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View Full Version : Fate of the Original Moonliner Twin!



merlinjones
09-29-2006, 02:43 PM
>>COLUMBIA, Mo. - Dan Viets isn't the attorney Columbia thinks he is at home. Oh no, no, no - he's a rocket man.

Recently, Viets, wife Sheila Dundon and friend Don Jourdan set off in a two-vehicle caravan as Jourdan's F-150 pickup towed a trailer carrying a 40-foot novelty shaped like a rocket known as the Moonliner II. They were headed for the Airline History Museum in Kansas City.

"I just think this is fascinating history," Viets said. "It was something I had always thought was really cool."

Viets is a 54-year-old Walt Disney fanatic. For years, he said, he had seen the rocket stationed along Interstate 70, just west of Concordia. He even stopped a few times for a better look. Yet it wasn't until 1997, when he read "Disneyland: The Nickel Tour," that he realized the significance of what he had been visiting.

In 1955, Disneyland opened its gates in California, and Trans World Airlines sponsored "Rocket to the Moon," a ride that featured a nearly 80-foot tall Moonliner at its entrance. When TWA built an administrative building in downtown Kansas City in 1956, Howard Hughes approved construction of the Moonliner II to top the structure.

Disney and TWA ended their business agreement in 1962, and the Moonliner II came down from its perch. It was sold to Spacecraft Co., a business that used the metal figure to promote its camper-shell and recreational-vehicle operation. Spacecraft later moved to Concordia.

The Moonliner II eventually became an I-70 landmark that Viets purchased in 1997. He declines to say how much it cost.

"I spent a lot more - many, many times more - restoring it," he said. "If I had known how much it was going to cost me, I wouldn't have done it."<<

...read more at...

http://www.belleville.com/mld/belleville/news/state/15635326.htm

wardkimballfan
09-29-2006, 04:12 PM
So, from what I can tell, this guy has, not the actual original Moonliner from Tomorrowland 1955, but a half-size replica of it, approved by Howard Hughes, that was put atop TWA's Kansas City administrative building in 1956 and was taken down in 1962. And he's restored it and lent it to a museum indefinitely, so all may come and gaze upon it. That's pretty darn cool.

Alex S.
10-01-2006, 01:28 PM
That is correct. Somewhere on MousePlanet you should be able to find photos of Viets' Moonliner from his first public exhibition of it in 2001 at Marceline, Missouri's 100th Walt Disney birthday celebration.

I'm pretty sure we published photos but if not somewhere I have about 100 of them, both being hauled down Marceline's Main Street and set up in Marceline's Walt Disney Park (only feet away from the Midget Autopia track that was build when Disney donated that ride to the town way back when).

Opus1guy
10-01-2006, 01:50 PM
That is correct. Somewhere on MousePlanet you should be able to find photos of Viets' Moonliner from his first public exhibition of it in 2001 at Marceline, Missouri's 100th Walt Disney birthday celebration.

I was there for that event and I didn't see it! How could I have missed a 40 foot tall Moonliner!!!??? I went everywhere in Marceline that weekend. I must have been blind!

I feel like that old joke punchline: "What elephant?"

:)

I do recall that weekend occurred shortly after airlines started flying again after the 9/11 tragady...and a lot of the Disney people I was going to be traveling with to Marceline had to cancel their flights because the Company was discouraging many of them due to (then) continuing safety concerns (I did see a handful of Disney folks there, however). And I believe the overall turnout was much lower than expected because of other folks canceling their trips. Which was really sad because the organizers had been working so hard on this for years prior. :( But everyone that did make it sure seemed to have a great time! That town knows how to make a mean Buffalo Burger! :)

Alex S.
10-01-2006, 02:14 PM
Yes, I felt really bad for the event organizers because of that. Turnout was definitely depressed and several invited guests weren't able to make it because of travel restrictions/difficulties.

On the other hand, it was first event I ever covered as "press" and because all the big press organizations were otherwise occupied and distracted we ended up being treated very, very well.

Here's one of the aritcles (http://www.mouseplanet.com/more/mm011004.htm) we published from that trip. I thought this was article that had the photos of the Moonliner but it doesn't. I now fear we never ran them. I'll have to track them down when I have time later.

We were in the press office talking to the event organizers when out in the street came driving by the moonliner on its side on a trailer. Did quite a double take.

I haven't checked in a while, but at that time Dan Viets and another collector had purchased the old Laugh-O-Grams building in Kansas City and were trying to raise money for restoration and opening of a museum. As part of the same trip we went down to KC and looked at the building.

Opus1guy
10-01-2006, 02:16 PM
I just did a Google search and came up with this article:

http://www.kshb.com/kshb/nw_local_news/article/0,1925,KSHB_9424_5029155,00.html

...that has a couple of photos, but also mentions something the article linked to in the original post wasn't very clear on...and that's that Dan's copy is apparently going back on top of the same old TWA building it came off of. I guess I could assume that that's the Airline History Museum mentioned in that first article?

Also...I found the MousePlanet photo that has the caption that says it was at Walt's 100th celebration (part of a John Hench story):

http://www.mouseplanet.com/articles.php?art=fm040210sh

But again...I sure don't recall it being there. Perhaps it wasn't installed until after the 100th celebration weekend...but sometime later still during the 100th year? The MousePlanet article on the 100th celebration sure doesn't mention anything about the Moonliner either:

http://www.mouseplanet.com/more/mm011004.htm

...so I'm starting to feel my memory wasn't so bad, after all.

:)

Edited to add: Alex...looks like we were typing at the same time. I might have been out at the farm or someplace else when it came down the street or something. But I don't recall seeing it or hearing anything about it. And certainly didn't see it on display anywhere. Guess I just missed it due to being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Alex S.
10-01-2006, 02:35 PM
Yeah, you must have missed it. We were there for only three days, the days of the actual celebration and I photographed it extensively. It was down by the end of the park where they had the corn maze.

Opus1guy
10-25-2006, 02:35 PM
Hey! Now I got my very own!

Sorta.

As many of you know...the Disneyland Moonliner was not always the TWA Moonliner. After TWA withdrew from the park, Douglas Aircraft took over sponsorship of the attraction and the Moonliner park icon:

http://members.aol.com/opus1guy/uploads/douglasrocketjetsweb.jpg

http://members.aol.com/opus1guy/uploads/douglasrocketjets.jpg

So last week I go poking around at an estate sale, and the gentleman that passed away apparently either worked in the aviation industry, or was an avid aviation model collector.

And I'm not talking about the kind of models that you buy at your local hobby shop. These were professional type aircraft models that were hand-made for promotion and display purposes by the various aircraft manufacturers. I was told some go for thousands of dollars to collectors of these things.

I got there on the last day of the sale and I could tell by the dozens of dusty shelves with the clean imprints of recently sold display bases, that the few models left were not considered hot items by previous model hunters. But my eye immediately went to a little "left-over" beauty that I picked up for a song. An original hand-made Douglas Disneyland Moonliner model that probably sat on some Douglas executive's desk at some point.

Take a look at the newest addition to the Opus Archives (left shot as I found it, right shot now at home):

http://members.aol.com/opus1guy/uploads/douglasmoonlinermodel.jpg

Not quite as impressive as Dan Viets' TWA copy in Kansas City. But still...pretty cool Disneyana score, huh?

:)