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Main Street Windows: A Complete Guide to Disney's Whimsical Tributes
As you walk down Main Street, U.S.A., have you ever looked up and wondered what the names on the windows mean? Although the tradition of honoring people with a window has been around since Disneyland's opening day, there has never been a comprehensive list of them all... Until now. In this book, you'll find a complete guide to all of the whimsical tributes at every Magic Kingdom park throughout the world, complete with full color photos!
- GenresNonfiction
300 pages, Hardcover
First published September 30, 2014
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121 people want to read
About the author
Jeff Heimbuch
12 books25 followersJeff was raised in New Jersey, but lives in California. He loves theme parks, and has written theme for a variety of publications, including several fan sites and magazines. Jeff co-hosts the popular theme park podcast Communicore Weekly, which you can find on iTunes. He also thinks Animal Kingdom is a full day park.
He also writes about horror stuff, produces video content, and more.
He also writes about horror stuff, produces video content, and more.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 24, 2014
An outstanding guide to the windows on Main Street U.S.A.
If you've ever visited a Disney "magic kingdom" park (those modeled after the original Disneyland), you've walked by dozens of windows bearing the names fictional businesses and their employees. What you might not realize is that these windows are tributes to the people who contributed to the parks in some way, such as design, construction, or operations. Having your name on a window on Main Street in a Disney park is one of the highest honors for Disney Cast Members, and is considered by some to be even more prestigious than being named a Disney Legend.
Disney is famous for its attention to detail, particularly in their theme parks, and windows on Main Street are an great example. Cast Member names aren't simply slapped on any old window. The fictional names on Main Street windows almost always allude to either the job or interests of the person being honored. For instance, Roy E. Disney's (son of Roy O. Disney and Walt Disney's nephew) windows have a nautical theme, based on his passion for sailing. Some windows are based on inside jokes, such as Imagineer Rolly Crump's window, on which he's listed as "Assistant Palm Reader" because he used to bring people to fellow Imagineer John Hench to have their palms read.
This book is a guide is all of the windows on the Main Streets of Disneyland, Magic Kingdom (Walt Disney World), Tokyo Disneyland, Disneyland Paris, and Hong Kong Disneyland. Each park is given its own chapter, and the pages of each chapter are all the same color, which can help readers navigate between chapters more easily than using page numbers.
Within each chapter, the book arranges the window descriptions in order as a Guest at the park might encounter them, starting at the entrance of the park, continuing along the left side of Main Street, crossing to the right side of Main Street at the Hub, and then back towards the park entrance. This helps give the reader some idea of roughly where each window is located in each park.
For each window, the book provides the wording of each (the name and slogan of a fictional company) along with a description of the person(s) honored by the window. For the US-based parks, the book also contains pictures of all of the windows listed, and contains pictures of most of the windows from the international parks as well.
I knew there were a lot of windows in the Disney parks, but I had no idea just how many there were until reading this book. This book represents a Herculean effort on the part of the author. Beyond simply identifying the windows and getting the wording and names on each correct, the descriptions of the people honored by each window represent what must have been countless hours of research. Wherever possible the author provides more than simply a sentence about each window honoree, and tries to provide background on each so the reader can really understand the contribution each Cast Member made to the parks. The author's passion for Disney really shines through on every page of this book.
One of the things I especially like about this book is how it names so many of the Imagineers who worked on the parks. While management and operations Cast Members are obviously important to the parks, without the Imagineers, Disney parks just wouldn't be what they are. This book provides names of countless Imagineers who have gone largely unrecognized to many of even the most diehard Disney park fans, and for that, I give the author extra kudos.
Beyond simply being a reference to the windows in the parks, this book could also make for an interesting type of park guide as well. I've seen pictures online of people using the book to find specific windows in the parks, and I can envision many Disney park fans using this book as the basis for scavenger hunts and games.
All that said, I did have a couple of (very) minor quibbles with the book. First, I would have liked it if some of the pictures were a little easier to read. In the case of some windows, I couldn't make out any of the words from the picture (fortunately, the window descriptions compensate for this). Given the challenges of getting pictures of any kind for some of these windows (given their locations), this is a very minor point indeed, but is something I noticed. Secondly, an index of the names honored by the windows would have been a nice addition, but again, given the enormity of the effort involved in putting this book together, its absence is completely understandable.
As a fan of Disney parks, I had been looking forward to getting a copy of this from the moment I learned about it, and I wasn't disappointed. Simply put, I loved this book! I read it over the course of three evenings, staying up (too) late each night because I couldn't put it down.
If you enjoy Disney parks and want to learn more about the people responsible for creating them, this book is for you.
If you've ever visited a Disney "magic kingdom" park (those modeled after the original Disneyland), you've walked by dozens of windows bearing the names fictional businesses and their employees. What you might not realize is that these windows are tributes to the people who contributed to the parks in some way, such as design, construction, or operations. Having your name on a window on Main Street in a Disney park is one of the highest honors for Disney Cast Members, and is considered by some to be even more prestigious than being named a Disney Legend.
Disney is famous for its attention to detail, particularly in their theme parks, and windows on Main Street are an great example. Cast Member names aren't simply slapped on any old window. The fictional names on Main Street windows almost always allude to either the job or interests of the person being honored. For instance, Roy E. Disney's (son of Roy O. Disney and Walt Disney's nephew) windows have a nautical theme, based on his passion for sailing. Some windows are based on inside jokes, such as Imagineer Rolly Crump's window, on which he's listed as "Assistant Palm Reader" because he used to bring people to fellow Imagineer John Hench to have their palms read.
This book is a guide is all of the windows on the Main Streets of Disneyland, Magic Kingdom (Walt Disney World), Tokyo Disneyland, Disneyland Paris, and Hong Kong Disneyland. Each park is given its own chapter, and the pages of each chapter are all the same color, which can help readers navigate between chapters more easily than using page numbers.
Within each chapter, the book arranges the window descriptions in order as a Guest at the park might encounter them, starting at the entrance of the park, continuing along the left side of Main Street, crossing to the right side of Main Street at the Hub, and then back towards the park entrance. This helps give the reader some idea of roughly where each window is located in each park.
For each window, the book provides the wording of each (the name and slogan of a fictional company) along with a description of the person(s) honored by the window. For the US-based parks, the book also contains pictures of all of the windows listed, and contains pictures of most of the windows from the international parks as well.
I knew there were a lot of windows in the Disney parks, but I had no idea just how many there were until reading this book. This book represents a Herculean effort on the part of the author. Beyond simply identifying the windows and getting the wording and names on each correct, the descriptions of the people honored by each window represent what must have been countless hours of research. Wherever possible the author provides more than simply a sentence about each window honoree, and tries to provide background on each so the reader can really understand the contribution each Cast Member made to the parks. The author's passion for Disney really shines through on every page of this book.
One of the things I especially like about this book is how it names so many of the Imagineers who worked on the parks. While management and operations Cast Members are obviously important to the parks, without the Imagineers, Disney parks just wouldn't be what they are. This book provides names of countless Imagineers who have gone largely unrecognized to many of even the most diehard Disney park fans, and for that, I give the author extra kudos.
Beyond simply being a reference to the windows in the parks, this book could also make for an interesting type of park guide as well. I've seen pictures online of people using the book to find specific windows in the parks, and I can envision many Disney park fans using this book as the basis for scavenger hunts and games.
All that said, I did have a couple of (very) minor quibbles with the book. First, I would have liked it if some of the pictures were a little easier to read. In the case of some windows, I couldn't make out any of the words from the picture (fortunately, the window descriptions compensate for this). Given the challenges of getting pictures of any kind for some of these windows (given their locations), this is a very minor point indeed, but is something I noticed. Secondly, an index of the names honored by the windows would have been a nice addition, but again, given the enormity of the effort involved in putting this book together, its absence is completely understandable.
As a fan of Disney parks, I had been looking forward to getting a copy of this from the moment I learned about it, and I wasn't disappointed. Simply put, I loved this book! I read it over the course of three evenings, staying up (too) late each night because I couldn't put it down.
If you enjoy Disney parks and want to learn more about the people responsible for creating them, this book is for you.
November 25, 2014
From BetweenDisney.com
I was in the midst of researching Roy O. Disney and needed details on tributes to Mr. Disney in the parks. It was Christmas and I had friends visiting the Walt Disney World Resort from Betweenland. At one point at 11 p.m. WDW time I was yelling into a cell phone hoping my friends could hear me over the capacity crowd, "I NEED A PICTURE OF THE DAVIS WINDOW." Needless to say they could not hear me, could not find the window and only days later even figured out what I was looking for. In today's world I could have avoided yelling.
Main Street Windows by Jeff Heimbuch chronicles the visual tributes to Disney employees who have influenced the theme parks through honorific windows located primarily on Main Street U.S.A.. Heimbuch takes his readers through Disneyland, The Magic Kingdom, Tokyo Disneyland, Disneyland Paris and Hong Kong Disneyland with a glance at every current window and even a few that have been removed. Typically on the left hand pages Heimbuch provides the window text and biographies of the honored individuals with the right hand pages showing a picture of the window itself. For the American parks this pattern if followed with every two pages featuring either one or two windows. In the non-domestic parks there are less pictures and more windows featured every two pages primarily by text. Though one discovers there are many more atmosphere only windows outside of the United States.
You ever try to take a good picture of Main Street Windows? I have. It is hard! You think to yourself you can do it, you can get the right angle and the right light and it will happen...with your phone! Yeah, you are hot mess if you think you can pull it off with a lack of time or equipment because with overhangs, canopies and angles shooting from the ground you are fighting a losing battle. This for me is the real win of Main Street Windows, a resource with largely readable pictures of the windows. It is clear that Heimbuch's team of photographers knew their way around a camera and found ways to photograph the windows in their best possible light, literally in some cases. There are photos were shadows do obscure part of the window, but even the novice (like me) begins to realize the difficulty of photographing the windows and what a good representation of the widows the photos are.
If for some reason cannot read the window, Heimbuch does provide a full transcript of the window's inscription. And he provides readers context by giving a brief write-up of who the window honors and why they deserved to be recognized on Main Street U.S.A.. As one reads through the biographies it becomes clear that many honored are not the known legends of Disney we can recite off the tip of our tongues. Instead there are numerous men and women recognized whose names do get thrown around but are honored for providing excellent service to the parks. The biographies for individuals with windows in multiple parks are largely copies of each other.
If there is one thing I wish was added it would be an index. It is easy enough to scan through the book with names in bold and text primarily being printed on the left hand side. But an index would help speed readers to the window they are seeking in the book.
Main Street Windows by Jeff Heimbuch is the most comprehensive book on Disney's Main Street Windows. For me it is an important reference, as any Disney writing I do includes me wanting to know about window tributes in the park. Main Street Windows will be a first reach for me when I start to assemble outlines on Disney parks related projects in the future.
Review Copy Provided by Orchard Hill Press
I was in the midst of researching Roy O. Disney and needed details on tributes to Mr. Disney in the parks. It was Christmas and I had friends visiting the Walt Disney World Resort from Betweenland. At one point at 11 p.m. WDW time I was yelling into a cell phone hoping my friends could hear me over the capacity crowd, "I NEED A PICTURE OF THE DAVIS WINDOW." Needless to say they could not hear me, could not find the window and only days later even figured out what I was looking for. In today's world I could have avoided yelling.
Main Street Windows by Jeff Heimbuch chronicles the visual tributes to Disney employees who have influenced the theme parks through honorific windows located primarily on Main Street U.S.A.. Heimbuch takes his readers through Disneyland, The Magic Kingdom, Tokyo Disneyland, Disneyland Paris and Hong Kong Disneyland with a glance at every current window and even a few that have been removed. Typically on the left hand pages Heimbuch provides the window text and biographies of the honored individuals with the right hand pages showing a picture of the window itself. For the American parks this pattern if followed with every two pages featuring either one or two windows. In the non-domestic parks there are less pictures and more windows featured every two pages primarily by text. Though one discovers there are many more atmosphere only windows outside of the United States.
You ever try to take a good picture of Main Street Windows? I have. It is hard! You think to yourself you can do it, you can get the right angle and the right light and it will happen...with your phone! Yeah, you are hot mess if you think you can pull it off with a lack of time or equipment because with overhangs, canopies and angles shooting from the ground you are fighting a losing battle. This for me is the real win of Main Street Windows, a resource with largely readable pictures of the windows. It is clear that Heimbuch's team of photographers knew their way around a camera and found ways to photograph the windows in their best possible light, literally in some cases. There are photos were shadows do obscure part of the window, but even the novice (like me) begins to realize the difficulty of photographing the windows and what a good representation of the widows the photos are.
If for some reason cannot read the window, Heimbuch does provide a full transcript of the window's inscription. And he provides readers context by giving a brief write-up of who the window honors and why they deserved to be recognized on Main Street U.S.A.. As one reads through the biographies it becomes clear that many honored are not the known legends of Disney we can recite off the tip of our tongues. Instead there are numerous men and women recognized whose names do get thrown around but are honored for providing excellent service to the parks. The biographies for individuals with windows in multiple parks are largely copies of each other.
If there is one thing I wish was added it would be an index. It is easy enough to scan through the book with names in bold and text primarily being printed on the left hand side. But an index would help speed readers to the window they are seeking in the book.
Main Street Windows by Jeff Heimbuch is the most comprehensive book on Disney's Main Street Windows. For me it is an important reference, as any Disney writing I do includes me wanting to know about window tributes in the park. Main Street Windows will be a first reach for me when I start to assemble outlines on Disney parks related projects in the future.
Review Copy Provided by Orchard Hill Press
September 15, 2018
I thought I would rate this book 5 stars... I should know how picky I am with books about Disney!
I loved to see the pictures of the windows and to know the history behind it but I wish the pictures would be for EVERY parks. Also it was annoying to read the same information in the different parks! I liked to read about all these important people in the history of Disney.
I loved to see the pictures of the windows and to know the history behind it but I wish the pictures would be for EVERY parks. Also it was annoying to read the same information in the different parks! I liked to read about all these important people in the history of Disney.
June 6, 2020
A really interesting book for anyone who has ever wondered who those names in the window are! Lots of fascinating profiles to read however, there was a lot of copy and paste text for the same person being in multiple windows and it was a little frustrating that photos were only provided for every window in the US parks with sporadic photos provided for the international parks.
A really great book to have on kindle ready on my phone for reference whilst in the park!
A really great book to have on kindle ready on my phone for reference whilst in the park!
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews