During Disneyland's 50th anniversary, several details and decorations were added to the park, including more than 50 hidden Mickeys. I would like to add miniature versions of those 50th decorations to my Olszewski collection wherever possible.
Why the 50th? That part of Disneyland history is particularly nostalgic for me because my wife and I went on many of our first dates at the park during that time.
Most of Olszewski's miniatures aren't designed to represent a specific time or season, so they're sort of like blank slates ready for additional decoration. In fact, there is a set of decorative accessories in the works that will let collectors decorate their pieces for the Fourth of July, Halloween, and Christmas, just like the park gets decorated. There's no word on when these accessories will be released, but they are eagerly anticipated by many collectors.
The image below is from colddeadfish.net and it shows a preview of the Christmas bunting, streamers, and other decorations that will be included in the Main Street Seasonal Accessory Pack:
My 50th decorations will fall into the same category as that future accessory pack. For the most part I won't be making any significant permanent changes to my pieces, I'll just be adding temporary 50th details as best as possible.
Conveniently, Disney did commission Olszewski to release five of his pieces as commemorative editions for Disneyland's 50th, one representing each of the original lands plus the Haunted Mansion because it was such a popular release. At least some of the commemorative pieces were decorated and painted in their 50th attire. These commemorative pieces also came in special packaging that matched the golden scheme of the 50th, which was a nice touch.
Here is a list of the five pieces released as 50th commemoratives:
-Jungle Cruise, representing Adventureland
-Mad Tea Party, representing Fantasyland
-Mark Twain, representing Frontierland
-Astro Orbitor, representing Tomorrowland
-Haunted Mansion, honorary commemorative due to popularity
It appears as though not all of commemorative editions were actually painted or decorated differently than later open editions. My source of information is basically limited to whatever I can find on the internet, and unfortunately there just isn't much out there because it's been 10 years since the initial release of these editions. Here is what I found so far:
The commemorative Mark Twain is significantly different than the later open edition. All of the bunting is painted in the golden 50th scheme and the 50th Hidden Mickey is present between the riverboat's stacks.
As far as I can tell, the remaining commemorative pieces, including the Jungle Cruise, Mad Tea Party, Astro Orbitor, and Haunted Mansion don't appear to be painted or decorated any differently than the open editions. There isn't anything wrong with this, it just means that I can buy whatever edition I can find because the commemorative edition will need the same amount of detail added as the open edition in order to reach my goals.
In future posts I'll take a closer look at each of the Disneyland Attractions that have Olszewski miniature counterparts, the decorations added to those attractions during Disneyland's 50th, and whether those details can reasonably be added to Olszewski's miniatures.
50th Details Part 1: Jungle Cruise
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