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Did you need a distraction from all of the sad news coming out of Boston tonight? I know that I do. Which is why -- rather than watch that footage of the explosion at the marathon's line yet again -- I picked up a copy of Doug Lipp 's terrific tome, " Disney U: How Disney University develops...

"The best laid plans of mice and men often go astray." This oft-quoted line from Robert Burns ' 1785 poem applies to an awful lot of aspects of modern day life. But none more so than the work that's recently been done in & around WDW 's Magic Kingdom Park . Take -- for example...

Figment's Friend sent me a rather anxious e-mail last week. This JHM reader wanted to share a bit of news coming out of WDW's Magic Kingdom which had really upset him: Did you see what happened to that portrait of Tony Baxter which was hung in the new interactive queue of Big Thunder Mountain...

First up, Brandon S. writes in to say: Hi Jim, I love listening to the Unofficial Guide’s Disney Dish podcasts with you and Len Testa . Even when you guys are touring the resorts and not just the Theme Parks its really cool to here all the stories about how things came to be. One question I always...

The Tinker Bell drone that Disneyland almost got Over the past week or so, there have been a number of stories out there about media companies and drone technology. With TMZ insisting that it wasn't really in the market for a celebrity-seeking missile, Mid-Missouri NPR affiliate KBIA revealed that...

Over the past week or so, I've gotten a number of e-mails from JHM readers about this year's Attractions Expo . People wanting to know more about what it was like to wander the floor of the Orange County Convention Center after the International Association of Amusement Park & Attractions...

I have to admit that I'm kind of a sucker for all of these castle shows that Disney has begun doing in the Magic Kingdom . Whether it's draping this iconic structure with over 200,000 lights to turn it into a wintery wonder for the "Cinderella's Holiday Wish / Castle Dream Lights"...

Chris B. wrote in on September 10th to say Hi Mr. Hill, Great website and so appreciate how you share your Disney knowledge. With the opening of the New Fantasyland Disney has installed a statue for Beauty and the Beast's Gaston. Disney villains have typically only been out and about for the Halloween...

How tall is Walt Disney World 's Space Mountain ? Seems like a relatively straight forward question, don't you think? But the way that Company officials have answered that question has changed greatly over the past 37 years. By that I mean: If you were to ask a spokesperson who works for the...

I know, I know. A lot of you have been patiently waiting to hear about who won JHM's most recent trivia contest. And I apologize for the delay. But I have been traveling a lot over the past month or so. And between covering the opening of Cars Land at Disney California Adventure, "Brave"...

PixiePal 225 recently wrote into say: I've been following the Fantasyland expansion project at WDW's Magic Kingdom for a couple of years now. And while I love the level of design and attention to detail that I've been seeing in the completed portions of Storybook Circus, as a Tinkerbell fan...

Okay. The first field test of xPass / FASTPASS+ officially wrapped yesterday. And while Disney correlates all of that data which they collected from those 4200 individuals, groups and families who agreed to take part in this pilot program at the Magic Kingdom , the Company's already reaching out...

Earlier this week (Monday, to be exact), Bond from Upstate dropped a line to ask: Hi Jim, Long time fan... just wondering with "The Avengers" making a kajillion dollars and receiving near universal love, is Disney ready to go all in with a high profile Marvel area? With Universal Hollywood...

So we're two days into WDW 's first real field test for the Resort's new xPass / FASTPASS+ system . And the results so far look rather promising. Perhaps the biggest news so far is that we've discovered one of the ways that Disney is recruiting Guests to take part in this two-week-long...

"You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality" -- Walt Disney And when it comes to next week's "One More Disney Day" event (which will run from 6 a.m. Wednesday, February 29th right through to 6 a.m...

Upstage: (verb) To divert attention or praise from; force out of the spotlight This wasn't how The Walt Disney Company envisioned 2012 starting out. After weeks of broadly hinting that the Mouse had something big in the works for Leap Year, Disney's PR department thought that Twitter & Facebook...

This week's first Why For question comes from Buddy W. Who asks about a change that was made to one of Disney's Animal Kingdom 's opening day attractions: It seems like "Countdown to Extinction" was tamed down when they changed it to " DINOSAUR ." Besides the movie coming...

It's the joke that senior members of Mouse House management have never found to be all that funny. That it now costs so much to vacation at the WDW Resort they should probably change the name of the place to Wallet Disney World. (L to R) Larry Silverstein, president and CEO of Silverstein Properties;...

Picture this: It's late June of 1995. And the folks in charge of Disney-MGM Studios are racking their brains, trying to come up with some sort of signature holiday event for that theme park. "The Magic Kingdom had Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party and Epcot had its Candlelight Processional...

TikiTerry writes in to say: I've really been enjoying all of these Disney World history stories that you've been sharing with JHM readers lately. So I was wondering if you could maybe talk about the Polynesian Resort 's wave machine. How long did it work? Where was it located? Why did Disney...