If you think Interstate 4 traffic is bad now, imagine what happened when an alien landed next to the road.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s what occurred in February 1989 when E.T.-The Extra Terrestrial arrived in Orlando in billboard form to promote the opening of Universal Studios Florida.<\/p>\n
Reporter Debbie Salamone wrote one of several Sentinel stories in 1989 about the popularity of the roadside ad. \u201cE.T.\u2019s two hands and 800-pound head hang over the billboard,\u201d she said. \u201cEvery few seconds his index finger glows red.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI think everybody\u2019s looking at that sign,\u201d Orlando police officer Trina Frye told Salamone. \u201cI guess they are just curious and think it is cute.\u201d<\/p>\n
The E.T. billboard was located on the west side of I-4 near the Fairbanks Avenue exit. Curious drivers slowed their cars to a crawl to get a good look at it, causing traffic jams on the interstate. Some would even pull over on the side of the road to take pictures of it.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you hear that, it sounds great. Of course, you don\u2019t want accidents,\u201d Tom Guttman, chief of the E.T. billboard design team with the Foote, Cone & Belding ad agency, told the Sentinel, \u201cbut you know you\u2019ve done your job.\u201d<\/p>\n
While the giant E.T. grabbed attention, the intent was for folks to read the words on the billboard, too: \u201cFly with me. Universal Studios. Orlando 1990,\u201d<\/p>\n
Bill Howard, VP of advertising for Universal at the time, said he hoped drivers would notice the sign but didn\u2019t expect it to cause a traffic problems. \u201cHe said be believes traffic will resume its normal pace once residents get used to seeing E.T. on Earth,\u201d Salamone wrote.<\/p>\n
The E.T. billboard remained an eye-catcher into the early 2000s until an I-4 widening project displaced the beloved alien. Maybe he finally went home?<\/p>\n
More stories and features from the Orlando Sentinel\u2019s 150 years of covering Central Florida can be found at OrlandoSentinel.com\/150<\/a>. Sign up for our free history newsletter at OrlandoSentinel.com\/newsletters<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you think Interstate 4 traffic is bad now, imagine what happened when an alien landed next to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":171424,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[81541,81542,139,141,140,6114],"class_list":["post-171423","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-billboard-design","tag-debbie-salamone","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-universal-studios-florida"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171423","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=171423"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/171423\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/171424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=171423"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=171423"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=171423"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}