Bobbing Along With Bob Gurr

Bob Gurr (l.) and me.

OK, I'll admit it. I had a geek moment when Bob Gurr complimented me on my choice of video camera (a Canon Vixia). There's something inherently cool about having your electronic equipment validated by the engineering genius (and Disney Legend) who designed the Monorail, the Matterhorn and pretty much everything that moves on wheels at Disneyland.

There were a lot of moments like that on Saturday morning.

Visiting Disneyland last weekend to celebrate MiceChat's 7th anniversary, I had the pleasure of attending a breakfast at the ESPN Zone in Downtown Disney where Bob (do NOT call him "Mr. Gurr"), Margaret Kerry (the original live-action model for Tinker Bell), Susan Egan (Meg in Disney's Hercules and the original Belle in Broadway's Beauty and the Beast) and author/historian Sam Gennawey (Walt and the Promise of Progress City) were the special guests.

The restaurant could barely contain the crowd's enthusiasm for these Disney heroes who shaped and influenced so many childhoods in the room. A seemingly endless stream of great stories, old and new, was shared that morning, like this one from Bob about a project at Walt Disney World that didn't quite make the cut (shot with my Canon Vixia, TYVM).

I'll have more video footage plus my own interviews with Margaret and Sam later this week. I just couldn't wait that long without posting something.

Yeah, I'm a tease.

Bob Gurr's Main Street window at Disneyland.

Bob has written a new book about his fascinating life as a project designer for Disney, Universal Studios, the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics and many others. Design: Just for Fun will be available in late spring and can be pre-ordered now directly from Bob's website.

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