Windows With a View, Part 3 — Honoring Claude Coats, Elias Disney & Wathel Rogers


In this episode, we will be continuing on to part three of our Windows With a View series about the people honored on the windows of Main Street U.S.A. at the original Disneyland Park in Anaheim, California.

Now, in part of one of this series, we took you through the turnstiles and went under the railroad tracks on the left, where we found City Hall with windows for Buzz Price, Marty Sklar, and J.B. Lindquist. Then, in part two, we continued up the road to the Firehouse and Walt's apartment, followed by windows for Charles Boyer and Harriet Burns, which are found on the second floor of a building facade to the left of the Carriage Place entrance of the Emporium.

On this episode, we will be taking a look at a few more of the windows on that extended Emporium building, to share some details about the lives of and contributions to the parks by Claude Coats, Elias Disney, and Wathel Rogers. As always, we will point out other Easter eggs and fun facts about the buildings as we continue down the road.

For example, that section of the Emporium where the Charles Boyer and Harriet Burns windows can be found today, plus the separate facade with that doorway and the Carriage Place Clothing Co. sign, well, it was originally Bekins Storage. It had a completely different brick facade, and was brought to you by Bekins Vans & Storage Lockers, from 1955 to 1963, at which point it was rebranded as Global Van Lines Lockers until 1979, from 1980 to 1990 it was National Car Rental Lockers, and after that it was converted into new facade with the Carriage Place Clothing Company that we see today.

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Claude Coats: Color, Atmosphere, and a "Gentle Giant"

To the right of that section of the building, there is another facade with a rounded half-circle window on the first floor that reads Emporium Annex. Sometimes over at Disney's Hollywood Studios in Florida, in their Walt Disney Presents exhibit, they have a display with a model of Main Street that was created in 1954 by two of the first Imagineers, Fred Joerger and Harriet Burns, and this facade is actually the first building on the left on their model. On the second floor of the building at Disneyland today, there are spots for three windows, just like on that model, but the one in the center was replaced with a shutter-like grate at some point, probably to hide a speaker. The two windows that are still visible advertise "Coats & Co" with an illustration of a well-dressed man from front and back, and the other reads: "Big and Tall Sizes for Gentlemen." The proprietor of this fictional company is Disney Imagineering Legend Claude Coats.

The simple reason why he runs a company for big and tall gentlemen is because, well, at 6 foot-6 inches, he was pretty tall, and was often referred to as a "Gentle Giant." Of course, you don't just get a window on Main Street for being tall, Claude Coats began his career with Disney back in 1935 as a background artist on classic Disney animations like Mickey's Fire Brigade, The Old Mill, and Ferdinand the Bull, he also worked on feature films such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo, and many more.

But, in 1955, while work was already underway at what would soon become Disneyland, Walt Disney requested that Claude create a physical model for the Mr. Toad's Wild Ride attraction. He had worked on backgrounds for The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad in 1949, so it seemed like a fairly normal thing to ask for.

According to Disney historian Dave Bossert, in his book Claude Coats: Walt Disney's Imagineer-The Making of Disneyland, several weeks after Walt had approved the model, he came back to Coats to inform him that the company that was supposed to create the scenes for the ride, Grosh Studios, had informed him that they were only going to be able to do the art for Snow White and Peter Pan. Ken Anderson, a Disney artist and another soon-to-be Imagineer, happened to be in the room at the time, having a chat with Claude, so Walt put them both on the project. We'll be covering Ken in a future podcast, because his window is on the other side of the street.

Claude Coats transitioned from the animation department to WED (the original name for what we now know as Imagineering), and he never really looked back. He did so well on this one project, that he was quickly moved onto other projects for the park, becoming a theme park art director and show designer. After Mr. Toad's, he worked on other Fantasyland murals, Space Station X-1, Rainbow Caverns, Alice in Wonderland, the Grand Canyon Diorama, Submarine Voyage, Primeval World, Pirates of the Caribbean, Adventures Thru Inner Space, and the Haunted Mansion.

He would also work on attractions and general park design for the 1964-65 New York World's Fair, Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom and Epcot Center, Tokyo Disneyland, and Disneyland Paris.

He was among the first Imagineers to have his name on a window on Main Street at the Magic Kingdom park in Florida back in 1972. He retired from Disney in 1989 and became a Disney Legend Award winner in 1991. He has a tombstone dedicated to him at the Haunted Mansion, which reads

At peaceful
Rest Lies
Brother Claude
Planted Here
Beneath This
Sod.

The window on Main Street at Disneyland was added in 1992, not too long after he had passed away from Cancer in January of that year.

If you want to learn more about Claude Coats, we recommend picking up that book by Dave Bossert, it's a great read and it has so many amazing photos in it. The link for it is in the resources section below.

Continuing on, the building to the right of the Annex is the actual main entrance of the Emporium shop. From the earliest conceptual maps drawn of Disneyland by Marvin Davis, a shopping area on this end of Main Street was always in the plans, with the name "Emporium" showing up by the third draft in September of 1953. In early architectural drawings, it was labeled as building 304, but today it has the address of 101 Main Street. Over at the Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco, there is a display that includes a reproduction of these drawings as well as original balsa wood models created by, according to the display, James F. Trout in 1955. Though there is a page on the Museum's website that mentions these models being made in 1954, which I think might be more accurate. James wasn't a person I was familiar with, so I reached out to my friend Disneyland Thomas for some help. He let me know that the model maker was professionally known as Jimi Trout, and that helped me learn that he was also a background artist on Disney films like Claude Coats, his credits including Make Mine Music, So Dear to My Heart, and Lady and the Tramp. Now, this building has several windows, but as of when we are recording this episode in November of 2025, none of them have been dedicated to anyone.

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Elias Disney: Storytelling - or Touching Tribute?

The facade following this entrance building currently has signs reading SOUVENIRS to the left of a canted bay window, and NOVELTIES on the right. There is an old black and white photo of Walt in front of this building, and those words are on the opposite sides, but it changed at some point, likely in the 1960s. The original designs have a similar-looking building in this location, but they don't have either words visible, and the top of the building had a rounded ornamentation with a 1890 date on it. It was built with the same flat top that it has today.

The top half of the center of the bay windows reads Elias Disney, and below that, Contractor Est. 1895. Elias Disney was Walt Disney's father. He had passed away in 1941, and unlike everyone else with a window on Main Street, Elias did not have any direct personal involvement with Disneyland, and obviously never visited the park. This dedication has been at this location ever since the park opened in 1955. We don't really know if Elias's inclusion was a tribute or a "thank you" from Walt to his father, or if he just felt that his dad's real-life work as a contractor in 1895 made sense story-wise to include in the turn of the century Main Street. The only reason why we question whether Walt considered this window as being dedicated to "honor" his father is because there isn't a window dedicated to his mother, Flora. As far as we know, Walt just thought it was a fun nod. But, anyway, it is a fact that his father worked as a contractor in 1895, and that he built the house in Chicago where Walt Disney was born in 1901. That house is still standing, and just a fun fact, it also has a canted bay window, but it's below an overhang on the first floor.

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Crystal Arcade and Jewelry Shop

Continuing on, the next building is the Crystal Arcade at 107 Main Street. The Fred and Harriet model had a brick building with a sign for Martins Drug Company and a smaller building with a sign for Dr. Tom's Health Food in the location where the Crystal Arcade is located in the park today. Their model had a similar-looking "Crystal Palace" down the road, but it had an overhang not found on the building in the park. The design that went into the park seems to find inspiration with signage at the former Electric Park amusement park in Kansas City, which Walt reportedly snuck into many times with his sister Ruth when they moved nearby in 1911. It is often pointed to as one of the inspirations of Disneyland. Another fun fact, Elias Disney was a construction worker on a project that inspired Electric Park, the 1893 Columbian Exposition's "White City." In 1955, this Crystal Arcade location was a shopping arcade separate from the Emporium, with various tenants leasing spots. This included glass blower Bill Rasmussen, and the Story Book Shop, run by Western Publishing, which is famous for those Little Golden Books for children. The building was remodeled in 1995 to connect it with the Emporium as it is today.

After the Crystal Arcade facade, there is a three-story brick building with a sign jutting out from the right of the center section that reads "Jewelry Shop." The building is similar to a building in this location on the original model that had a sign reading "Peaks Hotel" above the door. When the park opened, it was part of Upjohn Pharmacy, with that Jewelry Shop sign reading "The Upjohn Co" instead. And just to be clear, this was not an actual working pharmacy; it was more of an exhibit/advertisement for The Upjohn Company. Which wasn't a company that ran pharmacies; they were actually a pharmaceutical manufacturer. After that sponsorship ended in 1970, the building had its sign updated to "Elgin Clock Shop" when it became part of the New Century Clock Shop, sponsored by Elgin, a watch company. The sign changed again to the current Jewelry Shop in 1986 when the location was renamed New Century Jewelry, which is the name you'll find in the Disneyland app today.

This building has a locked door on the left side of the ground floor, which has the following text on it:

Dr. Benjamin Silverstein M.D.
General Practitioner
Have a Fever? Have the Flu?
Come on in and We'll Cure You! 

Benjamin Silverstein is a fictional resident of Main Street, and that door is not a dedication to a single person. Many years ago, though, I took a Holiday Time at Disneyland tour, where the tour guide stopped at this door to share about Hanukkah, and they pointed out the mezuzah on the doorframe and told us about its meaning to Judaism. The mezuzah was added to the park in 1995 at the request of, then-Park President Paul Pressler. Also, that year, a menorah was added to a window in the "apartment" above the jewelry shop during the holiday season. Some years it's on the left of a dedication window, and other years it's on the right. Right now in 2025, it's on the right.

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Wathel Rogers: Animator, Tinkerer & Innovator

As for that dedication window, it's dedicated to another Disney Imagineering Legend, Wathel Rogers. It reads:

"You'll Cut A Fine Figure"
Wathel Rogers
Menswear

The quote is on the top half of the window, mostly hidden by an awning, with the bottom section including an illustration of a young man on a horse who looks like he's blowing a large horn, with the name "Wathel Rogers" on a scroll below. It says menswear below that, just to make that "cut a fine figure" line make sense in a historical context.

Wathel Rogers worked in the machine shop, where, among other tasks, he would hand-cut gears and levers for audio-animatronic "figures," which is what they're actually talking about. He had begun his career at Disney in the "Traffic Department" in 1939, later becoming an assistant animator on Pinocchio, and eventually an animator, working on films such as Bambi, Alice in Wonderland, Cinderella, Peter Pan, Lady and the Tramp, and Sleeping Beauty. In his free time, though, he liked to sculpt and build toys, which included a model railroad. If you know Walt Disney, you'll understand why that got his attention. This is how an animator found himself working on props and miniatures for Darby O'Gill and the Little People and the Absent-Minded Professor. In 1951, Walt had Wathel work with Roger Broggie, another future Disney Imagineering Legend with a window on Main Street, to work on Project Little Man for Walt's Disneylandia project. This was a precursor to Disneyland and animatronics. In 1954, Walt asked him to form a model shop for another project he was working on, which we now know as Disneyland. Some people consider Wathel as one of the first three Imagineers, along with Harriet Burns and Fred Joerger. But, according to other people, Roger Broggie is the "first" Imagineer, and Harper Goff the "second." So, let's just say Wathel is probably in the top five.

Wathel would go on to work on many fan favorites, including the Jungle Cruise, The Enchanted Tiki Room, and Pirates of the Caribbean. There is a fairly famous episode of the Disneyland TV show named "Disneyland goes to the World's Fair" that features Wathel in a motion capture harness controlling the guy from Carousel of Progress, if you haven't seen it, check it out here. 

Wathel would also work on attractions at Walt Disney World, including their Pirates of the Caribbean, the Hall of Presidents, and Horizons at Epcot. 

He retired in 1987 and received a Disney Legend Award in 1995. He, like Claude Coats, also has a tombstone dedicated to him at the Haunted Mansion; his reads:

Here Rests
Wathel R
Bender
He rode to
glory on
a fender
Peaceful Rest

His name was also one of the first names added to a window at the Magic Kingdom, the Buena Vista Magic Lantern Slides window above the Confectionery, which he shares with three other Imagineers. This Main Street window was added in 1992, the same year as Claude's. He passed away in his Arizona home at the age of 80, in the year 2000.

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And well, we'll go ahead and put a pin in this for now. Join us on the next installment in this series, and we will continue down the windows of this former Upjohn Pharmacy as we explore Main Street and the windows with a view that you will find there.

Until next time, we'll see you... Somewhere in the park.

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Sources Referenced:

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