Fantastic Creatures May Greet You to Mars (1957)

The February 28, 1957 Lowell Sun (Lowell, MA) ran a fantastic piece about the plant and animal life we would likely find on Mars. A map that accompanied the piece even laid out where the likely vegetation, deserts, canals and oases were located.

The 1957 Disneyland TV episode Mars and Beyond shared many of the same assumptions about animal life on the Red Planet. Of course it would be difficult for life to sustain itself on Mars, that's why they're Martians!

An excerpt from the Lowell Sun piece appears below.

The Martians greeting the first space travelers from Earth may be fantastic furry little creatures peeking out of lonesome burrows.

Speculation that Mars might have animal life is contained in a book, "A Space Traveler's Guide to Mars," by Dr. I. M. Levitt of the Fels Planetarium, Philadelphia.

But these Martians would be astonishingly different from earthly animals, living by a different chemistry of life dictated by severe conditions of our Red Planet neighbor.

Many astronomers think Mars has some kind of plant life. One bit of evidence is changes in blue-green areas, which could be plant life spreading with the seasons over the Martian deserts.

And if there are plants, are there animals that feed on them and help decompose dead plants?

See also:
Animal Life on Mars (1957)
Plant Life on Mars (1957)
Mars and Beyond (1957)

Disneyland Jetpack (1966)

The Disneyland TV program aired Disneyland Around the Seasons on December 18, 1966. The episode contained this great clip of a man wearing a jetpack (or rocketbelt), flying around Disneyland. The entire program can be found on the DVD Disneyland: Secrets, Stories & Magic.

See also:
Jet Pack Video (1966)
Rebuilding Tomorrowland (1966)
Bell Aviation's Rocket Pack (1964)
Jet Flying Belt is Devised to Carry Man for Miles (New York Times, 1968)
Where's My Jetpack? (2007)
Tomorrowland, Disneyland Opening Day (1955)
How Do You Like Them Apples?
The Tomorrowland That Never Was (1965)
Rocket to the Moon (1967)

Magic Highway U.S.A. Publicity Stills (1958)

Kevin Kidney has uploaded some amazing Magic Highway, U.S.A. images taken straight from publicity stills of the era. He cleaned them up, spending upwards of an hour and a half on each image. As a Disney artist for over 22 years, Kevin's Flickr account also contains great examples of his work on Disney collectibles. Kevin currently works as a freelance designer.







See also:
Disney's Magic Highway, U.S.A. (1958)
Farm to Market (1958)
Magic Highway, U.S.A. Segment (1958)
Disneyland to Take to Highways Tonight (1958)

Magic Highway, U.S.A. Segment (1958)

Jeff over at 2719 Hyperion consistently has great analysis of all-things-Disney. Last week he posted the futuristic segment from the 1958 Disneyland TV show, "Magic Highway, U.S.A." Provided it stays up, I recommend checking out the clip because you can't find this program anywhere else.

You may remember the clips that we've looked at here on the Paleo-Future blog, including the commute as well as farm to market.

See also:
Disney's Magic Highway, U.S.A. (1958)
Farm to Market (1958)

Farm to Market (1958)

This clip from the May 14, 1958 Disneyland TV episode, "Magic Highway, U.S.A." depicts the high-speed freightways of the future. Simplicity and efficiency reign supreme in this streamlined future of yesteryear.

These non-stop farm-to-market freightways will bring remote agricultural areas to within minutes of metropolitan markets. At transfer points within the city, individual units automatically separate from the truck-train for immediate delivery to shopping centers.





See also:
Disney's Magic Highway, U.S.A. (1958)
Superfarm of the Year 2020 (1979)
Delicious Waste Liquids of the Future (1982)
Robot Farms (1982)

Man and the Moon (1955)

The Disneyland TV show episode Man and the Moon originally aired December 28, 1955 and was released theatrically outside the United States.

The entire episode prominently showcases Werhner von Braun's torodial space station. The clip below dramatizes what a space mission may involve some day in the distant (paleo)future.

You can view a clip of the program here and you can find this program in its entirety on the DVD set Walt Disney Treasures - Tomorrowland: Disney in Space and Beyond.

See also:
Challenge of Outer Space (circa 1950s)
Mars and Beyond (1957)
Animal Life on Mars (1957)
Plant Life on Mars (1957)

Disneyland to Take to Highways Tonight (1958)

The TV critic for the Albuquerque Tribune (Albuquerque, New Mexico) wasn't a fan of the Disneyland TV episode, "Magic Highway, U.S.A." The review in May 14, 1958 proclaims that, "the future for driver's is hideous if Disney artists have their way." Below is the full review.

Walt Disney's Disneyland goes a-motoring in "Magic Highway, U.S.A." with a kaledoscopic history of the road, its present cluttered state and some future projections. The future for driver's is hideous if Disney artists have their way, though they don't mean it to be. There are also some road-building shots for any folks at home who might want to build roads. These sequences are rather interminable. Perhaps an hour was too long for the subject matter, with the Southern California Horseless Carriage Club providing the most amusing moments in their 1904 and 1906 models.

See also:
Disney's Magic Highway, U.S.A. (1958)

Disney's Magic Highway, U.S.A. (1958)

On May 14, 1958 the Disneyland TV program ran an episode called "Magic Highway, U.S.A." It examined the past, present and (paleo)future of transportation. The 2719 Hyperion blog has a great breakdown of the episode.

Below is a short clip of the episode as well as some paleo-futuristic still images. Many thanks to Paul at Waltopia for the video.

As father chooses the route in advance on a push-button selector, electronics take over complete control. Progress can be accurately checked on a synchronized scanning map. With no driving responsibility, the family relaxes together. En route business conferences are conducted by television.


I really wish that Disney would release this as part of their Walt Disney Treasures collection. (Maybe an entire DVD devoted to Disney paleo-futurism?) Better yet, they could offer every Disneyland program on iTunes or use an advertising-based model. I know that Disney likes to make their offerings scarce through limited release DVDs, but the free flow of information just breeds piracy if "legitimate" copies aren't made available.

I'll get off my soapbox now. Enjoy.

See also:
The Future World of Transportation
Walt Disney Explaining the Carousel of Progress to General Electric (1964)
EPCOT's Horizons
Tomorrowland, Disneyland Opening Day (1955)

Tomorrowland, Disneyland Opening Day (1955)

Yes, this is Tomorrowland. And it's not a stylized dream of the future but a scientifically planned projection of future techniques by leading space experts in science.

This clip from Tomorrowland during the 1955 live broadcast of Disneyland's opening day shows the same brand of optimism we often see in 1950's predictions of the future.

You can see the entire broadcast of the opening of Disneyland on the DVD Walt Disney Treasures - Disneyland USA.

See also:
Walt Disney and City Planning

Animal Life on Mars (1957)

In the 1957 Disneyland TV program and subsequent theatrical release of the film, Mars and Beyond speculated what astronauts would eventually find on the red planet. There were some interesting predictions of what animals future humans could find.

You can view a clip of the program here and you can find this program on the DVD set Walt Disney Treasures - Tomorrowland: Disney in Space and Beyond.

See also:
Plant Life on Mars (1957) 15 March 2007
Mars and Beyond (1957) 28 Feb 2007

Plant Life on Mars (1957)

We looked at how Disney portrayed humans living on Mars in the 1957 Disneyland TV show "Mars and Beyond" but the depiction of possible plants on Mars may be even more imaginative.

According to Steven Watts in his book The Magic Kingdom: Walt Disney and the American Way of Life (p. 309):
"[Mars and Beyond] was the most speculative program [and] it veered near the realm of science fiction with its imaginative description of possible life forms on the planet, [and] Martian weather conditions..."




You can view a clip of the program here and you can find this program in its entirety on the DVD set Walt Disney Treasures - Tomorrowland: Disney in Space and Beyond.

See also:
Mars and Beyond (1957) 28 Feb 2007