Disney World ’07: The Magic Kingdom Part 2 – From Liberty Square to Tomorrowland…and Beyond
Friday, October 26th, 2007
After our whirl around the Haunted Mansion – which Adam did not care for – we headed back over to the Hall of Presidents to catch the next showing. As a Presidential buff, I always eat up this attraction and will be anxious to see the representation of our 44th President during one of my next visits. For now, I’ll have to be satisfied with the speech of President Bush. Our wait wasn’t short, so we browsed the Presidential artifacts and watched Adam get his diaper change and swing on the velvet rope partitions. This attraction concluded our visit to Liberty Square. Read the rest of this entry »
It was at the Hollywood ’80 Sons of the Desert convention when I first became acquainted with the flight of steps that Laurel and Hardy encountered in their 1932 Acadamy Award winning film The Music Box. This short film had been the first one that I had ever seen from my favorite comedy team so I was well aware of the significance of where I was standing – on the corner of Vendome and Del Monte in the Silver Lake district of Los Angeles on that warm summer afternoon, Thursday, July 31, 1980. Although I was only eight years old, I can distinctly remember being at this location, walking up and down the 133 steps, milling about, oohing and aahing, and then pressing on to our next locations. 
Most people wouldn’t know Jack O’Halloran from a jack-o’-lantern if it wasn’t for his appearance as Non, the mute super villain from the planet Krypton in Superman and Superman II. I, of course, have a Superman fetish so I was well aware of who he was. Therefore I had already requested that Bob pick me up an autographed photo of him when he made an appearance at a Hollywood Collectors Show. And naturally when I saw him at a later show in October of 2005, I rushed over to him and asked if I could pose for a photo with him. 
I didn’t get the chance to actually meet Our Gang member Jean Darling until the Nashville convention in 2002, but I was thrilled that she actually knew my name as soon as she heard it. We had exchanged some letters and such over the years, the first being her response to the letter and $9.00 I sent her on December 17, 1985. Jean was offering a package deal of six autographed 5.5″ x 8.5″ photos, nine signed notecards, and her book and cassette tape that she had created as her radio personality Aunty Poppy. The photos can be seen at right, below, and in the posting