Western alumnus Christopher Tremblay is a lifelong Disney fan.
“Back in December of 2013, I traveled to the Treasures of the Walt Disney Archives exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago and I was reminded of Walt's Midwestern roots," said Tremblay.
"I was like, ‘Oh, I think I want to do a road trip to the birth home and then go to Marceline" — the town in Missouri where Disney lived as a young child — "‘cause I'd never been before.’”
In 2015, the Disney-themed road trip envisioned by Tremblay became an experiential learning opportunity when WMU invited him to lead it as a travel course. Since then, except for a two-year pandemic hiatus, Tremblay has brought a group of students every summer on a journey from Disney’s birthplace in Chicago to Missouri, where he lived and worked and finally to Disneyland and other sites in California. He calls it “Walt’s Pilgrimage.”
Katie Weiss is a student in the class. She wants to get acquainted with the lesser-known parts of Disney’s life.
“So like, his elementary school and the places that he might have worked or visited that people may not necessarily know about," said Weiss. "Because obviously everybody knows about Hollywood Studios and Disney and like all of these bigger places.”
Their first stop is the Gilmore Car Museum, which Disney visited in 1964, a couple of years before it opened to the public. He later gifted his friend Donald Gilmore, founder of the museum, a set-piece from the 1967 Disney film The Gnome-Mobile – a giant replica of the backseat of a Rolls-Royce meant to make adult actors appear much smaller. (Production on The Gnome-Mobile began in 1965; Disney died in December 1966.)
Fred Colgren is the museum’s education director.
"Every single April the group comes through, and we give them a nice tour of the facility and tell the Disney story," he said.
Colgren even allowed the students to climb onto the oversized seat for a photo op, but they had to work for it.
"Maybe you have to put your foot there," he said as the students tried to find a toehold. "See what I mean? It's slippery."
