David Koenig, an Aliso Viejo author who is creating something of a cottage industry writing unauthorized books about Disneyland, thought he'd said it all about the world's most famous amusement park when he published "Mouse Tales: A Behind the Ears Look at Disneyland."
The 1994 book fairly blew the lid off the sanitized image of "The Happiest Place on Earth": its labor disputes, charges of discrimination, attraction malfunctions, fatal accidents, and lawsuits.
Not to mention insider stories, like the time a male guest pulled a switchblade on Alice in Wonderland and demanded a date. (The Mad Hatter came to her rescue.)
Now Koenig is back with a second installment that blows even more pixie dust off the Magic Kingdom. The bottom line: the bottom line.
In "More Mouse Tales: A Closer Peek Backstage at Disneyland" (Bonaventure Press; $24.95), Koenig asserts that a change in management philosophy over the last five years--a dramatic increase in the pursuit of profits--has come at the expense of Disneyland's traditional quest for providing the perfect theme park environment. That, he charges, has resulted not only in severe cost-cutting in everything from staff to maintenance, but has also transformed Disneyland into a "less magical, more dangerous environment."
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The most tragic case in point, Koenig says, occurred on Christmas Eve 1998 when an inadequately trained dockhand--an assistant manager filling in for a regular crew member--on the sailing ship Columbia, lashed a mooring rope onto the ship's bow as it approached the dock too quickly.
The line ripped loose a 9-pound metal mooring cleat, which injured the dockhand before flying into a crowd of tourists and fatally injuring a Washington state man. His wife was also seriously injured.
State safety officials later fined Disney $12,500 for inadequately training the worker and misusing equipment. The accident has also prompted legislative efforts to regulate California's amusement parks.
Koenig said in an interview that the accident caused Disneyland to rethink the way it was doing things and to change some of its newer policies.
"The Columbia [tragedy] was like the rock-bottom," he said. "They could see where the cost-cutting, the shortcuts and nearsighted changes could lead. As I try to show in the book, a pretty strong case could be made for the accident being a direct result of changes in training, new policies and failing maintenance."
