Bob Welbaum: Rolly Crump, One Special Imagineer
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Part II � It�s A Small World

Rolly said �Everything that we did, basically, when Walt was alive was Walt�s idea.� A good example was the four shows developed for the1964 New York World�s Fair. WED was already working on three shows � The State of Illinois�s Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, General Electric�s Progressland featuring the Carousel of Progress, and Ford�s Magic Skyway. These were keeping everyone in WED very busy, Rolly included. For an example of a typical assignment, Walt felt people in the queue of the Ford pavilion needed something to look at and listen to, so he had Rolly design an orchestra made from automobile parts.

Then Walt came in one day and said �There�s one more piece of real estate left.� Walt described the details: Pepsi Cola wanted to be the sponsor, it would be a salute to UNICEF (United Nations Children Fund), and he really wanted to do it. Then he said �I�ve got an idea for a little boat ride.�

This remark was initially met with incredulity. WED was trying to perfect an audio-animatronic Mr. Lincoln, was building elaborate sets and audio-animatronic figures for the Carousel of Progress, and now Walt wants to do a little boat ride? Of course, what everyone actually said was �Sure, Walt, sure,� and that was the beginning of �It�s A Small World.�

As one can imagine, things moved very rapidly. Walt told Rolly �I�m gonna need a marquis for the front of this,� and gave Rolly the task of designing the Tower of the Four Winds, which was really a tower of mobiles, which meant Walt had remembered the propellers [see Part I]. Rolly produced an elaborate but delicate design that was approved. The Tower was actually built in Los Angeles and assembled for inspection before being shipped to New York. Rolly was dismayed to realize his delicate design looked quite cumbersome when it was scaled up and built to withstand winds of up-to-hurricane force that might be encountered in New York � six-inch-diameter pipes became 12 inches in diameter, and so forth.

When he and Walt viewed the finished product before shipment, Walt asked him �Well, Rolly, what do you think?�

Rolly was always honest with Walt. �I hate to tell you, Walt, I think it�s a piece of crap.�

Walt came back with �No, no Roland, this cost $200,000. It cannot be a piece of crap.�

By the way, whatever became of the Tower of the Four Winds? When Small World was moved to Disneyland, everyone realized the Tower just wouldn�t work with the Disneyland fa�ade. So it was cut into two-foot sections and thrown into the ocean.

While Rolly was working on the Tower of the Four Winds, Walt wasn�t happy with the sketches for the interior design, so Mary Blair was brought in to style the attraction. Working with Mary was a big thrill for Rolly: �She was a goddess to me.� Mary began working, and eventually Rolly and two others began making toys for the sets, something else he had never done before. They made over 250 toys out of materials like Styrofoam and paper Mache. Mary�s previous work had included illustrating children�s stories for Golden Books, so Rolly and his fellow workers bought a lot of Golden Books to learn Mary�s style. That was the best way to make sure the toys they were making captured Mary�s shapes and feeling. Incidentally, they slipped in one doll with short blonde hair and clad in Mary�s favorite outfit as a tribute to her.

By the way, Rolly was talking about only the toys. The dolls that sang and danced � Rolly called them �rubberheads� � were a different category. Blaine Gibson sculpted those heads (all had the same head), Alice Davis (animator-Imagineer Marc Davis�s wife) did a �tremendous amount� of research on the costumes, and all the costumes were made by Disneyland.

Before being shipped to New York, all the Small World sets were assembled on a sound stage exactly the way they would appear in the finished attraction. Walt was pushed through the sound stage in a boat on wheels at the correct height so he could see the final product. It was about this point that both Rolly and Mary realized something was missing � the painted sets looked oddly flat, especially when compared to the toys and moving figures that were decorated with glitter and jewels. So they sent an assistant to downtown Los Angeles to purchase $250 worth of glitter. They slathered glue on the sets and blew glitter on them to give them a feeling of depth. Rolly said they caught a lot of grief from the Accounting Department for spending that much on glitter (proof that some things never change).

Rolly spoke with pride about the impact It�s A Small World had at the New York World�s Fair. Of the top five shows in attendance, four were Disney�s (General Motors was the other). Small World was in the top three, yet was the only show in the top 30 that charged admission (which was $1). This proved that the �funny little idea that Walt had� was a really great one.

And yet �none of us knew we were going to bring this back� to Disneyland. No one realized the true significance of all these shows until, as Rolly said, �All of a sudden we were called in one day,� and Walt informed them �We own those, so we�re gonna bring them back and we�re gonna put them into Disneyland.�

All the other principals on Small World � Marc & Alice Davis, Mary Blair � moved on to other projects, so Rolly inherited Small World at Disneyland.

When they got ready to install the attraction in the theme park, Mary Blair was still the stylist. At Disneyland, this attraction would be placed on a very large parcel of land. Rolly contacted Mary, �I need some sketches from you of what the fa�ade will look like.� Mary sent about six sketches, and Rolly built models from them.

Interestingly, Mary�s sketches were always so flat that Rolly had to take them and make them three-dimensional. Rolly said �She could not see three dimensions, but her colors and patterns were incredible. I learned a tremendous amount from Mary.�

Rolly built a cardboard model first to validate the layout, then a half-inch scale model. It was Walt�s inspection of the cardboard model that provided one of the more popular stories about adapting Small World for Disneyland, and this was Rolly�s chance to tell his version. He and Fred Joerger were getting the model ready to show Walt. The model was on a very small table, and they were trying to position the landscaping. Because there was no other space, they�d set their miniature trees on top of the building as a holding area while they decided on their placement. They hadn�t quite finished placing all the trees when Walt walked in early. He viewed the model approvingly, then remarked �And that idea of trees on the roof, that�s incredible. Nobody will know there�s a building there.� And they quickly replied �Yea, we thought it was a pretty good idea.�

Rolly confessed that then they told Walt the real story; they didn�t want to lie to him. And Walt still thought it was a good idea.

The original model showed a bare platform out in front. Walt looked at the platform and said �What are you going to put on the platform, Rolly?�

Rolly didn�t have any ideas; �I don�t know.� But something had to go there.

How about a band? That suggestion didn�t impress Walt. �You don�t want a damn band! We can�t afford that!� he growled. There were several more rounds of �I don�t know. I don�t know,� until finally Walt said �Why don�t you put a clock there?�

So Rolly immediately called Mary Blair. �Mary, draw me a picture of a clock.� Mary produced a small black-&-white sketch that looked similar to the Tower of the Four Winds. Rolly took that basic sketch and built a small model that Walt approved. From that he built an elaborate working model with music and little figures coming out the back � to that point the most sophisticated model Walt had ever seen, because Walt really wanted to see things that worked.

When Walt examined it, he had a question: �Rolly, how many figures do you have coming out there?� Rolly had nine. �Don�t you realize there are twenty-four hours in a day?� And one more thing: �I don�t want them coming out the side. I want them coming out the front.� So more figures were added and the clock was raised so the twenty-four figures could come out the front.

For the fa�ade�s color scheme, Rolly chose white accented with gold leaf, because gold leaf never tarnishes. During actual construction, Small World used up all the gold leaf available in the U.S.!

Despite being a beloved attraction (or perhaps because of it), It�s A Small World has generated a lot of scrutiny from the public. �You can�t believe the questions and letters that we�ve received,� was the way Rolly described it.

For example, there was one letter from Australia that declared �The koala bears that you have in the Island section would die climbing those palm trees because they live off eucalyptus leaves, and so we want to see eucalyptus leaves in the bear�s hands.� Rolly said his first reaction was �Where did you ever see a koala bear that was made out of yellow chicken feathers?� But believe it or not, real eucalyptus leaves were put in the bear�s hands in case that guest from Australia ever came back.

Another letter stated �There�s no representation of the Jewish people.� Ironically, Rolly�s boss at the time was Jewish � Marty Sklar. Marty said �Roland, we have to do that.�

So Rolly got to work with appropriate research. �Appropriate� meant all the dolls were costumed to conform to a specific timeframe, especially in the Middle East. So they costumed an authentic boy with a Jewish flute, made a set for him, and put him in the attraction. And he just looked like the rest of the Arabs! �We could�ve put a rabbi in there and he would�ve read a lot easier,� Rolly admitted, but that would�ve been out of place. Sure enough, they got the same letter �Where�s the little Jewish boy?� So they took a picture of the doll, photocopied their research, and mailed the entire package back to the concerned guest.

It was the same story during the design of It�s A Small World for Tokyo Disneyland. Their instructions were to make the Oriental section Japanese only. A Japanese girl volunteered to take the project on: �I know exactly what they want.� She and Rolly worked for weeks, building a scale model of something that was traditional Japanese, then sent it to Tokyo. The feedback they got wasn�t quite what they expected: �What the hell is this? This isn�t Japanese!�

As Rolly said, �Some of the things we do are unbelievable.�