Carolwood Pacific Railroad

"In some way or another, I have always loved trains." Walter Elias Disney, (1901–1966), founder of Disneyland and Walt Disney Company

The Carolwood Pacific Railroad was a miniature of an old-fashioned steam railroad built by an American animated film producer and animator, Walt Disney (1901–1966) in the garden of the backyard of his home.

Walt's uncle Michel Disney, had been a steam locomotive engineer. As a teenager in Missouri, Walt had a summer job selling newspapers, candy, fruit, and soda on the Sante Fe Railway. Walt loved the uniform, the trains, the candy, and the chance to see the country.

It was Disneys lifelong fascination with public transportation, particularly railroads, that led in 1950 to the building of the Carolwood Pacific Railroad. Entertaining his daughters and their friends in his backyard and taking them for rides on his 1/2 mile-long miniature railroad led Walt Disney to include the railroad which formed the backbone of his family-oriented Disneyland opened in Anaheim, California in 1955.

Today, railroads and monorails are featured at all the Walt Disney Company theme parks worldwide.

1 Backyard railroad
2 Steam Locomotive
3 Walt's Barn
4 A predecessor to Disney theme parks
5 Heritage
6 References
7 External Links

Backyard railroad

Walt Disney built the Carolwood Pacific Railroad on the property of his mansion in the Holmby Hills district of Los Angeles, California where he and his family moved in 1949. With the help of his friends Ward and Betty Kimball, who already had their own backyard railroad, Disney developed the blueprints and immediately set to work. The name originated from the address of his home which was located on Carolwood Drive. Walt's 1/2 mile long layout included a 46-foot-long trestle, loops, overpasses, gradients, an elevated dirt berm, and a 90-foot tunnel underneath Mrs. Disney's flower bed.

Steam Locomotive

Walt Disney named his working model steam locomotive Lilly Belle after his wife Lillian

Disney admired the beautiful proportions and overall appearance of Central Pacific Railroad's steam locomotive #173. Roger E. Broggie of the Disney Studios machine shop used it as the prototype for a 1–1/2" scale working model.

Like the prototype, the working steam locomotive was an "American" type with a 4–4–0 wheel configuration, using the Whyte notation. Those numbers indicate the wheel arrangement. The first number represents the wheels on each side at the front of the engine, followed by the number of drive wheels (the large ones), followed by the number of wheels behind the drive wheels.

Walt Disney's wife, Lillian, was always supportive of Walt's train hobby. Walt named the new steam locomotive Lilly Belle in honor of her. The Lilly Belle was large enough for the engineer to ride aboard while taking cars with passengers around the track.

Walt's Barn

Walt Disney controlled the track of his backyard Carolwood Pacific Railroad from a special barn. The barn served as the storage facility for his rolling stock. It was also the central headquarters for the railroad's operations, with a central control console which included a fully functional signal system utilizing the "block" system — lights on the control panel indicate the presence of a train in a particular block and update the signals accordingly.

The barn was also a place where Disney, a creative man, retired to when needing to relax or develop new ideas.

A predecessor to Disney theme parks

I want you to build the greatest place on Earth. And I want a train circling it.

The first train officially ran on the Carolwood Pacific Railroad on May 15, 1950. Walt used the train to entertain his daughters, their friends, and the children of friends who would visit for dinner, and sometimes the adults themselves. He spent hours upon hours working on his train, which he loved. The backyard railroad is credited with becoming part of his inspiration for the creation of Disneyland, first of the Walt Disney company theme parks. The first designs of the park included a live railroad that circled the park, and that part of the design was kept to the finished product. The existence of the Carolwood Pacific Railroad in Walt's backyard only became widely known to the outside world in the publicity relating to the opening of Disneyland in nearby Anaheim in 1955.

In the 50 years since Disneyland opened, Walt's love of railroads have become in integral part of the Disney tradition. In addition to the original Disneyland in California, there are now railroads circling the Magic Kingdom in Florida, Tokyo Disneyland in Japan, Disneyland Paris in France and the forthcoming Hong Kong Disneyland in China.

Walt's fascination with mass transportation led to the now synonymous Disneyland Monorail, and it's sister Walt Disney World Monorail in Florida which serves as a real form of transport with over 5 million annual passengers, (whereas the older and smaller Disneyland Monorail is more of an attraction).

Heritage

In 1999, Walt Disney's famous barn was relocated from his former home to Griffith Park in Los Angeles, where a large railroad track about 1* miles long allows model railroaders to operate their own equipment and provide free rides to the general public each Sunday.

At Griffith Park, the Disney Barn features displays of Walt Disney, Los Angeles Live Steamers (a group of which Walt was a member) and railroad related memorabilia. It is opened on the third Sunday of each month to the public. Guided tours are provided by members of the Carolwood Pacific Historical Society.

At Disney's Wilderness Lodge at Walt Disney World Resort in Florida, there is a mini-museum devoted to Walt's love of railroads.

One of the steam locomotives at Walt Disney World Resort in Florida, # 2, is named Lilly Belle, in honor of its Carolwood Pacific namesake. On October 21, 2003, Walt Disney World Railroad Steam Engine #3, the Roger E. Broggie was re-dedicated in honor of the late Roger Broggie, who was named a Disney Legend in 1990. It was longtime Disney Imagineer Roger Broggie who had built the original Lilly Belle for Walt's backyard Carolwood Pacific Railroad, where much of the fun began over 50 years ago.

References

Broggie, Michael, (1997) Walt Disney's Railroad Story: The Small-Scale Fascination That Led to a Full-Scale Kingdom Pentrex Media Group: Pasadena, California ISBN 1563420090.