October 22 - Roger E. Broggie

On this day, in 1908, mechanical engineer Roger Edward Broggie was born in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. By 1927, he'd moved to a little town just west of Chicago and attended from Mooseheart High School. Roger had taken some machine shop courses while in school and was, quite frankly, a genius when it came to tools and mechanical objects. He moved further west after graduation, landing in  Los Angeles. Roger almost immediately got into the motion picture business, working for companies like Technicolor and Bell and Howell, a company that built things like movie cameras. He soon found himself on the lots of General Service Studios working with such legends as David O. Selznick and Charlie Chaplin.

In 1939, Roger found a position at the Walt Disney Studio, working closely with Ub Iwerks, installing the companies multiplane camera at their new Burbank location. While his official title may have been precision machinist, Roger spent a great deal of his time whipping up special effects with Ub. By 1949, Walt tapped Roger for a special project of his. Both men were avid train enthusiasts and, together, they would create the train for Walt's personal railroad, the Carolwood Pacific, famously located through Lillian's flower beds. Roger is credited with building the Lilly Belle, a 1/8th scale working steam engine for the backyard attraction.

Walt promoted Roger to the Head of the studio's Machine Shop in 1950. He was instrumental in creating the special effects for the epic movie 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. In 1952, Walt created a new division to oversee the mechanical aspects of Disneyland. Called WED Enterprises at the time, it's been known as Walt Disney Imagineering since 1986. The very first employee hand picked to be a part of this new endeavor? Rogie E. Broggie.  As plans for Disneyland developed, Roger personally oversaw the creation of the Railroad, the Monorail and the Matterhorn Bobsleds.

One of the best innovations that Roger came up with was the one he created with Bert Brundage: the Omnimover ride system. First used in 1967 for Adventure Thru Inner Space, the Endless Transit System, as it's known outside of Disney, is a fairly ubiquitous sight in Disney parks. It transformed the concept of the Haunted Mansion away from a walk-through attraction and can be seen in various forms in everything from Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin at the Magic Kingdom to The Great American Chocolate Tour in Hershey, Pennsylvania. The main difference between the Omnimover system and mere continuous ride systems is that the individual cars in the Omnimover system can rotate and tilt as needed.

The other innovation that Roger helped develop were Audio-Animatronics. Roger and his co-workers in the machine shop were the ones who created the figure of Abraham Lincoln for the 1964 World's Fair. In the years that followed, he helped create countless refinements to that initial design that continue to amaze and delight guests to this very day.

As the company marched into the Seventies, Roger was as integral a part of making the Florida Project work as he was for Disneyland. Even after he finally retired in 1975, Roger would still lend his expertise to his Imagineering friends for pretty much the rest of his life. For his 36 years spent making so much of the magic possible, Roger was honored in several ways. First, Engine No. 3 of the Walt Disney World Railroad is the Roger E. Broggie. Second, he was given one of the most deserved titles of Disney Legend in 1991. Third, Roger was posthumously given his own window on Main Street, USA in Disneyland that reads "Can Do Machine Works, Mechanical Wonders, Live Steam Engines, Magical Illusions, Cameras, Roger E. Broggie Shopmaster, Advisor to the Magic Makers."

On November 4, 1991, the man about whom Michael Eisner once declared "Without him, Disneyland wouldn't have happened" quietly passed away in his Carmel, California home. He was 83.

Also on this day, in American history: Pretty Boy Floyd