If you've been to Epcot within the past decade or so, you've no doubt, seen these...
They're kind of hard to miss. Standing anywhere from three to nineteen feet
tall, the stone-sculpted monoliths all have hundreds of tiny photos etched into them.
Each showing a different portrait of
various people or a short message. Now, there's been a lot of confusion
surrounding the stones in recent years. Pretty much every time I go through
there, I can always overhear somebody asking about why they're there or what they are.
"Daddy, why are there tombstones here?"
"I don't know son, just eat your $5 Mickey pretzel"
So in this video, we're gonna take a look at the brief history
of these things, hopefully clear up some of the misconceptions about them and
talk about what their future might be. Sounds good? Alright, let's do it .
The sculptures were actually for Epcot's Leave a Legacy program that began in
the fall of 1999. Leave a Legacy was part of the parks ongoing Millennium
Celebration they were hosting to celebrate the upcoming new millennium.
The idea was, unsurprisingly, birthed from Disney executives who wanted a way to
make some extra money from the parks entrance Plaza which, up until that point,
really didn't have anything in it besides some flower beds. But instead of
going the usual "put a gift shop or food stand in it route" they instead came up
with the idea of giving guests the opportunity to have their photo
permanently in the park, by purchasing a small engraved plaque on one of the
sculptures they were gonna make. They then called upon Disney Imagineer John
Hench who, you might know is the man to design Spaceship Earth, to now design the
sculptures for Leave a Legacy. Hench's concept art for the new plaza removed
six of the original planters on both sides of the main one, and replaced them
with the new granite monoliths.
In June of 1999, Disney put up construction walls around
the entrance Plaza and began construction. The walls stayed up for the
next three months, while Disney installed all 30 of the sculptures. By September,
the pieces of stone themselves were all in place and the construction walls
surrounding them came down. Shortly after that, the other construction walls that
were around the mirrored pillar at the base of Spaceship Earth came down as
well, revealing Leave a Legacy's kiosk. The kiosk explained what the program was and
how for the meagre price of $35 (or 38 he had someone else in the photo with you)
You could be immortalized in one of the sculptures at the front
of the park. On October 1st, Disney began engraving the photos visitors had
took, within the first month of the kiosks being unveiled, and started to put
them on the sculptures. However, it wasn't long before Disney's executives realized
that they had grossly overestimated just how many people wanted to buy a spot
since they only ended up filling about a quarter of them by the time the
celebration was finished. They then decided to keep the program running, in
an attempt to fill the rest of the empty spaces. The kiosks all continued to
operate for the next seven years until May of 2007, when Disney ended the
program altogether. Promising those that had had their photos taken, that their
engravings would remain in the park until 2027 or, 20 years after the last
one was engraved. And really, that leaves us with what we have today. Since then,
there haven't been any real changes to the statues themselves. Even the areas
where the kiosks used to be are now completely empty and, if you didn't know
any better you'd have no idea they were ever there. Since Leave a Legacy
program managed to disappear without any trace of itself, besides of course, the
gigantic sculptures, guests who weren't around when it was first happening were often
wondering why Epcot had these large, war memorial-esque hunks of rock right at the
entrance. This would later spark some of the many different rumors surrounding
them, like the idea that all the people pictured were the parks sponsors, or they
helped build it, or my personal favorite that all the pictures were of people who
died on Disney property. Because yeah, over 500,000 people dying on Disney
property, eh, sounds reasonable. Half a million dead at Disney? Yeah, sounds about right...
On top of being somewhat puzzling to the average visitor, the stones were
also pretty universally disliked by Disney fans. Many of which think of them
as an eyesore that ruins the view of Spaceship Earth. In the end, Disney sold
more than 550,000 of the 700,000 spots they had open, still leaving them
plenty of space to add more if they ever decided to continue the program. However
some recent developments have cut down the likelihood of that happening.
on July 16th of 2017, Disney unveiled a piece of concept art at D23. The art gave us an
idea of what Epcot will look like by the year 2021, due to all the updates they
announced would be happening in the years leading up to then. It wasn't long
before people realized that the Leave a Legacy sculptures were missing from the
rendering, and many assume that means they'll be gone within a few years.
As of now, Disney hasn't confirmed their removal but it is very likely they'll go
since they don't really fit in with anything else in the new area. I would
however like to point out, that there have been rumors of these things going
away for years now. And they have somehow managed to stick around. On top of that,
Disney did promise that the pictures would stay in the park until 2027 but,
I'm pretty sure they could just move the plaque somewhere else in the park and
then get rid of the sculptures. Which is another very likely scenario leave a
Leave a Legacy might not have been one of Disney's best decisions but, it was still
a very unique project that allowed people to leave their own mark in a
place that's still visited by millions of people every year. On top of that it
also did it in a much more personal way than some of the other similar programs
at Disney was offering at the time, like the "Walk Around the World" at the Magic
Kingdom, which only allowed you to put your name on one of the bricks. But that
still doesn't negate some of the complaints about them, like how they feel
out of place or that they make the entrance feel unwelcoming because both of those
are still true. Really, I think the statues are a classic example of
something sounding a whole lot better in concept than it does in reality. And the
reality of this situation is we've got 30 slabs of rock just sitting around at
the gate of Epcot, making a pretty annoying maze that also ruins everyone's
view of the parks icon. And really now that they no longer serve their original
purpose of selling you the engravings, how much longer do these things
realistically have? Hopefully when, and if, the sculptures get removed in a few
years, we'll see a return of the original plaza. Allowing us to have a better
view of a much more impressive work from John Hench.
HH: You know, my favorite is Tangine chicken.
Scott: Hey, mine too!
Waiter: I'm sorry, you only have one tangine of chicken left...
Scott: DIBS!
HH: Mine!
Scott: Yours?!
HH: Wrestle you for it
Scott: No, we dont-
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