Extinct Attractions - Spirit of America Parade and Mickey's All-American Birthday Parade
Welcome to Extinct Attractions. This week, I got into the spirit of the 250th anniversary by looking at a couple of American parades.
Disneyland has been connected with the American experience since its first opened with Main Street USA, the prime example amongst others. Over the years, they have celebrated America’s anniversaries with much aplomb with this year’s highlight for the 250th being the addition of Soarin’ Across America. I got to experience it last weekend and I feel like it did a great job of hitting all of the American landmarks that one would hope to see, even if it did rely a bit too heavily on CGI for my taste.
Via Harvard
Over the years, Disney has leaned into all kinds of American celebrations, even celebrating the bicentennial anniversary of the signing of the Constitution in 1987. To celebrate, Magic Kingdom added the Spirit of America parade on October 1, 1987.
The parade did its best to celebrate as many different parts of America as it could, with floats based around different regions of the country. Meanwhile, Mickey Mouse had his 60th birthday celebration in 1988, with shows, parades and an entirely new land in Mickey’s Birthdayland. Because of the success of Spirit of America, Disney decided to do something new and combine the two celebrations with Spirit of America being rebranded as Mickey’s All-American Birthday Parade starting in 1988.
Interestingly, the primary change for the parade was simply adding some Happy Birthday Mickey signage to most of the floats as well as adding a new beginning and end float, but let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves.
One of my favorite moments actually came before the official opening of the film when some of the characters from Oliver & Company appeared as a little appetizer. I had never seen any of the characters as costumed characters before, so it was really cool to get to see the characters from one of my favorite films represented in that way.
Via YouTube
The experience began with a band coming through before a little squad of dancers who were on the float of a half-gazebo of sorts that featured a statue of the main man Mickey himself.
The Northeast was the first region to be represented with a lighthouse lighting the way along with some “workers.” That wasn’t quite enough, so there was a cabin afterwards followed by Captain Hook and Mr. Smee on a little boat for some reason. I don’t know how they represent the Northeast but I didn’t mind seeing them.
The Midwest got to join the party next with a giant silo and some dancing scarecrows up next. Not to be outdone, some of the Country Bears followed along in a wagon and some great outfits along with Clara Cluck in her own farmhouse.
For some reason, Donald and Daisy were the representatives of the South with some dapper outfits as they stood on a porch of some kind. There wasn’t too much else to it, but their outfits were great.
The Southwest entered the fray afterwards with some cool floats that represented the rocky nature of the Southwest. There was a prospector with some cacti along with Goofy on a real horse and Chip and Dale seemingly dressed as bulls. But the fun didn’t stop there as some of the country bears were back with another float with some gymnasts.
For some reason, Br’er Bear and Br’er Fox appeared next on the Pacific Northwest float in a logging float of some kind. You’d think that they’d fit in with the South more, but they beat to their own drum.
Via YouTube
Even crazier, Pooh and Eeyore appeared next, leading off the California and West float of all things. There was an actor with a keytar and a guy riding a bike by standing on it all to the theme of the Beach Boys. But the best part was seeing Tigger surfing some big waves because how could he not hang loose?
To close things out, the character brigade came to town with the S.S. Mickey steamboat housing over twenty characters, most notably our guest of honor Mickey himself in a nice white tuxedo. The float was separated into a few pieces to help it move easier and it included heroes and villains for a bit of fun at the end.
All in all, Mickey’s All-American Birthday Parade was a lot of fun and a good way to keep the American floats alive, though not good enough to last more than a year. It unfortunately called it quits in 1989 to be replaced by the Disney Character Hit Parade, though the S.S. Mickey lived another day, serving as the opener of the successor. It’s sad to see a fun parade close, but getting two different parades out of the floats is definitely a win.
Via Orlando Weekly
As always, don’t forget to check out my interactive maps of the Disney Parks throughout the years where you can watch or learn more about all the attractions from every Disney park around the world.
Thanks for reading and have a magical day!