Disneyland's Haunted House Portrait Paintings Saved and Restored

Are you aware that Disneyland has five Haunted Mansions worldwide?? You can go through this super-popular amusement ride at Disney World, Disneyland Anaheim, Tokyo Disneyland, Disneyland Paris and Hong Kong Disneyland.

The Haunted Mansion at Disneyland Anaheim

The Winchester Family home (of Winchester Firearms fame) in San Jose, California, was the inspiration for the design of the ride. But, New Orleans culture and style inspired the Disneyland Anaheim mansion's look and feel.

The home is known for its huge size and Victorian architectural oddities. It is believed to be haunted by the ghosts of those killed by Winchester rifles which the family business manufactured.

The original 2 Disneyland designers disagreed on how the haunted mansion concept would be built. One wanted it to be funny, while the other wanted it to be scary. In the end, the two themes were combined... and I'm pleased to see that it's more entertaining than terrifying.

Disneyland Anaheim opened the first haunted house August 9, 1969 and, as you can imagine, there have been renovations in the last 56 years. In fact there have been renovations at all of the haunted houses as technology has developed.

During my earlier years of growing up, my father was an elementary school district superintendent in Anaheim, California. All of the local schools used to get discounted access to Disneyland once a year, plus there must’ve been other promotional programs also because as a child from very young through my teenage years we would go to Disneyland at least a couple of times a year. I remember one weekend where we went all three days on single day passes. I remember a Christmas Day we went to Disneyland and the amusement park was empty so all we did was run from one ride to another, getting on immediately! Not only was the haunted house one of the new attractions 16 years after the amusement park opened, it has persisted as one of the most popular attractions in the park.

The four family portraits that would appear to stretch or grow from 4' to 10'

You'll remember, that when you enter the attraction of the Haunted Mansion, the story of the hauntings begins and the floor imperceptibly lowers, magically expanding the height of the room. As the room becomes hauntingly taller, the four portraits of demised family members on the walls are apparently stretched from about 4 feet to 10 feet tall, changing the appearance from a pretty picture of a mansion's family member to a gruesome or "edgy" funny image. This is the introduction to the Haunted Mansion before you get into the seats of the moving ride.

About 10 years ago, we were approached by an art dealer in the Los Angeles area who had what he thought were all four of these famous original portrait paintings. Apparently, they had been discarded as part of a renovation. All four of these paintings were original oil paintings. We cleaned and varnished them and mounted the paintings so they would be stable, framed and displayed. It was really a nostalgic thrill to have them come into the lab and be responsible for their preservation as a piece of American culture. It was really fun to have them under our care for a while. Of course, when anyone visiting us at the lab saw them, they would always lapse into an enthusiastic story-telling of when they were a kid... Click here to see what fun artwork we have in the lab now!

You can imagine how surprised we were about a month ago when I got a call from the Las Vegas area. The family's grandfather had been the chief electrician at Disneyland Anaheim, who serviced the Haunted Mansion. During his employment there, as they shut down the attraction for renovation and began demolishing certain parts, the workers threw into the trash the paintings previously mentioned! The family’s father could not bear to see these iconic paintings discarded so unceremoniously. So he rolled 2 of them up and took them home where they have been in storage, rolled up like maps, for decades.

The two portraits that the head electrician saved from the trash

The children and grandchildren now are interested in having the paintings look their best so they can display them and continue to tell the funny stories that accompany their grandfather‘s work there. Checking online, they also discovered that these same images from other Disneyland Haunted Houses have come up at auction over the years and have brought up to $150,000 each!

So, once again, we are thrilled to have under our care. the preservation and restoration of two more of the paintings from the Haunted Mansion at Disneyland Anaheim.

The two paintings were stabilized, so that any flaking was stopped; they were also relaxed on a warming table so that all the cracks and distortions would lie flat; they were, of course, cleaned and very carefully touched up if there was paint missing. They received several coats of archival varnish that doesn’t yellow and new frames were built that were reproduced from photos in the Haunted Manson. What fun to see them preserved and looking great for future generations! We're going to redeliver them to the family in a couple of weeks... they are going to go NUTS with excitement!!!!