Walt Disney and the Ford Magic Skyway – What happened to all those Mustangs?

Every now and again while searching for unique and less traveled Disney history one can find some rather interesting information. Well, while on one of my 1964 NYC Worlds fair searches about the Ford Magic Skyway attraction created by Walt Disney Company for the Ford Motor turned up something rather interesting but not uncommon. We are all aware of how Disney reuses or repurposes items from an attraction like the Dinosaurs from the “Ford Magic Skyway” and sometimes even whole attractions like “It’s a Small World”. But it was rather exciting to find out that Ford did pretty much the same thing with a portion of the Automobiles, specifically the Ford Mustangs that were utilized from the attraction itself.

Ford Featured several cars on the attraction but the one that was all the talk was the introduction to the 1964 ½ Ford Mustang and its presence on and around the attraction. Several Hardtops were used at the pavilion and the Actual Ford Mustang Convertible as well as other convertibles was used for the ride vehicles. Not automobile mockups but the real deal an actual car was used with of course slightly modified for the attraction.

There were approximately 24 Mustang Convertibles used for the 2 year run with 12 1964 ½ Mustangs and 12 1965 Mustangs. In total there were approximately 146 cars used in total for the attraction and it was really neat to find out that a few of these amazing cars still exist today! I’ve included a few pictures of some of still visible modifications that were made to adapt the car to the ride system.

This is the Article I stumbled across about the whereabouts of the Mustang Convertibles used for the Attraction.

Website: MustangandFords.com

Article:

1964 World’s Fair Production Mustangs – The Many Stories Of 100004 – ’64 World’s Fair Survivor

 

From Mustangattitude.com Here is the breakdown of the Mustangs used.

With the introduction of the Mustang at the 1964 Worlds Fair in New York, Walt Disney created a unique Magic Skyway ride at the Ford Motor Wonder Rotunda. They used real Mustang convertible on the ride! There were twelve 1964 Mustang convertible converted to run on the Magic Skyway track. Their VIN range was 5F08F100003 through 100014. The breakdown were: three Wimbledon White Mustangs (5F08F100006, 5F08F100007, and 5F08F100008); three Raven Black Mustangs (5F08F100003, 5F08F100004, 5F08F100005); three Guardsman Blue Mustangs (5F08F100009, 5F08F100010, 5F08F100011), and three Rangoon Red Mustangs (5F08F100012, 5F08F100013, 5F08F100014). These cars were later replaced with 1965 Mustangs and converted for resale to the public.

Disney too was able re purpose the Dinosaurs into Primeval World Diorama along the Railroad and adopted the ride operating system to the Disneyland People Mover that was one of my favorite all time attractions that I was very fortunate to ride just once before it closed.

Its amazing how Disney have woven into our daily living to the point where it is almost impossible to go one day without experiencing something Disney related in some form or another. But that is coming from someone who and I am guessing if you are reading this, you too have Disney in you heart, mind and soul running inside you too!

 

Resources:

MustangandFords.com

Mustangattitude.com