So you might already know that experienced surfers visiting the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida can hang 10 during a private surf session at Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon Water Park. But did you know that there was once another place that surfers could try out their skills on Walt Disney World property? In this episode of We Love Attractions, we’re taking a look at the unfortunate history of the Polynesian Wave Machine.
The Polynesian Resort at Walt Disney World opened with the resort on October, 1st 1971. During construction, The Disney Company was thinking of ways that they could attract the many potential guests who regularly visit Florida. At that time, one of the biggest attractions that was luring tourists to the sunshine state was the miles and miles of warm and luxurious beaches. Disney’s Vice President of Park Operations, Dick Ninus, came up with the idea of adding outdoor recreation activities including sailing, boating, hiking, and of course surfing.
Nunis was born on May 30th, 1932 in Cedartown, Georgia. He had a huge ambition to become a professional football player and coach, and even attended the University of Southern California on a football scholarship. Unfortunately his dreams on the gridiron came to a quick halt when he broke a part of his neck while playing.
During his time at USC, Dick Nunis attended classes with Ron Miller, who was Walt Disney’s son-in-law. One day, out of the blue, he applied for a summer job at Disneyland. After graduation, he was hired by Van France, the founder of The Disney University, and one of Dick’s very first assignments was to train Disneyland employees during the park’s orientation and training program. His first class was attended by Walt Disney himself and other Disneyland executives.
Working his way up through the ranks, he became the Director of Park Operations and would eventually go on to help develop “Project X,” better known as Walt Disney World.
While overseeing the development of the Polynesian Resort on the Seven Seas Lagoon, Dick and the team were thinking of which outdoor activities could be added to the guest experience. Over the years in California, Nunis had become quite fond of surfing and he came up with the idea of placing a wave machine on Beachcomber Island, which is the island closest to the Polynesian Resort Beach.
The project idea was not without its issues. First, to accommodate a wave machine, there would have to be a buffer on the shore of the lagoon where the waves would hit. Second, the wave machine would have to be rushed and installed before the Seven Seas Lagoon was filled with water. And finally, with the rising costs to build the resort, there was very little money left in the budget.
Dick Nunis would not take no for an answer and insisted that the Polynesian Resort would open with a wave machine, to give that typical island feeling.
So the project was given the go-ahead. The half a million dollar wave machine was installed and, to the surprise of everyone, it worked very well for a little while. The wave machine operated for at least a year from 1971 until 1972, and Dick Nunis himself was even spotted a couple of times catching a wave out on the lagoon.
Of course, the attraction would eventually come to an unfortunate halt for three very interesting reasons.
First, over the months, wave after wave would hit the beaches surrounding the Seven Seas Lagoon and those beaches became very eroded quickly. The wave machine operated so well that the costs were rising to keep the beaches in the quality shape that Walt Disney World became known for.
Secondly, the wave machine itself would often fail during operation. The machinery could only be operated for a few hours at a time.
Finally, thousands of guests were being transported across the lake between the Ticket and Transportation Center every day. Those water crafts that you see cruising across the lagoon could not withstand the high powered water force that the wave machine was creating. Often the waves would become too intense for the water crafts to safely maneuver around the Polynesian boat docks. The Southern Seas boat in particular, which was one of two Osceola-Class Sidewheelers – a term Disney created, would often be knocked off its route across the Seven Seas Lagoon and the boat’s Captains found it hard to maneuver the ship around the force of the waves.
Eventually, the wave machine at the polynesian was shut off and left untouched for almost 15 years. Eventually, in 1985, The Disney Company decided to dismantle the wave machine, but not before testing it out one last time. There wasn’t very much erosion in recent years and they believed that after the beaches had been left without waves constantly hitting them, that the sand would now have settled into place and would not be affected by the high powered machine if it were back in operation. However, once the waves started back up again, it was immediately apparent that the beaches would not be able to withstand the barrage of waves, and the water crafts were once again feeling the pressure while trying to move across the seven seas lagoon. Disney continued on with their plan to dismantle the machinery and up until recently, the only remains of the waves from Beachcomber Island was a small brick wall bordering the trees. There are some rumors floating around that Disney left small portions of the machine under the water, left to rot away.
However, Dick Nunis’s dream was not over yet. Just 4 short years after the wave machine was removed from the seven seas lagoon, Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon opened for guests across from the newly built Pleasure Island as part of the MGM Studios expansion in 1989.
In the year 2016, approximately 2,277,000 guests passed through the turnstiles of Typhoon Lagoon, making it the second most visited water park in the world. Disney decided to offer surf sessions before and after regular park hours where guests can enjoy 100 perfect waves split into sets of 25 across 3 hours. Most recently, Typhoon Lagoon hosted the first-ever Surfing Competition for 2022 Special Olympics. Surfing was, once again, back at Walt Disney World. Something that, I’m sure, Dick Nunis is truly proud of.
Well that’s a wrap on another episode of We Love Attractions. As always, show notes and further reading can be found in the links below. If you enjoy learning about the history behind the attractions that we all love at visit around the world, make sure you give a thumbs up for this video on YouTube and hit that subscribe button so you don’t miss out on future videos. Thank you so much for watching and I’ll see you in the next episode of We Love Attractions.
Works Cited
- Disneyworld.disney.go.com. (n.d.). Retrieved August 12, 2022, from https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/recreation/surf-lessons
- Themouselets. (2019, March 19). Surfing at the Polynesian – the history of the wave machine. The Mouselets. Retrieved August 12, 2022, from https://themouselets.com/surfing-at-the-polynesian-the-history-of-the-wave-machine
- Au, Tsz Yin (Gigi); Chang, Bet; Chen, Bryan; Cheu, Linda; et al. (June 1, 2017). Rubin, Judith (ed.). “TEA/AECOM 2016 Theme Index and Museum Index: The Global Attractions Attendance Rep” (PDF). Themed Entertainment Association. Archived (PDF) from the original on July 26, 2019. Retrieved July 26, 2017.
- Dick Nunis. D23. (2018, April 2). Retrieved August 12, 2022, from https://d23.com/walt-disney-legend/dick-nunis
