Designer Times
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57. Mickey Mouse Airlines - Traveling at Disney

Walt Disney was never a limousine passenger like most Presidents of large corporations. He drove his own car to work every day. In 1955 he had a blue 1950 Cadillac Convertible while I drove a yellow 1951 Cadillac Convertible. I felt a bit funny being the new kid at the studio and my Caddy was newer than Walt's. But that was Walt....not really interested in always driving the latest model.

Walt used to drive back and forth a lot between his Holmby Hills home and the Smoke Tree Ranch in Palm Springs. Disney Studio animator Woolie Reitherman was an airplane buff and a founding member of a local Burbank flying club, Sky Roamers. Woolie suggested Walt could make the weekend trips much easier if he would fly rather than drive. Arrangements were made so that Chuck Malone, a well trusted club pilot, would fly Walt a few times to Palm Springs as a charter aircraft passenger.

On one of the visits to Palm Springs Airport, Frank Sinatra's airplane was parked nearby, with a big picture window and a grand piano visible inside. One of Walt's grandchildren said "Sinatra has a plane....how come you don't have one too, grandpa?" That did it. Buzz Price did the economics, Chuck developed the flight department operations manual based on American Airlines procedures, and the Studio ordered a green and white (8) passenger Beechcraft Queen Air Model 80 tail number N123MM. This was powered by two big piston engines and propellers. Walt Disney Productions was now in the corporate airline business.

Walt wanted everyone to become acquainted with the service that the new airplane could provide for company personnel. He invited groups of employees to enjoy a local box lunch flight in the new plane. I went up with Chuck on March 14, 1963, naturally grabbing the co-pilot seat, since I was a glider pilot and loved aviation since childhood. The flight would leave the Burbank Airport at noon, fly up the coast to Santa Barbara, then out to Catalina Island before returning to Burbank in time to get back to work by 2:00pm.

The guys felt very honored to ride in Walt's new toy, all the while chomping on tasty sandwiches. We had several WED folks with us on that (300) mile 1.75 hour demo flight around Southern California. I got real excited when Chuck turned the controls over to me. I got to actually pilot Walt's airplane for twenty minutes!

Chuck knew I was a pilot, so he always liked me to help out on every single-pilot flight we made thereafter. I made a number of business flights with Chuck over the next year and a half. He expected me to keep a sharp lookout for other traffic and tend to the needs of our passengers back in the cabin. He gave me the job of designing various pieces of custom equipment for the new Beechcraft, which soon was known as "The Mouse". Walt liked to watch takeoffs and landings. I engineered a folding jump seat that could be placed in the aisle just behind the cockpit. We built this along with some other custom items in the Studio Machine Shop.

Walt was busy with forming the new CalArts college in 1964. A plot of land had been suggested for the campus that was located in the hills just east of the Hollywood Bowl. The architects needed aerial photographs of the site and Chuck Malone was asked to obtain these. On June 17, 1964 Chuck, a photographer, and myself took off from Burbank for the five minute flight down to the location. A passenger window had been removed so the photographer could get a clear shot as Chuck circled overhead at an altitude so low that we barely cleared the hills. We had FAA permission, but I wondered how many folks below we scared to death on that buzz job!

Disney was transporting many Imagineers back and forth between Burbank and the New York Worlds Fair Project by airline....time to get a bigger airplane. The Disney Flight Department bought a beautiful and luxurious cream and orange Grumman Gulfstream Model G1 tail number N732G. This was large (13) passenger propeller driven twin engine turbo prop aircraft. I traveled extensively tens of thousands of miles all over America during the following (17) years in the Gulfstream. It became the highest utilization Gulfstream in world wide corporate service due to almost continuous flights weekly to New York and Florida.