Disneyland will begin showing the Walt Disney and Abe Lincoln audio-animatronic shows in rotation after the Great Emancipator took a 10-month hiatus so the Anaheim theme park’s founder could hog the spotlight during the 70th anniversary celebration.
“Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” returned to the Main Street Opera House at Disneyland for a full day’s run on Friday, Feb. 13 from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. while “Walt Disney — A Magical Life” remains dark for the day.
Starting on Saturday, Feb. 14, the daily schedule will feature “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” from 8 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and “Walt Disney — A Magical Life” from 2 to 8 p.m.
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“Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” closed in April so Walt Disney Imagineering could install “Walt Disney — A Magical Life” in the Main Street Opera House.
Imagineering redesigned the Main Street Opera House with a turntable stage to allow “Walt Disney — A Magical Life” and “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” to play in rotation.
The world’s first Walt Disney Audio-Animatronics figure debuted on July 17 at the Main Street Opera House as part of Disneyland’s 70th anniversary celebration.
“A Magical Life” allows visitors to sit down in Walt Disney’s office and listen to the park’s visionary founder talk about how he got started, his thoughts on his career and his dreams for the future.
The “Walt Disney — A Magical Life” animatronic show initially ran solo for seven months while “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” remained dark.
Disneyland occasionally ran the “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” show whenever the Walt Disney animatronic malfunctioned during the 70th anniversary run.
Keeping “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” in the Main Street Opera House was important to Imagineering.
“Being able to keep Lincoln in his home was really great,” Imagineering Portfolio Executive Creative Producer Jeff Shaver-Moskowitz said during the media preview in July. “It’s so important to Disneyland and the DNA of Disneyland.”
Disneyland filed building permits in 2024 valued at $5 million with the city of Anaheim that called for an existing platform to be replaced with a new turntable in the Main Street Opera House, according to city records.
The former platform raised and lowered the Lincoln animatronic so the theater could be used for traditional stage presentations.
(Photo by Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register/SCNG)
“Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” was inspired by a pavilion exhibit at the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair that displayed wax figures of all the U.S. presidents with recorded voice tracks explaining their roles in American history. Walt Disney thought he could bring the presidents to life for the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair with Imagineering’s burgeoning audio-animatronic technology.
When the $4.4 million price tag to build animatronic figures of all the U.S. presidents proved too expensive, Walt Disney decided to press forward with a show based around Lincoln as the centerpiece attraction in the Illinois state pavilion at the New York World’s Fair.
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After the World’s Fair, “Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln” was transported cross-country to Disneyland and set up in the Main Street Opera House.