The Grand Opening of Walt Disney World Part 3 – Where the Goodyear Blimp goes during the mating season

We Start today's post on Bay Lake as Glen Campbell comes back to show off the Contemporary and Introduce “The Spirit of Eternal Youth, My golfing buddy Mr. Bob Hope.” We then See Bob “Ex Mouseketeer” Hope walk off the Monorail and on to a set of stairs with a landing... Wait what? That's not part of the Grand Canyon Concourse. In fact, this staircase was built especially for the Dedication of the Contemporary. And here is a cool look at the original Artist rendering of it.

Bob goes on to make some classic Bob Hope Style jokes including flirting with a few tour guides telling them to wait for him in Adventureland. Then jokes aside he shares some very touching words about his friend Walt Disney.

"Walt Disney always believed in the beauty and natural wonders of the world. But he felt as we passed through that we should try to add a little wonder and beauty to it. Maybe you'll understand that Walt's dream was just a beginning. The dream doesn't stop here. This is the start of it. I think you'll want to tell your grandchildren you were there when it happened."

But surely this wasn't all that Bob hope said and did at this event. There has to be more to it right? Well, you're in luck I have included below several images of the Master Script of the Grand Opening showing exactly what the morning of October 24^th 1971 looked like. I say just the morning because in the evening was the dedication of the Polynesian Resort and that will come up later in our special. I would like to thank the folks at https://www.disneydocs.net/ for sharing this and so many other great pieces with all of us.

A few Highlights of this timeline are:

10:30 – A private reception for the guest of the Dedication Ceremony was held at the Polynesian. Guest would then board monorails to the Contemporary.

12:00 – The ceremony would begin. Bob Hope then would give an Introduction and mono-log, introduce several special guests then introduce the Chairman of the Board of U.S. Steel Edwin H. Gott. Ed then would make some remarks and had it over to Roy O. Disney to make some Acknowledgments and invite everyone to a lakeside buffet down by the Bay Lake Docks.

12:30 – The Buffet would start. Take a moment to read the menu it sounds really awesome and really 70's. After the buffet everyone had to be whisked back to the Polynesian for the dedication there and a big beach luau. But we'll get to that later.