Horizons 1 is now departing. Our final destination today – the twenty-first century.
Since Disneyland first opened in 1955, Disney Parks have been practically obsessed with predicting the future… and more often than not, they’ve gotten it surprisingly right. The idea of lifting the curtain of time and exploring innovation and invention has been a driving force behind the Parks, as evidenced by Walt’s dedication of Tomorrowland in 1955: “A vista into a world of wondrous ideas, signifying Man’s achievements… A step into the future, with predictions of constructed things to come. Tomorrow offers new frontiers in science, adventure and ideals. The Atomic Age, the challenge of Outer Space and the hope for a peaceful, unified world.”
Through Tomorrowland, Disney accurately envisioned (and perhaps inadvertantly shaped) the look and feel of the Space Age. As tomorrow leapt forward, so did Walt’s vision, always retaining an optimistic and bright sense of unity. Eventually, though, the idea of showcasing actual scientific innovation became too daunting a task for designers constantly faced with progress moving too quickly.
But Tomorrowland wouldn’t be Disney’s last attempt at imagining how society, enterprise, culture, and life might look in the distant future. Enter Horizons – one of the most cherished, beloved, and celebrated rides ever created by Disney’s Imagineers. This classic dark ride whisked guests away from today and into that vista of wondrous ideas, transporting them into the future they most wanted to see.
Our in-depth Lost Legends seek to tell the full, behind-the-scenes stories of forgotten classics before their tales are lost to time. We’ve looked back on the complete histories of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, the original Star Tours, TOMB RAIDER: The Ride, Adventure Thru Inner Space, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, and so many more. And yet again, we’re calling on you to comment and share your memories to preserve one of Disney’s greatest masterpieces ever for future generations who might one day wonder, “What was the big deal?” So off we go to the twenty-first century to bring Horizons back to life…
A (Future) World’s Fair
For more than a century, World’s Fairs have been landmark cultural events on Earth. At these international expositions, countries and corporations from around the world come together in celebration, showcasing their newest innovations. Take, for example, 1889’s Exposition Universelle in Paris (with the Eiffel Tower built as its central icon), 1915’s Panama-Pacific International Exposition in San Francisco (with its icon – The Palace of Fine Arts) or 1962’s Century 21 Exposition (hosted in Seattle, with the Space Needle commissioned as its icon).
At these global celebrations, corporations and countries would build stunning, massive pavilions in which they could show off their newest advances to the eager public, who would show up in droves to see the technologies that would soon be in their own homes, roads, schools, and workplaces.
And of course, World’s Fairs are of tremendous importance to Disney fans, too. In particular, the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair is remembered as the birthplace of a number of Imagineering innovations. In fact, the State of Illinois, Pepsi-Cola, Ford Motors, and General Electric had each requested that Disney develop an attraction for their pavilions. At the close of the Fair, the resulting attractions were each transported back to Disneyland as Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, “it’s a small world,” the Lost Legend: The Peoplemover, and finally, an attraction Walt called his very favorite…
Image: Disney
The headliner of General Electric’s pavilion at the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair was Progressland: A Walt Disney Presentation. This revolving theater show was meant to follow the hopes and fears encountered by one American family as technology and electricity became increasingly prevalent in American homes. Beginning in 1900, guests would meet John and his wife Sarah, as well as their children Patricia and James, first in the year 1900.
Then, to the tune of the Sherman Brothers’ “There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow,” an outer ring of theaters in which the audiences sit would rotate around a core of stages, jumping forward in time to the 1920s; then 1940s; and finally, “today” (the 1960s!), with the family catching guests up on the easy-living innovations of General Electric at each step along the way. The show’s message of optimism and change thanks to electricity was perfect for GE and earned them praise at the Expo.
When the World’s Fair ended, the attraction was shipped to Disneyland just in time for the park’s 1967 New Tomorrowland where it opened under a new name as the Modern Marvel: Carousel of Progress. That will become an important element in the story to come… But with the World’s Fair finished, Walt and his team were moving on. The technological advancements they’d been able to make thanks to Ford, Pepsi, and GE footing the bill had propelled Walt even further down a path he’d always been interested in… And he was ready to start buying land.
EPCOT – a vista of wondrous ideas
Image: Disney
Though he’s often remembered today as a storyteller, artist, and animator, Walt Disney’s closest friends say that he was one thing above all else: an optimist. In fact, we know Walt’s infatuation with futurism, and saw it play out in each career move he made. Disneyland, for example, was his playground for experimenting with urban design and transportation solutions. The New Tomorrowland he heralded at the height of the Space Age, for example, was a “World on the Move,” alight with the kinetic energy of gliding Monorails, mass-transit Peoplemovers, churning subs, and soaring rockets.
But everything that had come before was merely a prototype. Walt’s “Florida Project” was where he envisioned applying all that Disneyland had merely previewed. The Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow he planned to build would be a living city, master-planned for efficiency and convenience. From its central hub of stores, restaurants, and hotels, the city’s Peoplemovers would be propelled outward like arteries, carrying residents to suburban cul-de-sacs where homes would be subject to continuous updates by American corporations. EPCOT would be an ever-evolving showcase meant to be a living blueprint for all modern cities to come after.
Walt said:
EPCOT will take its cue from the new ideas and new technologies that are now emerging from the creative centers of American industry. It will be a community of tomorrow that will never be completed, but will always be introducing, and testing, and demonstrating new materials and new systems. And EPCOT will always be a showcase to the world of the ingenuity and imagination of American free enterprise.
Friends say that, as Walt was lying in his hospital bed, dying of lung cancer, he would look up at the tiles on the ceiling, using them as a grid to explain the layout of the city he saw in his head. Unfortunately, after Walt’s death in 1966, plans for EPCOT were shelved. Instead, the new “Walt Disney World” that opened in 1971 would become a recreation resort anchored not by a city, but by Magic Kingdom.
Image: Disney
By the late 1970s, though, Walt Disney World was ready for growth in the form of an unprecedented second theme park on the property. At that time, then-CEO Card Walker began to toy with the idea of incorporating the essential ideals and core values of Walt’s EPCOT – industry, optimism, and futurism – with the tried-and-true concept of a permanent World’s Fair in Orlando. And it would be Disney’s most fascinating experiment ever. Read on…
Sponsoring the future
By time EPCOT Center made its debut in 1982, the idea of a permanent World’s Fair celebrating industry and innovation was set in stone. In fact, one of the park’s two “realms,” Future World, had been populated by eight massive, monumental pavilions. And just like at a real World’s Fair, each was sponsored by a corporation whose message and product could be highlighted within.
But brilliantly, Future World’s pavilions were master-planned by Disney, each relating to an area of science and industry. There was Spaceship Earth (communication), Communicore (innovation), The Seas (oceans), The Land (agriculture), Imagination (creativity), World of Motion (transportation), and Universe of Energy (energy resources).
Image: Disney
It’s no coincidence that each of EPCOT Center’s Future World pavilions was represented by a simple, circular icon. The visual language of Future World was meant to imply that the pavilions of Future World were all connected; each containing a piece of a message… and they were. And in fact, one pavilion demonstrated the interconnectivity of communication, technology, seas, land, creativity, transportation, and energy.
To bring it to life, Disney would partner with an old friend: General Electric, the long-time sponsor of the Carousel of Progress.
Century 3
Image: Disney
As with any sponsorship agreement at EPCOT Center, General Electric’s voice was essential in the concept development for the attraction inside Horizons. Reginald Jones (then-CEO of GE) and his soon-to-be-successor Jack Welch envisioned a ride that focused on Thomas Edison (founder of GE!) and how his invention of the electric light bulb led to the modern company. Disney Imagineers counteroffered that the attraction would need to more generally discuss the future of America before expanding to the larger future of the entire world… dropping the connection to electricity entirely.
But one thing GE and Disney did agree on was something spectacular. Imagineers wanted the attraction and its celebrational look at the world ahead to feature some familiar faces. The attraction would be the “spiritual sequel” to the Carousel of Progress itself. After all, Carousel of Progress traced how innovation improved the lives of John, Sarah, and their children through the 20th century. Now, this epic new attraction would continue their story, following the same family through the 21st century, to see how life changed at the crossroads of Future World’s topics.
Image: Disney
The pavilion itself would be one of Epcot’s most unique. The golden exterior was meant to resemble a spacecraft, with its elaborate and dramatic angles emphasizing its three dimensionality (compared to many other Epcot pavilions, designed with a more “flat,” silhouette-focused perspective) with the roof creating a distant horizon line in perspective. Its enormous atrium would also provide enough room to contruct something unique: an IMAX-created, curved “Omnimax” domed screen (which had debuted less than a decade earlier in San Diego) tilted on its side to create an immersive projection surface…
A last minute budget cut reduced the ride’s budget by $10 million, shrinking the size of the physical building by a scaled 35%, shortening the planned ride length by 600 feet. However, the building was still massive, with 137,000 square feet of space between two floors. The ride inside was an overhead Omnimover, similar to the Haunted Mansion or Spaceship Earth, but suspended from the ceiling like Peter Pan’s Flight. Those cars whisked along 1,346 feet of track during a 15 minute dark ride experience. Designed by Marty Sklar, John Hench, and dozens of other names familiar to Imagineering fans, Horizons would be a masterpiece for Epcot.
Image: Disney
The working name for the pavilion was Century III, a reference to society’s entry into the third century of American history (1976 – 2076). The name was considered too abstract for international guests, briefly changing the working name to Futureprobe (until the medical connotation dissuaded its use). If this very special pavilion were to zoom “out” from EPCOT Center’s specific industry-focused pavilions and explore the future of mankind, it needed an optimistic and ambitious name. Finally, GE and Disney settled on Horizons.
The future is now
Image: Disney
Horizons opened on October 1, 1983 (the park’s first birthday). The Omnimover ride through the future was immediately a fan favorite and inspired a new generation. Horizons established a very clear vision of what the future as seen from 1983 might look like, and it’s a vision that’s been carried on by those who saw the ride back then.
So what awaited inside the stunning golden pavilion that brought all of EPCOT’s themes together? Read on, as we step on board and explore the horizons of civilization….
It all begins in Futureport, where guests board the unique, geometric suspended Omnimover vehicles that will soar through the future. (As silly as it might sound, perhaps you could compare these specialized, overhead Omnimovers to the ride system of Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey. With nothing below, you feel as though you’re flying, turning to face scenes as your elevation changes – albeit, smoothly and gradually here. Like Forbidden Journey, you’ll also transition from sets to screens effortlessly… but that’s in just a few minutes…)
Image: Disney
Pulling back and away from Futureport, your vehicle appears to be flying. And it is. You’re floating among glowing, undulating clouds. The father and mother from Carousel of Progress will be our guides and narrators here, but en route to the future, things have changed. Now a little older, the characters are grandparents, and we’re going to visit their three children who’ve scattered around the world to three very different cities of the future.
The father speaks up first: “Wait till you see the new towns of tomorrow: desert farms, floating cities…. Even colonies in space! But you know, this isn’t the first time that anyone’s tried to make this trip. People have been dreaming about the future for centuries.”
Looking back at tomorrow
Leaving the glowing clouds behind and floating through the darkness, the sky would suddenly light up with the sketches of Leonardo Da Vinci’s contraptions. Then, the sky showed a glowing golden illustration of the Columbiad cannon launching a space ship toward the moon, taken from Jules Verne’s novel De la Terre à la Lune.
Nearby, an animatronic of Verne himself (and his chicken) float inside a lantern-lit capsule, bound for the moon. The father laughs, “Jules may not have had all the answers, but he had the right idea!” To which his wife replies, “He was just a little ahead of his time.” Around the corner, a projected George Méliès moon with a space capsule in its eye brings Verne’s grand fantasy to life. Back to Earth, a gorgeous pop-up-book style vignette of Paris shows people riding zephyrs and standing atop steampunk style towers, all with the Eiffel Tower beyond.
Image: Disney
Just past the Parisian landscape is more current (read: 1980s) vision of the future – a sleek apartment with a window overlooking a glimmering, metallic Avenue of Planets. A man looks out across the plaza as a robotic butler vacuums. Just beyond, grandpa is getting a complete haircut and facial thanks to a robotic chair, while a robotic chef cleans up a mess in the kitchen.
Image: Disney
A new vision of the future is around the corner: tomorrow as seen from the 50s. Sky needle towers, neon lights, hula-hoops, dogs with jetpacks, martini glasses…
“It’s a bit far out, don’t you think?” the mother laughs. And it is – a future that shaped The Jetsons. The father replies, “I guess so, but we always thought the future would be kind of fun!”
Image: Disney
Next, the Omnimover floats into an incredible Omnimax domed screen, surrounding riders in a continuous projected film images – DNA swirls around them, then fish and SCUBA gear; crystals crinkle across the screen; the sun and its limitless energy…All the while, the narrator discusses our increasing awareness and understanding of these micro- and macroscopic concepts, and how they’re feeding the future.
“What you’ve just seen are the building blocks for the future up ahead…. And while it may look fantastic, remember: it’s all possible. And we ought to know – we live there. Come on, take a look at 21st century living: on land, at sea, and even in space. But let’s start off at our place.”
Nova Cite
Image: Disney
It’s our first chance to see the father and mother as we enter their futuristic living in the urban habitat of Nova Cite. Outside of the massive paned windows, monorails and Peoplemovers zoom by angled skyscrapers. Out on the porch, plants are growing through genetically modified means, creating crops that are taller, heartier, and more nutritious than ever. Their daughter is visiting, musing over her job overseeing the variable solar control at the crop harvesting center.
“Isn’t it something?” the father laughs. “Send a city kid to college for seven years and what happens? She becomes a farmer!”
“Oh, I think agricultural engineer is more like it!”
“But hey, with today’s transportation, we’re just minutes away from our kids!”
Mesa Verde
Floating on, the Omnimover has made its way to the home of the first daughter, overlooking Mesa Verde, where endless rows of abundant crops proceed on into the mists of distant mountains. The daughter stands at a control panel overlooks the fields proudly. “A few years ago, this was all barren desert. No crops; no irrigation. Quite a transformation!”
Further on in the desert, we enter the daughter’s home after a day overseeing the fields. Her husband and son are making dinner in the desert home’s kitchen where the smell of oranges fills the room. Meanwhile, while her daughter is in the living room, speaking via videophone to her boyfriend, who’s elsewhere working on repairing a submarine.
Image: Disney
The narrator – a protective grandfather, no doubt – speaks up. “Shouldn’t she be studying instead of talking to that beach boy?”
“He’s not a beach boy,” his wife corrects. “He’s studying marine biology there on the floating city!”
Sea Castle Research Base
As the vehicle floats out of the living room, we’re suddenly on the other side of the conversation, watching the boyfriend repair the sub with the narrator’s granddaughter visible on a massive video screen nearby. The Omnimovers dive to reveal an entire set underneath the Repair Bay – it’s an undersea classroom of animatronic students meeting a seal for the first time, all dressed in wet suits.
Image: Disney
Now underwater, the Omnimover floats alongside the outside of Sea Castle where a little girl is leaned against a bubbled window looking out into the deep. Elsewhere, people relax and have dinner in an underwater resort. Octopi, sea horses, and other creatures hide among the sea grasses under the floating Base.
Pressing through the tall grasses, the Omnimover enters yet another film sequence, this time as the class from the classroom sets off in the water, diving through the kelp farms with the submerged towers of Sea Castle in the distance. In the dark depths, a machine harvests seaweed and kelp from the floor of the ocean as the narrator mentions, “Seawater has become an excellent source of energy as well as being valuable for desert irrigation. Kelp is a tremendous source of low cost fuel! We’ve found lots of good things under our oceans.”
“And don’t forget space!” his wife reminds him. “We’ve found lots of good things out there, too.”
Brava Centauri
At once, the darkness of the ocean becomes spotted with distant pinpoints of light as we find ourselves in space. Then, ahead, scientists are suspended upside down in the darkness repairing a telescope, with a massive space station – Brava Centauri – floating silently in the distance.
Entering the colony through a gravity-free spaceship dock, the Omnimovers enter into a zero-G chamber where a family plays in the weightlessness. In the next room, a laboratory is experimenting with floating crystals. The father and mother announce their departure (it’s their grandson’s birthday) and that they’ll catch up with us later.
And indeed, in the next room, three video screens broadcast all the members of the family that we’ve met in Nova Cite, Mesa Verde, and Sea Castle.
Choose your future
Next comes the part of Horizons you want to write home about. A kind female voice speaks. “Attention Horizons passengers. You are now invited to choose your own path back to the Futureport. Please look down at the lighted panels in front of you. Press one of the three ride choices: Space, Desert, or Undersea. Everyone can choose, majority rules. All passengers make your selections now.”
In front of each seat, three buttons illuminate: for Omega Centauri, Sea Castle Resort, and Mesa Verde. The ride’s finale will take guests into the distant future of one of the three biomes explored today through a 31 second simulator video – a different film for each Omnimover based on the selections of riders. The videos were a simulated flyover of the futuristic terrain, all achieved through cameras flying over scaled models. Those models – produced in 1983 by 30 model makers – were built and filmed in a hangar at the Burbank airport, with the desert model alone measuring 32 feet wide by 75 feet long.
Father: “Well, we’re almost back from the future.”
Mother: “Oh, it went by so quickly!”
Father: “Yes, but one of the nice things about traveling into the future is that the journey’s just beginning. And I’ll tell you something: if we can dream it, we really can do it. And that’s the most exciting part.” As always, we like to end with a point-of-view video that might give you a better idea of what the scenes and sights above really felt like:
Due to its retirement in 1999, Horizons closed just at the start of digitial photography, so videos and images are not easy to come by. The point-of-view video linked to above is simply one of the best we’ve found. As well, the attraction’s cult following has inspired many digital remakes, fan sites, and remastered attraction documentaries on video sharing services that we invite you to find if you’d like to learn even more.
Sunk?
Horizons closed December 1994, a year after GE’s sponsorship expired. In an era before social media (and one where many of Disney’s classics were falling), no one seemed entirely sure what would become of Horizons. The pavilion sat silently for one full year… until it surprisingly re-opened in December 1995.
Why? Epcot – already infamously short on actual rides – had seen its capacity reduced even further by the closure of two fellow classics. The Lost Legend: World of Motion had been shuttered to begin construction on TEST TRACK, while the Lost Legend: Universe of Energy was being retrofitted with Ellen Degeneres, Bill Nye, and Alex Trebek to become Ellen’s Energy Adventure. With precious few rides left in the park, Horizons was taken out of the mothballs to up the park’s lineup in the meantime.
Given that the original version of Test Track missed its opening by several years due to technical delays, Horizons lasted three more years as a placeholder. Once Test Track finally opened in 1999, Horizons was closed for good: January 9, 1999.
A popular urban legend alleges that a large marshland sinkhole near the structure had weakened it to the point of near-collapse, necessitated major infrastructural work on Disney’s part. Altogether, fans understand this as a convenient excuse. Famed Imagineer Marty Sklar did verify the existence of a large sinkhole in that corner of the park, but never insinuated that it was particularly to blame for Horizon’s demise. Rather, Imagineers hinted that it was much closer to World Showcases’ long-closed Odyssey Restaurant.
More than likely, the sinkhole was a convenient story cooked up by fans that made more sense than the truth: with GE’s sponsorship and financial investment gone, Disney would have to pay out of its own pocket to modernize Horizons – something that the company was unwilling to undertake in a post-Disneyland-Paris, pre-California-Adventure economy.
The structure stood, frozen in time, for sixteen months after its final closure. Horizons was finally demolished in July 2000 with construction beginning on the thrill ride simulator Mission: SPACE which would take its place by 2003.
Replacing the future
It’s never easy to say goodbye to an attraction – especially one being removed for being “obsolete.” However, the loss of Horizons rippled through the fan community (particularly those who had supported and grown up alongside Epcot) and shifted the perception of what Disney was capable of. Here are three very simple reasons that the loss of Horizons cut Disney fans deeply.
1. It was a masterful dark ride in the classic EPCOT Center tradition
No one does dark rides like Disney. From the early Fantasyland classics of cut-outs and blacklight of the 1950s, to the sensational, artistic, atmospheric anchors of the ’60s like Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, and the (EPCOT precursor) Lost Legend: Adventure Thru Inner Space.
In 1982, it must’ve felt like it was all leading up to EPCOT Center. It’s there that Imagineers seemed to master the medium, producing a lineup of attractions that remains legendary to this day… the Lost Legends: The Living Seas, World of Motion, Journey into Imagination, Universe of Energy, Body Wars, and Kitchen Kabaret. Epic in both concept and execution, these attractions dared to do away with princesses and pirates. As Imagineer Tony Baxter described, Magic Kingdom made fantasy real, but EPCOT Center made reality fantastical.
Each and every loss of EPCOT Center’s lineup was a blow to Imagineering fans who were inspired by Future World at any age; a slow, hair-by-hair removal of a Band-Aid, piecemeal removing the masterpiece rides Disney’s legendary designers envisioned. And reimagining or even replacing classics is inevitable… but the fall of Future World was all-encompassing, and, unfortunately, not for something better. Which brings us to…
2. It’s a classic case of a replacement not worth the loss
For fans, Disney Parks are immensely emotional places. Our Lost Legends collection is filled with some of the most-read features on Theme Park Tourist, and for good reason! The attractions developed by Disney Imagineers develop cult followings because they’re art; they’re visual, emotional, transformational experiences for those who grow up alongside them. It’s also the reason why fans can feel immense connections to attractions they never even saw in person!
And then, they’re gone. In the name of progress, technology, expansion, or pop culture, even treasured favorites disappear, often to be replaced with something newer, fresher, or more relevant. The problem is that if there’s one thing Disney Parks fans do well, it’s hold a grudge. So especially if fans deem that a replacement attraction wasn’t worth the loss of an original, the “community” can turn against it, souring reviews, perceptions, and ridership. Such is certainly the case with Mission: SPACE, an ambitious (but brainless) thrill ride meant to usher in a new identity for Epcot as Walt Disney World’s park of technological thrill rides.
The problem with closing a classic is that its replacement will always draw comparisons; and for Disney Parks fans, the rose-colored glasses of hindsight often mean that no replacement is truly worth the loss… but certainly, the piecemeal, disconnected ’90s and early-2000s additions to Epcot weren’t. Maybe because they inherently lacked what Horizons had… Connection.
3. Horizons represents the lost connectivity of Epcot
When Future World premiered in 1982, it wasn’t just that its pavilions each contained monumental dark rides willing to tackle massive topics in science and industry; it’s that those pavilions were ultimately connected. Like earning badges, visiting each pavilion and riding its respective dark ride gave you one piece of the story of our collective future; Horizons was the keystone that brought them together. When Horizons closed, it was the undeniable end of Future World’s thoughtful, intentional, and intellectual mission.
It’s likely that most guests to Epcot today don’t recognize or mind that Future World’s pavilions have diverted from their interconnected origins; that Finding Nemo and Guardians of the Galaxy sit, mis-matched, among ’80s originals, which are neighbors with 21st century thrill rides. But for fans, that connectivity; the “big idea;” the all-at-once master-planned design and development; the embedded narrative were what made the EPCOT Center concept so powerful.
And in fact, Epcot’s epic transformation (beginning in earnest in 2020) will begin to draw those connections once again, even visually reintroducing new iconography for Future World. But are these new icons a gilded shell when placed upon pavilions that don’t have anything cumulative to say? And without a “Horizons” to bring it all together, would a message land, anyway?
Does Epcot 2020+ have a purpose? A mission statement? A story to tell? Without Horizons, it’s hard to imagine.
What lies ahead
Image: Disney
The mural above is entitled “The Prologue and the Promise,” by Bob McCall. Perhaps the most beautiful mural ever commissioned for a theme park attraction (of which Epcot alone has plenty), the mural depicts the flow of civilized man from the past and present toward the future. Originally located along the exit of Horizons, the mural seems to encapsulate (perhaps accidentally) the entire concept of Epcot – even though we all come from different places and have different customs, beliefs, and traditions, we’re all looking for the same thing. Together, the promise of tomorrow is assured.
Horizons will always be remembered as an Epcot classic. It will always be remembered as a much-loved ride that could’ve become a permanent staple if only it had been given a little love and a 21st century lease on life, just like Spaceship Earth.
Walt Disney’s dedication for Disneyland called on it to be a place where “age relives fond memories of the past,” and where “youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future.” Horizons would’ve made him proud.
If you enjoyed our in-depth journey to the 21st century, be sure to visit our Legend Library and set course for another Lost Legend. As always, we encourage you to recall details and stories of Horizons in the comments below and on social media so we can preserve this ride for future generations.
