Scott Wolf: What was your Ambassador year like?

Connie Swanson Lane: Incredible. Fireworks! I traveled to Sweden and Denmark and five South American countries, and I'm a little foggy in how many states I went to. One time I had someone count it and tell me it was only thirty five states that I went to, so I'm not sure.

What was the point of going to those places?

CSL: You see, Disneyland was it. There wasn't a Disney World or EuroDisney and your marketing was to the entire world.

So mainly to promote the park itself, not the films?

CSL: No, we promoted films as well as the records. In South America it was the re-release of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," "Blanca Nieve," so we went to various countries. At that time we were connected with Rank Films, a British company, they handled our releases in South America. Rank kind of piloted some of the techniques we used in "Mary Poppins" and then it was brought in to Disney and then refined, so that was the main focus there was to re-release "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs." So that's my film, my favorite film obviously.

You know that the witch sounds just as mean and as menacing and the queen is evil in Portuguese, Spanish or French. The voice sounds the same. You would swear it was the same actress, speaking those other languages, because I would sit in that theatre and I'd hear Snow White's voice and I'd go, "That's really her," then you'd hear it in Portuguese and go, "That's really her," then you'd hear it in Spanish and you go, "That's really her!" because we took care of the dubbing of all of our own films at the time, too. Or there'd be a promotion with toy manufacturers so that was a tie in there, too. It was more than Disneyland, it was the entire Disney company.

And Walt's name as well?

CSL: Yes.

it's a small world opened the year you were Ambassador. Were you involved for the grand opening?

CSL: I opened it from Sweden. I was over in Skansen which is a cultural amusement park in Stockholm and I was with the Minister of Communication, Olaf Palma and I said the dedication words in that office in Sweden, it went on the loud speaker.

They were having some communication problems that day weren't they?

CSL: Yes they were!

Do you know if your speech actually heard?

CSL: I really doubt that I was. I could hear Walt saying, "There's some difficulty, we can't get it through," and I thought, "Oh dear, here I am in Stockholm with the press and this Minister of Communications" and the line just is going down, so I read my script as I was asked to do.

Why were you in Sweden?

CSL: That's a good question. Skansen, because they have the cultural amusement park, sent a representative of Skansen over here as kind of an exchange. Kind of like Tivoli Gardens would have an exchange, only this was Skansen. Well, my heritage is Swedish. My family was born in Örkelljunga, a small farming community, and they managed to find some relatives for me to meet, so I drove up to their little farm and met these wonderful people in Skåne, the county of Skåne, and I just really loved it.

But having you overseas might simply have been to have you be international because of the small world theme?

CSL: Yes, again it's an excellent marketing tool because Skansen was willing to send somebody out, SAS was willing to sponsor the flight, and we had offices in Copenhagen and in Stockholm, so that wasn't a problem. We had representatives there.

What were some of the other things that opened in 1966?

CSL: New Orleans Square, Blue Bayou.

Were you involved in the opening of that?

CSL: Of the opening, yes. Pirates wasn't open yet, but for that (the following year) we rode the Columbia around and I'm in my hostess costume and the pirate goes to swing at me.

Oh, that's on the show "From Pirates of the Caribbean to the World of Tomorrow!"

CSL: I think for New Orleans there was just a surrey ride down to New Orleans. Of course, Walt was there so you wouldn't see me in very many shots because they were shooting Walt which is the way it should have been.

And when New Orleans Square opened there were no attractions, right?

CSL: Right, because Audio Animatronics was brand new and Walt wanted it perfected before we put it in.

What are some of your favorite memories of being the 1966 Ambassador?

CSL: Just the look on kids faces. We did a lot of hospital connections, too, and you go into a hospital with a character where a child maybe hasn't spoken because they had been so deadly ill, and then you bring in Mickey Mouse and you see their face light up and there's a physical healing that starts quite often in times like that. The look on their faces would have to be a highlight.

I didn't realize the hospital visits went back to the '60s. Did you just do it locally?

CSL: No, I did it in South America, too. In fact, we visited orphanages in South America and because Coke was our companion tie-in company they would send cases of soda and little toys to the orphanages for the children. A big impact was in Bogotá, Colombia, we visited a Polio sanitarium. In the United States we just don't see anybody like that, but the cost for immunization is enormous. It's a week's wages and so sometimes the children had to be sent to a sanitarium or hospital and they would send a younger child with them to take care of them. That was just heartbreaking.

What did you do after you were Ambassador?

CSL: I was a hostess in Guest Relations, which was a VIP hostess.

What was a VIP hostess?

We wore suits. Skirts, high heels, hats sometimes and we just took a single person or a family on a day at Disneyland. They could be perhaps someone politically important or kings and queens or just someone that Monsanto (a Disneyland sponsor) wanted or someone that Walt wanted to have you take on a tour. That was fun. That was the best. I went from one best to another best. I had a great time.

What are your favorite things here, or what were you favorite things if they don't exist anymore?

CSL: Favorite things... it changes because my moods change. I love small world because it sort of embodies what I feel, that there's an international joy that you could feel here. You can't find it anywhere else. It's just a wonderful feeling.

I saw the Jedi Training Academy and I loved it. These little kids fight Darth Vader and Darth Maul, and of course they win and I love it!

I also like the fireworks. One year we were over here watching the fireworks and there was a little child next to me and he hadn't seen them before and I said, "If you watch really hard, I'll bet we'll see Tinker Bell," and so I said, "Look! It's Tinker Bell! It really is!" and he just got so excited. "Mommy, mommy, she's real! She's real! She's flying!" and I teared up.

More from Connie:
Becoming Ambassador, and the first Ambassador ceremony

Remembering Walt


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