Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln
| Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln | |
|---|---|
| Park | Disneyland |
| Land / area | Main Street, U.S.A. (Disneyland) |
| Type | Audio-Animatronic stage show |
| Opened | July 18, 1965 |
| Designer | Walt Disney Imagineering
|
| Status | Operating |
Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln is a theatrical presentation at Disneyland in Anaheim, California, centred on a lifelike Audio-Animatronic figure of Abraham Lincoln, the sixteenth president of the United States. The show is staged in the Main Street Opera House on Main Street, U.S.A. (Disneyland), where a seated audience watches Lincoln rise from his chair and deliver an address compiled from his own speeches. Walt Disney regarded Lincoln as a personal hero, and the attraction became one of the clearest expressions of his interest in American history.
The Lincoln figure is widely described as the first fully realised human Audio-Animatronic figure. Earlier figures, such as the Enchanted Tiki Room birds, had shown what programmed movement could do, but Lincoln had to stand, gesture and speak with a dignity that would hold up only a few rows from the audience.
History
Disney had considered a presidents presentation for Disneyland in the late 1950s, as part of an unbuilt Liberty Street off Main Street. The technology was not ready, so the idea waited until the 1964 New York World's Fair.
For the State of Illinois pavilion, Disney's team built a single-president show instead. Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln opened with the fair on April 22, 1964.[1] Sculptors worked from a copy of Leonard Volk's 1860 life mask of Lincoln to shape the face, and actor Royal Dano provided the recorded voice. The fair presentation paired a short film about Illinois with the theatre performance, and it proved to be one of the fair's most talked-about exhibits.
A duplicate version opened at Disneyland on July 18, 1965, the day after the park's tenth anniversary, and for a time the show played on both coasts at once.[2]
The Opera House version ran until the start of 1973, when it was replaced by The Walt Disney Story, a biographical film about Walt Disney that opened on April 8, 1973.[3] Guests objected to Lincoln's absence, and in 1975 the two ideas were combined as The Walt Disney Story Featuring Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, a pairing that, in updated forms, carried the attraction through the rest of the century.
From 2005 to 2009 the Opera House instead housed Disneyland: The First 50 Magical Years, the 50th-anniversary film and exhibition narrated on screen by Steve Martin, while Lincoln was absent again. Lincoln returned in December 2009 as part of The Disneyland Story Presenting Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, which kept elements of the anniversary exhibition in its lobby.
The venue changed again for Disneyland's 70th anniversary. On July 17, 2025, the Opera House debuted Walt Disney – A Magical Life, a new presentation built around an Audio-Animatronic figure of Walt Disney himself.[4] After that show's initial run, it was announced to play in rotation with Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, so that the theatre now alternates between the park's founder and the president he admired.
Show
In its modern Disneyland form, guests enter through lobby exhibits about the park's history before taking seats in the theatre. A short filmed introduction traces Lincoln's life and career, after which the curtain rises on the figure seated on stage. Lincoln stands and speaks, drawing on passages from several of his real addresses, before sitting again as the presentation closes.
The effect depends on stillness and timing: small head movements, a hand on the chair, a measured speaking pace. That restraint is why the show remains a reference point for Audio-Animatronics design.
See also
References
- ↑ The Walt Disney Family Museum, "Disneyland, The Classics: Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln."
- ↑ Wikipedia, "Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln" — opening dates for the World's Fair and Disneyland versions.
- ↑ D23, "Walt Disney Story, The" — A-to-Z entry.
- ↑ Visit California, "What to Expect from Disneyland's 70th Anniversary Celebration" (2025).