Hidden History at Wilderness Lodge: Walt Disney and His Trains
by Beth Keating
Disney Resort
March 13, 2025
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We are taking a bit of a risk with this article... By sharing this information, we might be exposing one of our favorite quiet places to work while we are at Disney World. At the same time though, we know there are plenty of Disney fans out there who appreciate the rich history that is Walt’s legacy. And so we forge on…
Tucked away in the Disney Vacation Club (Boulder Ridge) building at Wilderness Lodge is the Carolwood Pacific Railway Room, just off the lobby of the building. The Carolwood room is a tribute to Walt’s love of trains, and in fact, the train that Walt created in 1949 for the backyard of his home was called the Carolwood Pacific Railroad. It was so named for the Disneys’ street in the Holmby Hills area of Los Angeles, at 355 Carolwood Drive. The completed train took its first laps around the newly constructed track in 1950.
“I suppose I’ve always been in love with trains,” Walt once wrote, and the first “railroad” he built (besides the Lionel trains in his office) was a ride-on miniature live-steam train, constructed at one-eighth scale on 2,615 feet of 71⁄4-inch gauge track with eleven switches, overpasses, and even tunnels. A flat area of the yard was named “Yensid Valley.” Sound familiar?
The locomotive was named the Lilly Belle after Walt’s wife, and had been built with the guidance and assistance of Imagineer Roger Broggie (and the other machinists) in the Walt Disney Studios machine shop. (Broggie would later have a train named after him at Disney World, and honored with a window – Broggie’s Buggies – on Main Street. He would go on to work on the Disneyland Railroad and the monorail system, among many other attractions. In 1990, Broggie was named a “Disney Legend.”)
Behind the Lilly Belle steam engine were two box cars, two stock cars, a flatcar, and a caboose that Walt himself built by hand, with such miniatures as a pot belly stove and framed art on the walls of the caboose! Walt would often invite visitors to his home to ride the train with him around the half-mile long track. It could hold up to a dozen riders at a time. Later on, this train would serve as the inspiration for the Disneyland Railroad.
Walt had two friends at the Disney studios that encouraged his love of ride-on trains. Disney animators Ollie Johnson and Ward Kimball both had backyard trains, with Ward naming his larger train the “Grizzly Flats Railroad,” a name that will no doubt be familiar to Disneyland park fans. Walt himself had a lifelong love of trains, beginning with the fact that his father and his father’s cousin had both worked on railroads (His father installed tracks for Union Pacific Railroad, and Uncle Mike Martin was an engineer on the Santa Fe Railway.). Walt himself even sold newspapers and candy onboard the Missouri Pacific Railway as a teenager.
While the Lilly Belle, caboose and several other cars can be found at the Walt Disney Family Museum in California, two of the original middle cars are displayed in a plexiglass viewing box in the Carolwood Room at Wilderness Lodge. A smaller model of what the original train looked like is also on display on the opposite side of the room.
The Carolwood Room is a quiet, comfortable spot that many guests walk right through without paying any attention to the treasure trove around them. In addition to the models and original cars on display, there are curio cabinets on either side of the fireplace that hold lanterns, train memorabilia, books about trains (including a copy of Michael Broggie’s book, Walt Disney’s Railroad Story), and painted plates with varying train themes. The fireplace itself is covered by a fireplace screen with a train motif. “Stone” walls help provide a sense of atmosphere, while music plays softly in the background.
Cushioned rockers give you a comfortable spot to sit in front of the fireplace while you contemplate life, and three octagonal wooden tables are spread over the other portion of the small room. Oak barrels serve as end tables, and the walls are adorned with black and white historical photos (including many of Walt) and beautiful paintings of train scenes.
The Carolwood room is a great place to work, and is generally empty and super quiet during the day when everyone else is at the parks. And as an added bonus, when you are done working and looking to nosh, there’s always Geyser Point mere steps away. Try the Bison Burger!
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Beth Keating is a theme parks, restaurant and entertainment reporter for DisneyBizJournal.
Walt Disney ranked as one of the great entrepreneurs of the 20th century. In 10 Points from Walt Disney on Entrepreneurship, Ray Keating, editor and columnist for DisneyBizJournal and a leading economist on entrepreneurship and small business, turns to Walt for inspiration and insights on what it means to be an entrepreneur, on embracing entrepreneurship, and on learning lessons for the entrepreneurial journey.
The Disney Planner: The TO DO List Solution combines a simple, powerful system for getting things done with encouragement and fun for Disney fans, including those who love Mickey, Marvel, Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Pixar, princesses and more.