Let freedom ring

During the development of Walt Disney World the appeal of Disney-style entertainment on the east coast was in question. Guests were pouring into Disneyland but the company was unsure if a similar style park would appeal to the clearly more discerning tastes of sophisticated east coasters (have we mentioned we're from the east coast?).

Fearing an East Coast/West Coast entertainment battle on the scale of Tupac and Biggie, Walt decided to test the waters. He wisely solicited a number of companies and offered to create attractions for them for New York's 1964-1965 World's Fair. His Imagineers created the WEDway PeopleMover for the Ford Pavilion, The Carousel of Progress for the GE Pavilion, It’s a Small World for the UNICEF Pavilion (sponsored by Pepsi-Cola), and a robotic Abraham Lincoln which could recite the Gettysburg Address for the State of Illinois Pavilion.

It turns out Walt's concerns were unnecessary. All of the attractions were wildly popular, especially the talking (and standing) Lincoln. Eventually the attraction was developed into The Hall of Presidents in the Magic Kingdom's Liberty Square which was unique to Walt Disney World. While Disneyland guests enjoyed New Orleans Square Imagineers felt that Walt Disney World guests would not find a New Orleans themed area interesting due to the proximity of Florida to the real thing. They needed an analogous land. 

The idea of colonial America was originally to be an annex to Main Street in Disneyland but eventually became the main theme of Liberty Square. Ironically, when we here at Second Star Films are touring Walt Disney World we tend to breeze through Liberty Square without much thought. Being from Philadelphia we've got colonial history coming out of our ears and at first glance there isn't much there. Liberty Square is almost literally a square connecting to Fantasyland, Frontierland and the hub. We tend to bolt directly to The Haunted Mansion or high tail it through to get to Splash Mountain without so much as a pause. Turns out, we've been missing some fairly interesting things. Who knew?!

The land is painstakingly detailed and thematically carries guests from America’s east to the “wild west” of Frontierland. For authenticity, rocks used in the Liberty Square Bridge from the hub into Liberty Square were quarried six miles from where George Washington crossed the Delaware River in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Despite living approximately twenty minutes from Valley Forge we could not confirm nor deny the veracity of that statement. You would not believe the looks you get when you show up at local quarries and begin asking about rocks which may or may not have been used to build a bridge in a theme park 1000 miles away 40 years ago.

The architecture of the buildings takes guests through a historical and geographical progression starting in upstate New York during the 1600s and ending in the west during the 1800s. The doors in Liberty Square have two digit numbers over them. Adding 18 to the front of these gives the year that style of house would have been popular. The date above The Hall of Presidents, 1787, is the year the United States Constitution was ratified.

The shutters on the windows of the buildings hang at an angle because in Colonial days the upper hinges tended to be made of leather straps to conserve metal. The straps would eventually wear and the shutters would sag.

We've heard rumors that a silver plate can be found between Liberty Square and Fantasyland which represents the Mississippi River. Search as we did we, including the conscripted services of a game but ultimately confused Cast Member, we were unable to find any such plate. So, for the sake of jounalistic integrity we did not include any reference to or mention of said plate in our video for Liberty Square. If you happen to find it, please send us a pic and a detailed description of where to locate it.

Also, we've been told that the tan areas running through the walkwasy of the land are represenatative of when our intrepid forefathers would dump their waste into the street. True or not, we've decided to ignore it completely since that's really gross.

The centerpiece of Liberty Square, the Liberty Tree, a 135 year old oak tree, has 13 lanterns hung from it, one for each of the 13 original colonies. The nearby Liberty Bell is a replica made from the same mold as the original in Philadelphia.

A building near The Hall of Presidents representing Boston’s Old North Church tower features two illuminated lamps as a subtle allusion to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous poem “Paul Revere’s Ride”. In the poem Revere instructs a friend to hang a lantern in the belfry arch to signal if the British will march by land or sea. “One if by land and two if by sea.” Guests may also notice a rifle hanging in a nearby window. During the Revolutionary War, this was a sign indicating that townsmen were home and ready to answer the call to arms.



Check out the Second Star Films™ Hidden Disney page for a video about Liberty Square as well as many other attractions.