{"id":465789,"date":"2026-09-16T17:10:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-16T17:10:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/465789\/"},"modified":"2026-09-16T17:10:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-16T17:10:15","slug":"at-csulb-tony-baxter-69-learned-to-imagine-disneys-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/465789\/","title":{"rendered":"At CSULB, Tony Baxter \u201969 learned to imagine Disney\u2019s future"},"content":{"rendered":"

Image<\/p>\n

\"Dreams<\/p>\n

In November 2013, Tony Baxter \u201969 stood beside Mickey Mouse on Main Street, U.S.A., as a velvet curtain slipped from a second-story window. Behind it was his name, over the words: “Inventor: Imagination is in the Heart of our Creations.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

By then, Baxter had spent 42 years bringing some of Disney\u2019s most ambitious ideas to life.\u00a0He’d co-created Splash Mountain, conceived Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, led a team of 400 Imagineers in building Indiana Jones Adventure and developed Star Tours alongside George Lucas. He’d also spearheaded EPCOT\u2019s Journey Into Imagination and, later in his career, served as executive producer of Disneyland Paris.<\/p>\n

Yet when he spoke that day, Baxter said little about his own accomplishments. Instead, he thanked the people who had helped him find his way there.<\/p>\n

One was Claude Coats, the celebrated background artist whose work helped define the visual world of “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.” The other was Maxine Merlino, his watercolor teacher at Cal State Long Beach.<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

CSULB alumnus Tony Baxter displays the early renderings of a conceptual theme-park attraction that helped him land a job at Disney Imagineering. At his feet are other college work he keeps in a cabinet at his Anaheim Hills home, and behind him is a photograph of Baxter with his beloved art teacher, Professor Maxine Merlino.<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Baxter holds a self-portrait he created for Merlino\u2019s class, just a few years before he became an Imagineer.<\/p>\n

The making of an Imagineer\u00a0<\/p>\n

Baxter grew up in Orange County in the 1950s\u00a0to parents who\u00a0no\u00a0more\u00a0understood\u00a0their son\u2019s\u00a0obsession with Disneyland\u00a0than they did\u00a0his decision to\u00a0pursue\u00a0art\u00a0at CSULB.\u00a0But\u00a0Baxter had been miserable during\u00a0the two years he spent\u00a0studying\u00a0architecture and landscape architecture at other schools. \u00a0<\/p>\n

“It was only after getting over to Long Beach State that I saw a difference,” he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In\u00a0contrast to the\u00a0psychedelic\u00a0era’s\u00a0bastions of unrestrained self-expression,\u00a0Professor\u00a0Merlino required her students to master perspective,\u00a0draftsmanship\u00a0and classical technique. Baxter laughed as he described how she\u2019d appoint sink monitors and inspect desks for paint stains. \u00a0<\/p>\n

“You can do whatever you want when you leave here,” Baxter recalled her saying, “but you’re going to come out of this\u00a0class\u00a0knowing perspective, knowing all these basics. And then if you want to draw abstractly, you know what you’re abstracting from.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Merlino had always dismissed Disneyland as a carnival. But when Baxter, who had been working as a cast member at the park since he was 17, offered\u00a0to take\u00a0the class to a private after-hours\u00a0screening of “Sleeping Beauty” in Fantasyland,\u00a0she agreed \u2014 and came away a convert. \u00a0<\/p>\n

For his senior project, Baxter was allowed to design a conceptual boat ride through an undiscovered Arctic civilization, modeled on the capacity and logic of Pirates of the Caribbean.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The renderings got him an A in\u00a0Merlino’s\u00a0class \u2014 and then, six months later, they got him a job at\u00a0Disney Imagineering.\u00a0In the span of a\u00a0single\u00a0day,\u00a0he traded in his\u00a0cast member costume\u00a0for\u00a0a\u00a0model-making\u00a0smock.\u00a0He was\u00a023.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

At 17, Baxter began his Disney career scooping ice cream. Nearly five decades later, he would be named a Disney Legend. (Courtesy of Disney)<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Baxter created Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, a mine-train attraction now found at four Disney parks around the world. (Courtesy of Disney)<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Mickey Mouse and then-Disneyland Chairman Tom Staggs celebrate Baxter’s tribute window on Main Street, U.S.A. (Courtesy of Disney)<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Baxter with a model of the fairytale-like home he designed for himself in Anaheim Hills.<\/p>\n

Over the next four decades, Baxter\u00a0was never\u00a0surprised by how much he relied on the\u00a0art skills\u00a0he’d\u00a0honed at CSULB.\u00a0What did surprise\u00a0him was how much\u00a0he\u2019d\u00a0rely on the advice he once received\u00a0in a\u00a0required\u00a0speech class.\u00a0The best speakers\u00a0aren’t\u00a0the most polished,\u00a0the professor had told him, but\u00a0the ones who know their subject\u00a0better than anyone\u00a0else\u00a0in the room\u00a0and share it with enthusiasm. \u00a0<\/p>\n

“I cannot say how much that became as valuable as the art learning,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His communication skills drove one of his most consequential achievements.<\/p>\n

It was the 1980s, and Disney was not making enough new films to keep supplying its parks with fresh stories. So Baxter pitched the daring idea that\u00a0executives should look outside Disney’s\u00a0catalog for fresh stories \u2014 beginning, Baxter suggested, with\u00a0“Star Wars.” \u00a0<\/p>\n

Disney CEO Ron Miller arranged a picnic at Silverado Vineyards in Napa. George Lucas arrived in his BMW; Miller’s wife, Walt Disney’s daughter Diane, made the potato salad.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“We’re all standing in this queue to get the potato salad,” Baxter recalled, “and I’m going, what is going on here? This is crazy.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Before Baxter could describe the\u00a0ride\u00a0he envisioned \u2014 what would become Star Tours \u2014 Lucas agreed to collaborate. Flying home on the Disney plane, Baxter thought: “If it goes down, this was it. This was the day that changed my life.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

The measure of a teacher<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Merlino became dean of CSULB’s School of Art. In 2002, Baxter co-chaired a fundraiser that helped fund the Maxine Merlino Art Gallery \u2014 which\u00a0still stands\u00a0on\u00a0campus\u00a0today.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For its opening, she refused to display her own work. She insisted that the walls be filled with\u00a0her students\u2019 art instead.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“For a professor,” she\u00a0said\u00a0at the time, “my whole validity is my students.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Baxter\u00a0saw her once more, a decade later, in Spain. She was 100 years old and still climbing the stairs to her third-floor rooms several times a day.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The next year, Baxter announced that he would step down as senior vice president of Imagineering. Almost immediately, he was named a Disney Legend and told that he would receive a tribute window on Main Street \u2014 an honor reserved for those who have made an indelible mark on Walt Disney parks and resorts.<\/p>\n

At the ceremony, Baxter singled out Merlino as an \u201camazing\u201d influence on his career. He didn\u2019t know that she was sick. But he knew what the tribute would mean to a professor who measured her worth by her students\u2019 success: It was the validation of a lifetime.<\/p>\n

Merlino\u00a0died\u00a0two days later. She was 101.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I like to think that she knew,” he said.<\/p>\n

Image<\/p>\n

\"Two<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Image In November 2013, Tony Baxter \u201969 stood beside Mickey Mouse on Main Street, U.S.A., as a velvet…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465790,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[1818,1820,7,1815,1821,1822,1819,131,133,132,1817,1816],"class_list":["post-465789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-long-beach","tag-49ers","tag-cal-state","tag-california","tag-college","tag-csu","tag-csulb","tag-dirtbags","tag-long-beach","tag-long-beach-headlines","tag-long-beach-news","tag-long-beach-state","tag-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465789"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465789\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465790"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}