Mineral King
20
MENTIONS
9
EPISODES
8
PODCASTS
Search complete. 20 mentions across 9 episodes found for "Mineral King".
Oct 20, 2026
Cindy BurnettHOST
Do they sound familiar? In the summer, visitors could fish, camp, hike or take a scenic chairlift ride to the top of the mountain.
Cindy BurnettHOST
And the place that they decided to try to set this was called Mineral King Resort in Southern California.
Cindy BurnettHOST
And it was Disney's final passion project.
Cindy BurnettHOST
So this is set in the time period between when Disneyland had opened but before Disney World was opening.
Cindy BurnettHOST
Disney World had hardly even begun, like they'd started talking about it, but this was kind of in between the two.
Cindy BurnettHOST
So there was one major obstacle to his dream, and that was the growing environmental movement of the 1960s.
Cindy BurnettHOST
In Disneyland on the Mountain, they provide an unprecedented look into the Mineral King saga from its origins at the 1960 Winter Olympics to the years long environmental fight that eventually shut the development down.
Cindy BurnettHOST
The fight, which went all the way to the Supreme Court, reshaped the environmental movement and helped to put in place long leeching laws to protect nature.
Len TestaHOST
Mm-hmm.
Jim HillHOST
Uh, and yes, I know that sounds a lot like what [laughs] Walt wanted to do with Mineral King back in the mid-1960s.
Len TestaHOST
Mineral King.
Len TestaHOST
Yeah.
Jim HillHOST
Um, but a- again, Aulani's cost overruns totally killed that project.
Jim HillHOST
In fact, up here in New Hampshire, Len, Disney had already optioned property in the White Mountains where they were going to build a resort where guests could ski in the winter and then go hiking in the summer.
Jim HillHOST
And yes, I know that sounds a lot like what Walt wanted to do with Mineral King back in the 1960s.
Jim HillHOST
But again, Alani's cost overruns totally killed that project, which, by the way, if you folks want to see what Disney's White Mountain Lodge would look like, If you go to Tim Delaney's website, and by the way, he's a veteran Imagineer, worked for the company for 34 years.
Jim HillHOST
He was the guy who designed, for example, things like the Living Seas Pavilion at Epcot.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
And then here you have the 1960 Winter Olympics.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
And then, you know, in the, in this Winter Olympics he meets this, a ski instructor called Willy Schaeffler, and the two form a strong bond and plan to develop Mineral King.
Matt ParishHOST
Yeah.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
Um, so there's a lot of Disney and winter sports going forward.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
Um, maybe this'll just be what you guys hear for the, uh, [laughs] for the rest of the Historian shows.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
We're gonna do a show about Sugar Bowl, we're gonna do a show about Mineral King.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
Only Walt and winter sports from now on.
Matt ParishHOST
We'll save it for another snow.
Dan HansenHOST
And we're back.
Dan HansenHOST
A few months ago, we were doing a show and I brought up the Mineral King Ski Resort.
Dan HansenHOST
And Holly was convinced that I had made up that story and it wasn't a real story.
Jason ThomasonHOST
I'm sorry, but you guys should have seen me editing that show.
Holly StreitGUEST
We'll put those dates out when they're available.
Holly StreitGUEST
Um, and then also the Mineral King area closes to the public in, uh, mid to late October.
Holly StreitGUEST
So those two areas will see you next year.
Lisa D. SmithHOST
Yeah.
Matt ParishHOST
So this is like a brand new thing.
Matt ParishHOST
And it has really, really interesting roots in theme park design, in the Mineral King experience, in Walt Disney World Imagineering, and also had a rich history that dates back prior to all of that that I had no idea about until you did the research for this show.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
Yeah, so in 1954, Disney released A True Life Adventure, one of their big documentaries where they film animals or nature scenes.
Kevin QuigleyHOST
And these are the ones that were like shorts that would show in front of movies and win Oscars.
19 MINS LATER
Matt ParishHOST
You can relate it back to the Fab Five and the way that they entertain people with gags in the shorts through the early 20th century.
Matt ParishHOST
Country Bears has great roots.
Matt ParishHOST
And then beyond that, Kevin, it was supposed to be the signature attraction of Mineral King.
Matt ParishHOST
Mark Davis comes up with this concept.
LeslieHOST
And I'm very curious, actually, how much you know about this place.
LeslieHOST
But I am dying to go to a place called Mineral King.
LeslieHOST
Do you know what that is, Joe?
JoeHOST
No.
JoeHOST
Is this going to be Big Thunder Mountain related?
LeslieHOST
No, no.
LeslieHOST
So Mineral King is actually a location, a valley that's currently within Sequoia National Park here in California.
LeslieHOST
But it was the site of a ski resort that Walt Disney wanted to build.
Gwendolyn SavitzHOST
Or by some special interest in the subject, which was alone, quoting Sierra Clubby Morton.
Marc RoarkHOST
OK, but Morton is a case where the Sierra Club lost because no member said they used Mineral King at all.
Marc RoarkHOST
Hoagland says she uses the place at least once a month.
Gwendolyn SavitzHOST
Yes, that is an issue with the majority and the dissent pushes on it hard.