An evening with Disney royalty for a good cause

Hello friends, I hope that you are doing well. Things are moving along over here. Doing some writing, and trying to make more time for art. I did want to talk a little bit about a great event that I took the missus to at the start of October 2026. We don’t make tons of money, but we still like to support various charities, and fundraisers for our friends, and their kids. One of the organizations we’ve been supporting for decades is The Carolwood Society, and Carolwood Foundation. We don’t give them a lot of money, but we do donate our time on some of their fundraisers. In some cases our kid also volunteers time to help. The organizers are great people, and always kind to the volunteers, and staff. If you’re not familiar with them they work with the Disney Family, and the Disney Company to restore, and preserve the trains that Walt Disney owned, or operated at Disneyland.

In October they were in the process of restoring one of the four trains that used to operate at the Mine Train Through Nature’s Wonderland. For the past 40 years it was left outside in the elements as part of a set decoration in Frontierland. This was the attraction that my wife wrote about in a MiceChat history article. It was a nine-minute trip around a makeshift wilderness that included a mountain, desert, and cave scene filled with animatronic animals. It was closed down in 1977, and where Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge, and Big Thunder Mountain now currently reside. The event was hosted by Garner Holt Productions, and the Garner Holt Foundation.

The fundraiser featured both a silent auction, and live auction, dinner, and presentations by various people. The first person to talk about the attraction was Bob Gurr. Mr. Gurr was one of the few people that worked for Walt Disney that is still with us. He built just about everything with wheels at Disneyland. His recall on the Mine Train was amazing considering that Mr. Gurr was almost 95-years-old when he spoke. I hope to be as energetic, and sharp if I get to that age. The next group to talk were three of the actual ride operators from the attraction. They formed a club called the Red Handkerchief Society. It started with over 200 members, and there were still about 70 alive to share their stories.

The highlight of the event was a sit down with Joanna Miller, the daughter of Diane Disney Miller, and the granddaughter of Walt Disney. She talked about what it was like visiting the park with her grandfather, and what a blessed experience knowing that people cared enough to restore the train. She thought it was a lost cause considering how far the company had let the train deteriorate. She was certain that it would have to be scrapped. Then she saw the progress from Garner, and his team. She almost cried when she saw the transformation. It was hard to believe that he salvaged both the engine, and the ride vehicles. The train still had a way to go. The wheels, and cab were still being restored. The project would be finished around Feb / March of 2027.

The fundraiser was a wonderful event, but you had to have deep pockets if you hoped to walk away with anything from the auctions. The icing on the cake for use theme park fans was a chance to tour Garner’s actual company. The missus and I had actually visited it twice before when it was at its old location, just down the street. This was our first visit to his new location which must have been four times bigger. Plus the buildings he owned across the street where he hosted STEM workshops for students. The event happened in the middle of a heat wave. It was 109 degrees when we arrived and in the mid-90s when we left late at night. Garner Holt was a very kind man, and one of those people that could be ranked among the theme park greats alongside Walt Disney himself. He was bitten by the theme park bug as a kid when he visited Disneyland with his family. He dedicated his life to creating animatronics in his family garage. His mom let him turn the garage into a haunted house with his makeshift robots, which became better, and more popular every year. 

Garner dropped out of school to build full time. He then created a small company. The industry knew he was a force to be reckoned with when Wendell the animatronic unicyclist made his debut in 1989. The people at Disney said that they had been spending millions developing the greatest animatronics in the world, but they conceded that he spent a fraction of that creating an even more impressive animatronic. Garner’s small company eventually became a huge company that built animatronics all around the world for Disney, Universal Studios, and countless other parks. 

Garner never lost his love for all things Disney. He revered the imagineers, and sought out advice from Bob Gurr for many of his builds. Even those that were no longer with us he honored in one way or another. One of the things that stuck out to me was the impressive bust in his reception room of Leota Toombs. She was an artist that worked for Walt Disney Imagineering decades ago. She was known better as the original Madame Leota from the Haunted Mansion. Her daughter Kim Irvine reprised the role when the company redid the crystal ball effects for a Haunted Mansion refresh. Anyhow, I was amazed at how great the sculptors at the studio were in creating the busts of Toombs, Ben Franklin, Mark Twain, and Abe Lincoln.

Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures of most of his creative factory. There were tons of trade secrets, as well as projects for various theme parks that were still in the building stages. I’m sure that rival studios would have killed to get access to his technology, and techniques. As a lifelong theme park fan you could imagine how hard it was to play it cool as I walked past bins of fiberglass molds for items labeled Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, Mystic Manor, and more. It I could have cracked off a piece of theme park history I would have, unfortunately there was a security guard walking behind the group making sure that we kept out hands to ourselves, and that our phones remained in our pockets.

We were allowed to take pictures of his companies ride collection. He had an assortment of actual ride vehicles, animatronics, and set pieces from Disneyland. Some that he built, and some that he acquired directly from the company. In some cases he was simply gifted these items, the only catch was that he was responsible to pick it up, and transport it from the Disney warehouses. Which sounded easy but he said covering up just one of the items cost $3000. Disney does not allow anything to be identifiable when en route to a new location. So if it doesn’t fit inside of a transport, then it has to be completely covered. I am not at liberty to say what one of his most recent scores was until the “heat” dies down. I will say it was an impressive score. 

After our tour we got a chance to ask him all sorts of questions. Again he was very generous with his time despite it getting close to midnight. His foundation helped raise thousands just in auction items, not including how much the dinner tickets raised. We said our goodbyes, and drove back home in the heat as some happy theme park fans. I’d like to know if you’d ever attended a fundraiser for one of your interests. Tell me about it in the comments section. If you enjoy this blog there are several ways you can support me. You can sponsor me directly on Patreon. Or like and subscribe to my videos on YouTube. You can even subscribe to the Pink Monorail Podcast featuring my wife, and myself.