Latest news with #Gurr
Yahoo
25-04-2025
- Automotive
- Yahoo
He worked with Walt Disney to shape Disneyland. Now at 93, boy, does he have stories
Bob Gurr has often joked that if it's at Disneyland and it moves, he likely had a hand in its design. Gurr first started working for Disney in late 1954, just months before Disneyland would open in July 1955, and is one of the figures instrumental in the look, feel and tone of the park. Gurr was the pivotal designer behind the Autopia cars, the Disneyland Monorail, the Matterhorn Bobsleds and the tomb-like ride vehicles — the "doom buggies" — of the Haunted Mansion. But there's one of his designs that's often overlooked by fans, and it holds a special place in Gurr's heart: a little red vintage fire engine that can regularly be spotted on Main Street, U.S.A., Disneyland's introductory land. The Los Angeles-born Gurr had as a teenager been asked to drive a fire engine in a Temple City parade. Serendipitously, that car was owned by Disney master animator Ward Kimball, whom Gurr had met via a car enthusiast society, the Horseless Carriage Club. "So I'm 18 or 19, and driving a fire engine," Gurr says. "I want one and I'll never have the money for one. It was a bug." But one day in 1958 Gurr would get his fire engine. "Walt," says Gurr, referring of course to company founder Walt Disney, "came to my office, and he had a quiet moment, which he did a lot. I said, 'Walt, we don't have a fire engine on Main Street.' And he said, 'No, Bobby, we don't.' About 20 minutes later, the accounting department calls, and the lady says, 'Bob, write this number down. This is the charging number for the fire engine project.' And I thought, 'Oh my God, I'm going to get a fire engine!'" Today, Gurr has become one of the more public-facing advocates for vintage Disney tales. He hosts a monthly bus tour, Bob Gurr's Waltland, which visits integral Disney sites around L.A. It often sells out in minutes, as fans know that Gurr, 93 and still fiery, is a wealth of Walt-era stories about the creation of Disneyland and Walt Disney Imagineering, the secretive arm of the company devoted to theme park experiences. He shares them with fans regularly at Disneyland, as well as on his YouTube production "The Bob Gurr Show." This Saturday, a documentary on his career, "Bob Gurr: Living by Design," will premiere at the Alex Theatre in Glendale, the neighborhood in which Gurr grew up. He does all this, he says, because it's fun to talk about his work — he says in the film's trailer that he's done "250 basic jobs." But he also views it as something of a mission. "Walt was Walt," says Gurr, who's prone to talk in exaggerated tones with excitable gestures. "As time goes on, people think he's a company or a brand. I come across people who didn't know he was a person." And, he adds, few remain who worked with Walt personally. On a recent morning at his Tujunga home, Gurr was getting a little wistful. Sitting in a living room overflowing with tchotchkes — some of them incredibly valuable to Disney fans, such as artist-proof models of Gurr's original monorail designs that casually sit on a coffee table — Gurr draped one of his legs over the arm of a chair and talked about why his fire engine is so meaningful. It's that small, early 20th century open-air vehicle that became one of Walt's favorites. "The last photograph of Walt in his park, what was it?" Gurr asks, referring to a Renie Bardeau picture of Disney behind the wheel in the carriage of a car in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle. "Sitting there in the fire engine with his buddy Mickey Mouse. That was the last photo in Disneyland before he was gone. So that little fire engine has had a circle of life." In many ways, so has he. Gurr's life has been one of constant activity. Born in 1932 and raised just a short walk from Glendale's Grand Central Airport, now part of the Disney campus, Gurr grew up airplane- and car-obsessed, eventually attending ArtCenter to study vehicle design. His first major post-ArtCenter gig was in Detroit, working briefly for the Ford Motor Co. On his coffee table sits a gleaming metallic hood ornament, a winged pointed figure that looks like a mock spaceship that Gurr hoped would grace a new Lincoln. It was rejected, but he holds it proudly today as one of his first professional designs. "The company did not like it, but I loved it and stole it and took it home," he says. Missing the West Coast, however, Gurr returned to L.A. Though the Disney company wasn't on his radar, Gurr says he was close with Ub Iwerks and his family, having gone to school with one of Ub's sons. Iwerks was instrumental in the development of Mickey Mouse and often a close collaborator and business partner with Walt Disney. "I knew he worked at Disney," Gurr says, "but he never told me what he did." Gurr was asked to take a look at what would become Autopia and offer his design ideas. He was hired. "Bob was quickly identified as one of the can-do people," says Tom Morris, a former Imagineer turned author-historian on the division. "The ones who said 'yes' to an opportunity, even if they weren't really sure they could do it. Bob had that natural inclination, along with a strong curiosity and that thing Ray Bradbury called 'optimistic behaviorism,' the ability to be realistic and practical." Gurr met Disney on one of his first days on the job working on the Autopia cars, a story he tells often. Gurr didn't recognize the company patriarch — "an older guy, unshaven, kinda ratty looking" — when he put his leg up on one of the tires of the mini-car. But the two quickly got along. "He always came in at least once a week and sat down and talked to me," Gurr says. "I found out later he didn't do that with everybody. I think the kind of stuff I did — cars, and I could come up with stuff very quickly — was stuff he would like to have in his park. But he doesn't give 'atta-boys.' He doesn't thank anybody. He does it in a very subtle manner, but very seldom people are thanked. I think his attitude was, 'There's no point in giving an 'atta-boy,' because if I hired you and you're here and you're doing stuff, why would I thank you?' Gurr backs up. He notes he was thanked, in Disney's peculiar way, once in his career, and that's when he was working on the Disneyland Monorail, which debuted in the park in 1959. Gurr created the initial design, a "Buck Rogers"-inspired space age vehicle, as Gurr wanted it to feel sleek and ready for liftoff. The original drawing of the monorail, stenciled by Gurr within three days of getting the assignment and colored by John Hench, hangs in Gurr's living room. Eventually, Gurr also was tasked with overseeing its manufacturing. Gurr recalls one day in which he was working on a half-built monorail train in a soundstage and was paid a visit. "The finance guy pulled me aside and handed me an envelope," Gurr says. "He says, 'Walt can't understand how you do this, but he'd like you to have this.' I opened the envelope and it was 10 $100 bills in 1959. I took that as an 'atta-boy,' but he didn't want to tell me." Gurr speaks with a mix of humor, directness and curiousity, eager to share stories but also not someone who overly romanticizes them. Asked about his design philosophy, for instance, and Gurr dispenses with big theories and instead focuses on careful pragmatism. "If you over-anticipate and then something doesn't work, you have a downer," Gurr says. "I did this with everything I ever designed. 'This thing is going to work because...' And I have to prove every single step. You plot every detail, but you don't anticipate guaranteed success. It's a cautionary approach to life. People, say, 'Oh, I hope, oh I dream.' No, no no." Gurr is told such a philosophy seems to clash with a company that made wishing upon a star — and phrases such as "If you can dream it, you can do it" — part of its brand. "Think like a Buddhist," Gurr says. "Dream, wish and hope are dangerous words. You get yourself thinking and set up for disappointment. Stay on the reality side. Then if it didn't work, we're going to figure out what we're going to do now." Gurr gives an example from his career. He was brought in relatively late to the project that would become "Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln"; the long-running show features a robotic Abraham Lincoln and debuted at New York's 1964 World's Fair and was installed at Disneyland the following year. The Lincoln animatronic wasn't moving with the realism that Disney was demanding, and Gurr was told he had about three months to figure it out. Gurr began dissecting the figure's innards, working primarily with parts from the airline industry. "I didn't know anything about the shape of humans," Gurr says. "I'm a car and airplane guy. And 90 days is a rushed job. But I figured out how to build a structure with a human figure. Someone else had worked on it, and it didn't quite work. But I can look at a human and see something like an airplane — a lightweight, tubular structure. When you look at something and you're not trained, you see it with a different filter." The conversation inevitably turns to the upcoming Disneyland show 'Walt Disney — A Magical Life," which will temporarily displace "Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln" during Disneyland's 70th anniversary celebrations. "A Magical Life" is set to debut July 17, Disneyland's official anniversary, and will feature an animatronic of Disney, which the company has teased is its most lifelike robotic figure to date. Gurr is asked for his thoughts, specifically how Disney may have felt to be turned into a mechanical creation. But he doesn't bite; Gurr notes that the Walt Disney Co. has him sworn to secrecy on the matter. "I am embargoed," Gurr says. "I see, I know and I follow it, but I'm embargoed to say nothing. The public, though — there will be quite a reaction, I'll say." Gurr is typically an open book, especially as he has grown into his status as a mentor and a role model. In recent years, for instance, Gurr has become more comfortable discussing his personal life. For much of his professional career, Gurr was a closeted gay man, coming of age during the 1950s era of Joseph McCarthy and the Lavender Scare, the anti-communist purge of LGBTQ+ people from the U.S. government. Gurr isn't shy about the topic today, and he knows there's curiosity, especially because, at least publicly facing, the Walt Disney Co. has at times leaned conservative. In 1987, for instance, Disneyland hosted an AIDS Project Los Angeles fundraiser as a mea culpa for once banning same-sex dancing. As Gurr says, "You can have a very stiff Disney company. Mickey Mouse. Everything's sweet." Yet Gurr stresses that topic rarely came up during his time at Disney. Once, he says, he caught two peers placing a bet on his sexuality at a Walt Disney World event, but he laughed it off. And as far as his big boss was concerned, Gurr wants to state for the record that Walt Disney had little interest in the personal lives of his staff. "Walt ignored all of that," Gurr says. "He saw the talent. He had a bigger, broader picture." Gurr is, however, asked if he wishes the Walt Disney Co. and others would be more progressive in their storytelling, Disney recently removed a transgender athlete storyline from the critically acclaimed Pixar animated series 'Win or Lose." In a statement at the time, Disney said it recognized 'many parents would prefer to discuss certain subjects with their children on their own terms and timeline.' Gurr doesn't hide his feelings about the current political climate. He worries, for instance, that Hollywood may avoid such narratives during Donald Trump's presidency. And yet he takes a wide-angle view, noting that at his age he's lived through numerous cultural ebbs and flows. "Everybody's quieting down because we got Trump a second time," Gurr says, criticizing the administration's crackdown on DEI-based programs and labeling the president a "bully." "So I think everybody is laying low. The DEI pushback is quite serious. But long term in civilizations, these pendulums swing back and forth. I grew up in the era of Sen. McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover, an era where you dare not leave the slightest hint and you never used the word gay. It was assumed gay people were a diseased threat, and you had to design two lives for yourself." The film "Living by Design" digs deep into Gurr's history, complete with footage of him from the 1930s. The focus is primarily on Gurr's passions, the hobbies and subjects that shaped his design work and led to his projects for Disney. It aims to show, says director Frank H. Woodward, Gurr's curiosity and fearlessness; for instance, he was the first man down an unfinished Matterhorn track. "We hadn't gotten it all the way to bottom yet, so we had hay bales to stop the car in case it didn't stop," Gurr says. "My boss looked at me and said, 'Robert, you designed it, you ride it.'" Gurr hasn't seen the film yet. He wanted to wait to experience it with an audience. Woodward says after the Alex Theatre showing on Saturday, he and Gurr plan to tour the film, visiting other locations around Southern California and hopefully a trip to Florida for the Walt Disney World crowd. With Disneyland's 70th anniversary on the mind of many a park fan, the timing for the film should be right. As someone who has never slowed down and never stopped looking ahead, Gurr is asked what his message would be to those entrusted with ensuring that Disneyland is prepared for its next 70 years. "Just do it right," Gurr says. "Every detail of everything you do, make sure you're doing it in the best possible way that you can. The choices a person makes, whether it's legal work, medical work, science, cartoons or Disneyland vehicles, do it your absolute best. That will make sure you'll be much more successful than if you just clock in and out to do the job and go home." Gurr's defining Disney creations — the sci-fi-inspired monorails of Disneyland and Walt Disney World, the first implementation of a tubular steel coaster in the Matterhorn — are just a small fraction of his résumé. He would architect a 30-foot animatronic King Kong that once stood at Universal Studios Hollywood, work with Steven Spielberg on the dinosaur figures for "Jurassic Park," construct a constantly sinking ship at Las Vegas' Treasure Island and build a flying UFO for the closing ceremonies of the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics. In his spare time, he regularly flew glider planes, a hobby of his for 50 years. He's not piloting these days, but almost daily he'll sit in his office and get behind a simulator to operate digital planes or helicopters. It's how, Gurr says, he works out his mind. "Somebody told me, 'You're a kid playing 'Fortnite.' I've got rudder pedals on the floor and all these controls. The airplane is extremely real to fly. "This is the way I test if Alzheimer's were to come," he continues, gesturing to his computer setup in his office. "The first time I would see that is that if I had difficulty flying a helicopter — taking off and flying. It's a severe test of your brain." And it's safe to say that today, Gurr's mind — in addition to his body of work — still soars. Sign up for The Wild newsletter to get weekly insider tips on the best of our beaches, trails, parks, deserts, forests and mountains. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
25-04-2025
- Automotive
- Los Angeles Times
He worked with Walt Disney to shape Disneyland. Now at 93, boy, does he have stories
Bob Gurr has often joked that if it's at Disneyland and it moves, he likely had a hand in its design. Gurr first started working for Disney in late 1954, just months before Disneyland would open in July 1955, and is one of the figures instrumental in the look, feel and tone of the park. Gurr was the pivotal designer behind the Autopia cars, the Disneyland Monorail, the Matterhorn Bobsleds and the tomb-like ride vehicles — the 'doom buggies' — of the Haunted Mansion. But there's one of his designs that's often overlooked by fans, and it holds a special place in Gurr's heart: a little red vintage fire engine that can regularly be spotted on Main Street, U.S.A., Disneyland's introductory land. The Los Angeles-born Gurr had as a teenager been asked to drive a fire engine in a Temple City parade. Serendipitously, that car was owned by Disney master animator Ward Kimball, whom Gurr had met via a car enthusiast society, the Horseless Carriage Club. 'So I'm 18 or 19, and driving a fire engine,' Gurr says. 'I want one and I'll never have the money for one. It was a bug.' But one day in 1958 Gurr would get his fire engine. 'Walt,' says Gurr, referring of course to company founder Walt Disney, 'came to my office, and he had a quiet moment, which he did a lot. I said, 'Walt, we don't have a fire engine on Main Street.' And he said, 'No, Bobby, we don't.' About 20 minutes later, the accounting department calls, and the lady says, 'Bob, write this number down. This is the charging number for the fire engine project.' And I thought, 'Oh my God, I'm going to get a fire engine!'' Today, Gurr has become one of the more public-facing advocates for vintage Disney tales. He hosts a monthly bus tour, Bob Gurr's Waltland, which visits integral Disney sites around L.A. It often sells out in minutes, as fans know that Gurr, 93 and still fiery, is a wealth of Walt-era stories about the creation of Disneyland and Walt Disney Imagineering, the secretive arm of the company devoted to theme park experiences. He shares them with fans regularly at Disneyland, as well as on his YouTube production 'The Bob Gurr Show.' This Saturday, a documentary on his career, 'Bob Gurr: Living by Design,' will premiere at the Alex Theatre in Glendale, the neighborhood in which Gurr grew up. He does all this, he says, because it's fun to talk about his work — he says in the film's trailer that he's done '250 basic jobs.' But he also views it as something of a mission. 'Walt was Walt,' says Gurr, who's prone to talk in exaggerated tones with excitable gestures. 'As time goes on, people think he's a company or a brand. I come across people who didn't know he was a person.' And, he adds, few remain who worked with Walt personally. On a recent morning at his Tujunga home, Gurr was getting a little wistful. Sitting in a living room overflowing with tchotchkes — some of them incredibly valuable to Disney fans, such as artist-proof models of Gurr's original monorail designs that casually sit on a coffee table — Gurr draped one of his legs over the arm of a chair and talked about why his fire engine is so meaningful. It's that small, early 20th century open-air vehicle that became one of Walt's favorites. 'The last photograph of Walt in his park, what was it?' Gurr asks, referring to a Renie Bardeau picture of Disney behind the wheel in the carriage of a car in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle. 'Sitting there in the fire engine with his buddy Mickey Mouse. That was the last photo in Disneyland before he was gone. So that little fire engine has had a circle of life.' In many ways, so has he. Gurr's life has been one of constant activity. Born in 1932 and raised just a short walk from Glendale's Grand Central Airport, now part of the Disney campus, Gurr grew up airplane- and car-obsessed, eventually attending ArtCenter to study vehicle design. His first major post-ArtCenter gig was in Detroit, working briefly for the Ford Motor Co. On his coffee table sits a gleaming metallic hood ornament, a winged pointed figure that looks like a mock spaceship that Gurr hoped would grace a new Lincoln. It was rejected, but he holds it proudly today as one of his first professional designs. 'The company did not like it, but I loved it and stole it and took it home,' he says. Missing the West Coast, however, Gurr returned to L.A. Though the Disney company wasn't on his radar, Gurr says he was close with Ub Iwerks and his family, having gone to school with one of Ub's sons. Iwerks was instrumental in the development of Mickey Mouse and often a close collaborator and business partner with Walt Disney. 'I knew he worked at Disney,' Gurr says, 'but he never told me what he did.' Gurr was asked to take a look at what would become Autopia and offer his design ideas. He was hired. 'Bob was quickly identified as one of the can-do people,' says Tom Morris, a former Imagineer turned author-historian on the division. 'The ones who said 'yes' to an opportunity, even if they weren't really sure they could do it. Bob had that natural inclination, along with a strong curiosity and that thing Ray Bradbury called 'optimistic behaviorism,' the ability to be realistic and practical.' Gurr met Disney on one of his first days on the job working on the Autopia cars, a story he tells often. Gurr didn't recognize the company patriarch — 'an older guy, unshaven, kinda ratty looking' — when he put his leg up on one of the tires of the mini-car. But the two quickly got along. 'He always came in at least once a week and sat down and talked to me,' Gurr says. 'I found out later he didn't do that with everybody. I think the kind of stuff I did — cars, and I could come up with stuff very quickly — was stuff he would like to have in his park. But he doesn't give 'atta-boys.' He doesn't thank anybody. He does it in a very subtle manner, but very seldom people are thanked. I think his attitude was, 'There's no point in giving an 'atta-boy,' because if I hired you and you're here and you're doing stuff, why would I thank you?' Gurr backs up. He notes he was thanked, in Disney's peculiar way, once in his career, and that's when he was working on the Disneyland Monorail, which debuted in the park in 1959. Gurr created the initial design, a 'Buck Rogers'-inspired space age vehicle, as Gurr wanted it to feel sleek and ready for liftoff. The original drawing of the monorail, stenciled by Gurr within three days of getting the assignment and colored by John Hench, hangs in Gurr's living room. Eventually, Gurr also was tasked with overseeing its manufacturing. Gurr recalls one day in which he was working on a half-built monorail train in a soundstage and was paid a visit. 'The finance guy pulled me aside and handed me an envelope,' Gurr says. 'He says, 'Walt can't understand how you do this, but he'd like you to have this.' I opened the envelope and it was 10 $100 bills in 1959. I took that as an 'atta-boy,' but he didn't want to tell me.' Gurr speaks with a mix of humor, directness and curiousity, eager to share stories but also not someone who overly romanticizes them. Asked about his design philosophy, for instance, and Gurr dispenses with big theories and instead focuses on careful pragmatism. 'If you over-anticipate and then something doesn't work, you have a downer,' Gurr says. 'I did this with everything I ever designed. 'This thing is going to work because...' And I have to prove every single step. You plot every detail, but you don't anticipate guaranteed success. It's a cautionary approach to life. People, say, 'Oh, I hope, oh I dream.' No, no no.' Gurr is told such a philosophy seems to clash with a company that made wishing upon a star — and phrases such as 'If you can dream it, you can do it' — part of its brand. 'Think like a Buddhist,' Gurr says. 'Dream, wish and hope are dangerous words. You get yourself thinking and set up for disappointment. Stay on the reality side. Then if it didn't work, we're going to figure out what we're going to do now.' Gurr gives an example from his career. He was brought in relatively late to the project that would become 'Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln'; the long-running show features a robotic Abraham Lincoln and debuted at New York's 1964 World's Fair and was installed at Disneyland the following year. The Lincoln animatronic wasn't moving with the realism that Disney was demanding, and Gurr was told he had about three months to figure it out. Gurr began dissecting the figure's innards, working primarily with parts from the airline industry. 'I didn't know anything about the shape of humans,' Gurr says. 'I'm a car and airplane guy. And 90 days is a rushed job. But I figured out how to build a structure with a human figure. Someone else had worked on it, and it didn't quite work. But I can look at a human and see something like an airplane — a lightweight, tubular structure. When you look at something and you're not trained, you see it with a different filter.' The conversation inevitably turns to the upcoming Disneyland show 'Walt Disney — A Magical Life,' which will temporarily displace 'Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln' during Disneyland's 70th anniversary celebrations. 'A Magical Life' is set to debut July 17, Disneyland's official anniversary, and will feature an animatronic of Disney, which the company has teased is its most lifelike robotic figure to date. Gurr is asked for his thoughts, specifically how Disney may have felt to be turned into a mechanical creation. But he doesn't bite; Gurr notes that the Walt Disney Co. has him sworn to secrecy on the matter. 'I am embargoed,' Gurr says. 'I see, I know and I follow it, but I'm embargoed to say nothing. The public, though — there will be quite a reaction, I'll say.' Gurr is typically an open book, especially as he has grown into his status as a mentor and a role model. In recent years, for instance, Gurr has become more comfortable discussing his personal life. For much of his professional career, Gurr was a closeted gay man, coming of age during the 1950s era of Joseph McCarthy and the Lavender Scare, the anti-communist purge of LGBTQ+ people from the U.S. government. Gurr isn't shy about the topic today, and he knows there's curiosity, especially because, at least publicly facing, the Walt Disney Co. has at times leaned conservative. In 1987, for instance, Disneyland hosted an AIDS Project Los Angeles fundraiser as a mea culpa for once banning same-sex dancing. As Gurr says, 'You can have a very stiff Disney company. Mickey Mouse. Everything's sweet.' Yet Gurr stresses that topic rarely came up during his time at Disney. Once, he says, he caught two peers placing a bet on his sexuality at a Walt Disney World event, but he laughed it off. And as far as his big boss was concerned, Gurr wants to state for the record that Walt Disney had little interest in the personal lives of his staff. 'Walt ignored all of that,' Gurr says. 'He saw the talent. He had a bigger, broader picture.' Gurr is, however, asked if he wishes the Walt Disney Co. and others would be more progressive in their storytelling, Disney recently removed a transgender athlete storyline from the critically acclaimed Pixar animated series 'Win or Lose.' In a statement at the time, Disney said it recognized 'many parents would prefer to discuss certain subjects with their children on their own terms and timeline.' Gurr doesn't hide his feelings about the current political climate. He worries, for instance, that Hollywood may avoid such narratives during Donald Trump's presidency. And yet he takes a wide-angle view, noting that at his age he's lived through numerous cultural ebbs and flows. 'Everybody's quieting down because we got Trump a second time,' Gurr says, criticizing the administration's crackdown on DEI-based programs and labeling the president a 'bully.' 'So I think everybody is laying low. The DEI pushback is quite serious. But long term in civilizations, these pendulums swing back and forth. I grew up in the era of Sen. McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover, an era where you dare not leave the slightest hint and you never used the word gay. It was assumed gay people were a diseased threat, and you had to design two lives for yourself.' The film 'Living by Design' digs deep into Gurr's history, complete with footage of him from the 1930s. The focus is primarily on Gurr's passions, the hobbies and subjects that shaped his design work and led to his projects for Disney. It aims to show, says director Frank H. Woodward, Gurr's curiosity and fearlessness; for instance, he was the first man down an unfinished Matterhorn track. 'We hadn't gotten it all the way to bottom yet, so we had hay bales to stop the car in case it didn't stop,' Gurr says. 'My boss looked at me and said, 'Robert, you designed it, you ride it.'' Gurr hasn't seen the film yet. He wanted to wait to experience it with an audience. Woodward says after the Alex Theatre showing on Saturday, he and Gurr plan to tour the film, visiting other locations around Southern California and hopefully a trip to Florida for the Walt Disney World crowd. With Disneyland's 70th anniversary on the mind of many a park fan, the timing for the film should be right. As someone who has never slowed down and never stopped looking ahead, Gurr is asked what his message would be to those entrusted with ensuring that Disneyland is prepared for its next 70 years. 'Just do it right,' Gurr says. 'Every detail of everything you do, make sure you're doing it in the best possible way that you can. The choices a person makes, whether it's legal work, medical work, science, cartoons or Disneyland vehicles, do it your absolute best. That will make sure you'll be much more successful than if you just clock in and out to do the job and go home.' Gurr's defining Disney creations — the sci-fi-inspired monorails of Disneyland and Walt Disney World, the first implementation of a tubular steel coaster in the Matterhorn — are just a small fraction of his résumé. He would architect a 30-foot animatronic King Kong that once stood at Universal Studios Hollywood, work with Steven Spielberg on the dinosaur figures for 'Jurassic Park,' construct a constantly sinking ship at Las Vegas' Treasure Island and build a flying UFO for the closing ceremonies of the 1984 Los Angeles Summer Olympics. In his spare time, he regularly flew glider planes, a hobby of his for 50 years. He's not piloting these days, but almost daily he'll sit in his office and get behind a simulator to operate digital planes or helicopters. It's how, Gurr says, he works out his mind. 'Somebody told me, 'You're a kid playing 'Fortnite.' I've got rudder pedals on the floor and all these controls. The airplane is extremely real to fly. 'This is the way I test if Alzheimer's were to come,' he continues, gesturing to his computer setup in his office. 'The first time I would see that is that if I had difficulty flying a helicopter — taking off and flying. It's a severe test of your brain.' And it's safe to say that today, Gurr's mind — in addition to his body of work — still soars.
Yahoo
23-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Meet Disney Legend Bob Gurr at the Premiere of His New Movie
Untold millions have had the times of their lives onboard Bob Gurr's ride vehicles at Disneyland, cowering from his King Kong at Universal Studios or marveling at the sinking pirate ship he built on the Las Vegas Strip. He created a flying saucer that flew above the Coliseum at the close of the 1984 Olympics, the most-viewed event in TV history. The 93-year-old designer is the subject of a new documentary premiering April 26 at the Alex Theatre in Glendale. Bob Gurr: Living By Design showcases the Disney legend who is also a pilot, a sailor and a Burning Man enthusiast, with boundless energy and a curiosity that has inspired him since he was a kid. The L.A. native is excited for a red-carpet premiere at the 100-year-old movie house he frequented before becoming one of the first Disney Imagineers. 'I had all of Glendale to go snooping around,' Gurr says. 'My father gave me money to go see movies and I saw The Wizard of Oz when it first came out.' He's also notoriously picky about movies. 'I would say it takes me longer to select a movie for the evening than it takes to actually watch it,' he says. 'I like to see really good work. Really good work the way Walt Disney used to do stuff. I'm sorry but I'm spoiled. I don't see a movie to kill time. I'm busy all the time.' Gurr is considered one of the most influential designers in theme park history. As Disneyland approaches its 70th anniversary this summer, ride vehicles he designed for the park in the 1950s and 60s are still popular favorites. 'I'm busy every day,' he says. 'I just love being interested in everything.' Walt Disney himself recruited Gurr soon after he graduated from ArtCenter College of Design to design a car for his new theme park in Anaheim and Gurr's Autopia, Monorail and submarines have been transporting us into lands of fantasy ever since. 'I have 124,000 followers on Instagram,' he says. 'That would fill a stadium someplace!' Bob Gurr: Living By DesignSaturday, April 26Alex Theatre, Glendale
Yahoo
27-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
State report shows Nevada charter schools outperform public schools in test scores
LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – A report from a state agency said the quality of charter schools is decreasing as the number of them increases. However, that won't dissuade Republican Governor Joe Lombardo. He's all in on school choice. 'Increasing the number of charter schools that are available within all the participating jurisdictions,' Lombardo told 8 News Now on Monday. A report from the State Public Charter School Authority that was submitted to the Nevada Department of Education included data on student performance. It showed that test scores for SBAC, also known as Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, were higher among charter students than their public-school peers. In the 2023-2024 school year, elementary and middle school students scored 13% higher in ELA and 12% higher in math compared to public school students, according to the SPCSA's report. 'Charter schools are accountable schools. If they don't do a good job, they close them. That's the difference with the school district. If they do a poor job, [lawmakers] give them more money,' Valeria Gurr, a school choice advocate, said. Gurr said charter schools outperform public schools and the data shows – she's right. High school charters graduated 2% more students than public schools in the 2023-2024 year, according to the SPCSA report. 'It's not one versus the other. It's about how we all co-exist in the system. So we that can serve kids the best – is possible for them,' Gurr said. The report from the State Public Charter School Authority highlighted some problems with charter schools. It showed that pre-COVID, 2% of charters were 1-star schools, but in the 2023-2024 academic year that number climbed to 15%. The increase in 1-star schools comes as charters grow in Nevada. 8 News Now previously reported on the state closing Eagle Charter School for failing to pay back more than $800,000 in taxpayer funds. Eagle was open for less than a year. In an interview with our 8 News Now Investigators, Gov. Lombardo reiterated his support for school choice. 'School choice is all-encompassing. It's charter schools, it's different education opportunities. It's open zoning, the ability to receive transportation to go to a different school versus a traditional place where you reside,' Lombardo said. In the 2024-2025 school year, more students were enrolled in Nevada charter schools than in the Washoe County School District, making charters the second largest school system behind the Clark County School District. Five new charter schools are scheduled to open this fall for students, four of them are in Clark County. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
The Guardian
05-03-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
UK watchdog drops competition review of Microsoft's OpenAI partnership
The UK's competition watchdog will not hold a formal investigation into Microsoft's partnership with the startup behind the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT, stating that while the $2.9tn (£2.3tn) tech company has 'material influence' over OpenAI it does not control it. The Competition and Markets Authority said Microsoft, OpenAI's biggest financial backer with a $13bn investment, acquired material influence over the San Francisco-based business in 2019 but did not exercise de facto control over it – and therefore did not meet the threshold for an official inquiry. The decision follows expressions of disquiet over the appointment of the former boss of Amazon UK, Doug Gurr, as the CMA's interim chair. The organisation's chief executive, Sarah Cardell, has also said the CMA does not want to create a 'chilling effect' on business confidence, amid pressure from the UK government on regulators to produce pro-growth proposals. The CMA's executive director for mergers, Joel Bamford, said: 'We have found that there has not been a change of control by Microsoft from material influence to de facto control over OpenAI. Because this change of control has not happened, the partnership in its current form does not qualify for review under the UK's merger control regime.' However, Bamford added that the decision should 'not be read as the partnership being given a clean bill of health on competition concerns'. The CMA started investigating the OpenAI relationship after the dramatic sacking and reinstatement of Sam Altman as OpenAI's chief executive – over a hectic few days in November 2023, Microsoft announced it had hired Altman, only for him to rejoin the startup. The CMA highlighted a recent reduction in OpenAI's reliance on Microsoft for computer power – a key factor in operating an AI business – as an influence over its decision. A Microsoft spokesperson said the partnership with OpenAI and its continued evolution 'promote competition, innovation, and responsible AI development … We welcome the CMA's conclusion, after careful and prudent consideration of the commercial realities, to close its investigation.' Last year, the CMA decided not to investigate Amazon's investment in the AI firm Anthropic and further Microsoft partnerships with the AI firms Mistral and Inflection. Microsoft recently contributed to a funding round that raised $6.6bn for OpenAI and valued the business at $157bn. OpenAI is run by a non-profit board but has a for-profit subsidiary, in which Microsoft is the biggest backer, with returns to investors and employees capped. Sign up to TechScape A weekly dive in to how technology is shaping our lives after newsletter promotion Despite concerns over Gurr's appointment and the CMA's efforts to avoid a 'chilling effect' on the economy, the CMA did target big tech with investigations in January, the month that Gurr was appointed. Google is being investigated over its dominance in internet search and search advertising, while it is also conducting a separate inquiry on the impact of Apple and Google's mobile platforms on consumers and businesses. In January, Microsoft said the CMA was making a 'fundamental mistake' in its investigation into the cloud market, after the watchdog said the tech firm was making it harder for Google and Amazon to compete effectively for customers in cloud computing, the term for providing IT services such as data storage and computing power over the internet with a pay-as-you-go pricing structure.
