Author and Disney historian Jeff Kurti led a mellow but interesting panel at the D23 Expo 2017 taking a look at the very storied history of the Maps of the Disney Parks. He was joined Vanessa Hunt who helps curate the artwork in the collection at the Disney Archives. Two special panelists were also available for part of the panel including Imagineering Ambassador, Marty Sklar, and Imagineer (and son of legendary artist Sam McKim), Matt McKim.

A treasure trove of artwork was shown from Peter Ellenshaw‘s original drawing used to pitch Disneyland to the bankers to early souvenir maps, fun maps, land maps, and even lands for the parks abroad in Paris, Tokyo and Shanghai. It was a great panel going over a little history on the maps, how and why they look the way they do. Hunt is an undoubted master of her field able to recall every artist for every map along with intimate details about every single one mentioned.

Small anecdotes and details mentioned through out were what make pane like this so special. Matt shared several details about his father who helped create the Fortune Red pirate still in the parks today in New Orleans Square. Sam McKim had a figure of an old gypsy hag and he used clay to lay over this hag to create the salty dog we know in the parks. To this day, the original hag is still actually the base for fortune red! Unfortunately, you’ll find that our video cuts off. It went more than 10 minutes over and we had to cut out early to make it to the Legends of Imagineering panel.

Check out our full panel video above and enjoy below just a small peek at the selection shown during the panel!