The Future is Then

I got nostalgic over a font today.

Seriously, a FONT.

It was what its designers called "World Bold" and was used as the main font for the "Future World" portion of Disney's EPCOT Center when the park opened in 1982. I guess that's where it's most recognizable anyway (with the exception of, possibly, the credits of Close Encounters of the Third Kind). I like to think of it as a catch-all futuristic font, at least as far as futuristic fonts of my childhood are concerned.

Anyway, curing my nostalgia jones for World Bold got me on EPCOT Center itself. I'm old enough to remember when the park was relatively new, visiting it for the first time in 1985 when I was almost eight years old. Now I wasn't as cynical then as I am now, so I thought it was quite possibly one of the coolest things ever (this was during my requisite short-lived space-obsession phase, which lasted through about 1986 when two disasters occurred: the Challenger explosion and the release of Space Camp, which was a wreck of a movie even if I did wind up having a huge crush on Lea Thompson). I mean, the Magic Kingdom was fun and all, but here was this whole park that was made up to be like it was the future, complete with a bouncy new-age synth soundtrack!

Seriously, I thought it was the bomb, even if Lisa Simpson hit it on the head when she described it as, "what the people in 1964 thought the world would be like in 1987."

Still, it was an entire theme park devoted to learning, which you totally won't get today what with theme parks trying to outdo one another with roller coasters (I imagine that 20 years from now they'll be advertising roller coaster mortality rates. "The Coronary: 23% more deaths than any other coaster! Only at Six Flags Great Adventure!") and I know it was some sort of half-completion of an original concept that Walt Disney himself had, a city of tomorrow that would actually house people. I don't know much about it but had he lived to see it in its completion it would have been either a spectacular show or Walt's Howard Hughes moment.

What was there, in the end, were two parks in one: Future World and the World Showcase. The World Showcase was that social studies park that had all the different country pavilions. I was obsessed with getting lapel pins from each, and hated the 360-degree films that were shown in China and Canada. I mean, did Uncle Walt really expect kids to stand and look at a screen when he could get back on the monorail and go on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad? Yeah, I know.

Future World was the real deal and originally had six attractions. Spaceship Earth was the giant golf ball-looking structure that had this whole human history and innovation thing going. The Universe of Energy was sponsored by Exxon and was famous for having animatronic dinosaurs. Horizons was my favorite ride because it showed you what life was going to be like in "the 21st Century" and you could choose how you ended your ride. The Land was all about horticulture and hydroponics. The Living Seas featured this huge-assed aquarium. Journey Into Imagination was about creativity and had a dragon named Figment associated with it, although its most famous feature was the 1986 Michael Jackson short film, Captain Eo. The World of Motion was about transportation (and I don't remember it well). Finally, in the center was something called CommuniCore, where you could get different information or something. The only thing I ever remember about CommuniCore was that it was the only place, on my three trips to Disney World as a kid, where I met Mickey Mouse.

Originally, each section had its own logo and Disney really went out of their way to make you feel out of place for not wearing a tan or gray jumpsuit. I really dug the logos. Still do. And looking back, there are few things more 1980s than the original Future World park, but I can't help but feel that Disney was actually on the right track in terms of the park's concept (and this is coming from someone who is going to do everything he can to raise his child free from the influence of the Walt Disney Corporation).

As teachers, we often complain about that summer learning gap, the loss of knowledge that happens over a vacation. Here you have an amusement part devoted to it, and from what I gather they're still pretty good at keeping that original vision together, even if they have refitted the entire park twice over and ditched the Horizons ride altogether. But it is, on some level, that whole interactive, student-driven instruction thing that so many of us try and are either successful or frustrated with and blog repeatedly about. And while I'm simply awash in nostalgia for family vacations from 20 years ago, I do feel a twinge of "how do I use this in class?"

So a couple of decent videos here, both from the same person on YouTube. The first is a 25th Anniversary retrospecticus of EPCOT Center.


The second is Future World in its original glory (well, its pre-1994 makeover glory, anyway) in under 5:00.