewhat of a disappointment. Many of the Imagineers were upset with how the attraction turned out, one being Ken Andersen who was responsible for many of the mansion's early concepts and storylines. Another was Marc Davis who claimed that "too many cooks" were making the soup. Park guests were a bit disappointed as well after going through years of anticipation and hype. Pirates of the Caribbean had set a new level for following attractions and the Haunted Mansion met that level. Many wondered why the attraction wasn't scarier. Today the attraction is one of the most popular in the park, continuing to reel in thousands of guests every day. A humongous fan base has evolved. Die-hard mansion fans continue to support and research the attraction to this day.
In 1999, a retrospective of the art of The Haunted Mansion was featured at The Disney Gallery above the entrance to Pirates of the Caribbean. When the 2003 film The Haunted Mansion was released, a retrospective of its art was featured in the gallery as well.
In October 2001, Haunted Mansion Holiday premiered, a seasonal overlay featuring characters from the 1993 film Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas. The seasonal overlay was inspired by the question of what would happen to the Mansion if "Sandy Claws" landed there.
In October 2005, Slave Labor Graphics began publishing a bimonthly Haunted Mansion comic book anthology, with the main recurring story (Mystery of the Manse) centered around "Master Gracey" and inspired by the sea captain concepts proposed for the attraction by Ken Anderson in the 1950s. The comics are non-canon.
In July 2010, Guillermo del Toro announced that he is set to write and produce a new movie based on the attraction, promising that it will be both scary and fun.
Hidden Mickeys
- After exiting the stretching room, examine the wallpaper in the lower corridor art gallery. Hidden within the swirling wallpaper pattern, are several Classic Mickeys.
- Hidden on the ballroom table are three carefully arranged plates, which create a Classic Mickey place setting.
- A Classic Mickey shaped snowdrift has been hidden in front of a pile of Halloween-themed Christmas presents, seen just as the Doombuggies enter the ballroom (Disneyland Holiday Season).
- Hidden in the stretching room's holiday stained glass, are three round red ornaments found on the right. The ornaments form a Classic Hidden Mickey, which can only be found during the Disneyland Holiday Season.
- For Disneyland's 50th anniversary, one of the 50 "Hidden Mickeys" was placed on the front of the Haunted Mansion.