Daniel Jue - my 495th pick to be a Disney Legend

As lead creative executive for Disney’s first international resort, Daniel Jue oversees the visioning and development of Tokyo Disney Resort and leads Imagineers in Glendale, Calif., and Tokyo, Japan. He is my my 495th pick to be a Disney Legend.

Daniel began his Disney career in 1988, designing displays for Disney Store locations. He transferred to Walt Disney Imagineering in 1990 as a show set designer, responsible for the look and feel of an attraction’s physical scenes, and worked on such projects as Tower of Terror at Disney Hollywood Studios in Florida, and Indiana Jones™ Adventure at Disneyland Park in California. Daniel later became production designer and field art director for Test Track at Epcot and Pooh’s Hunny Hunt at Tokyo Disneyland, and served in various production design and field art direction roles on several other attractions such as Expedition Everest for Disney Animal Kingdom and the Pirates of the Caribbean enhancements at Disneyland Park and Tokyo Disneyland. Daniel has also been involved with developing tools for programming ride vehicles on such attractions as Toy Story Midway Mania! at Disney California Adventure and Monsters, Inc. Ride & Go Seek! at Tokyo Disneyland. From 2007-2011, he lived in Tokyo as design director of Walt Disney Imagineering Japan. His team recently completed Toy Story Mania! for Tokyo DisneySea and an update to Star Tours for Tokyo Disneyland, and is currently working on an update to that park’s Jungle Cruise attraction.

John Stone - my 486th pick to be named a Disney Legend

John D. Stone was a veteran Imagineer with over 25 years of experience with Walt Disney Imagineering and helped to bring many successful attractions e.g. Splash Mountain, Indiana Jones and Winnie the Pooh to the parks throughout his career. He worked closely with Tony Baxter. He is my 486th pick to be named a Disney Legend.

1/8” model of the Indiana Jones Ride

John Stone was involved with the Indiana Jones project from its conceptual beginning in 1989. It was John’s first 1/8” model of the Indiana Jones concept which was the key instrument that sold the show to Disneyland management in 1990. After two years of leading the dimensional design effort of the show John was inspired to create a “coffee-table” version on his own time which was presented to the shows executive producer, Tony Baxter. With the help of fellow imagineer, Scott Goddard, they molded and cast parts for 9 more models. Model # 5 was featured in a two year, world tour presentation of Disney Art and Architecture.

From his obituary: He was one of the Sr.Concept Designers for Walt Disney Imagineering for over 26 years & will beremembered for his work on EPCOT Center, New Fantasyland, Indiana Jones, Winniethe Pooh, & Splash Mountain along with many others. The pride he took in each project was amazing and his God Given talent unbelievable. Prior to Disney he worked for a miniature company where he made the models of the Space Shuttle. One of the Shuttles is in the Smithsonian, one is in the Kennedy SpaceCenter,and;one can be seen in the James Bond movie Moonraker.

Tom Fitzgerald -my 467th pick to be named a Disney Legend

Imagineer Tom Fitzgerald is my 467th pick to be named a Disney Legend.

He joined WED Enterprises (now Walt Disney Imagineering) in 1979, and has supervised story development and production of many of Disney’s most popular park attractions and shows. In 1989 he was made executive producer of Theme Park Productions, which provides conceptual development, production, and post production of all film and video presentations for Disney parks. In 2001 he was given the added responsibility of executive vice president and senior creative executive for Walt Disney Imagineering, being responsible for the creative direction of the Disneyland Resort and Disneyland Paris.

Morrie Houser - my 465th pick to be named a Disney Legend

1Morrie Houser was engineer for Walt Disney World and is my 465th pick to be named a Disney Legend. He shares an honorary window at the Magic Kingdom with other engineers above the Emporium.

According to the website WDWNT  - He was a Disney Imagineer since 1954, Morrie worked on – and was instrumental in – developing and bringing to fruition many of the most popular and famous attractions in both parks. One of his specialties was the Disney Railroad. At the time of his death, he was building – for the past 40 years – from scratch a scale model of Walt Disney’s Central Pacific No. 173, Lily Belle. The model is displayed at “Walt’s Barn” and there is a sign below it saying that it’s still considered “a work in progress.”