Lacrosse Boy
07-13-2001, 12:55 PM
This was one of the opening day attractions in 1955 and one of only three in all of Tomorrowland/Progressland if I am not mistaken.
Interestingly enough, there is virtually nothing about it on the web. The attraction was short-lived and before my time, but does anyone remember it?
Space Station X-1 was one of 3 Attractions to open in Tomorrowland on opening day, July 17,1955. (Along with Autopia and Circle-Vision).
You'll find a picture of it in Bruce Gordon's & David Mumford's Nickel Tour Book.
I believe in 1958, in an attempt to liven up it's sagging attendance figures, it was renamed: Sattelite View of America.
You walked up to a platform with a series of "windows" that gave you a view of America from 500 miles above Earth. Peter Ellenshaw was put to work to come up with a donut shaped canvas of the continental United States complete with "a few tricks" that showed lights of the major cities like LA, New York, Chicago, etc. Like a sattelite that circles the Earth, you "circled" this view. But actually (I think) the donut shaped canvas turned.
This gave way to Art of Animation in 1960, and then in the 1967 renovation of Tomorrowland, this area became the current Circle-Vision theater itself.
I'm sure that Space Station X-1 would be much more entertaining in Innoventions, where interest drops rapidly, and people bang around on computer keyboards getting frustrated! ;)
Interestingly enough, there is virtually nothing about it on the web. The attraction was short-lived and before my time, but does anyone remember it?
Space Station X-1 was one of 3 Attractions to open in Tomorrowland on opening day, July 17,1955. (Along with Autopia and Circle-Vision).
You'll find a picture of it in Bruce Gordon's & David Mumford's Nickel Tour Book.
I believe in 1958, in an attempt to liven up it's sagging attendance figures, it was renamed: Sattelite View of America.
You walked up to a platform with a series of "windows" that gave you a view of America from 500 miles above Earth. Peter Ellenshaw was put to work to come up with a donut shaped canvas of the continental United States complete with "a few tricks" that showed lights of the major cities like LA, New York, Chicago, etc. Like a sattelite that circles the Earth, you "circled" this view. But actually (I think) the donut shaped canvas turned.
This gave way to Art of Animation in 1960, and then in the 1967 renovation of Tomorrowland, this area became the current Circle-Vision theater itself.
I'm sure that Space Station X-1 would be much more entertaining in Innoventions, where interest drops rapidly, and people bang around on computer keyboards getting frustrated! ;)