You might think you know The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, but the facts behind this attraction may surprise you.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh is a charming, family-friendly dark ride at Disney World. But its backstory isn’t as adorable as the attraction itself. In fact, this tale of a day in the world of Pooh is pretty weird… and quite controversial.

So, the next time you head into the Hundred Acre Wood with Pooh and friends, you just might look at the Disney World (and Disneyland) dark ride in an entirely new light. Here’s how the attraction came to be – and why its backstory is so different from any other. 

Disney Started Planning a Winnie the Pooh Attraction in the 1970s

Photo by Cliff Wang

While The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh is a pretty recent addition to Disney World’s Magic Kingdom Park – it opened in June 1999 – it was a long time coming. Disney had actually been working on adapting Pooh’s story into an attraction for decades, dating all the way back to the 1970s.

In 1977, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh hit theaters. This Walt Disney Productions film was an animated musical anthology, bringing three animated featurettes together into a cohesive story. Audiences adored it (still today, it’s considered a classic for how well it retells the A.A. Milne original stories). 

And thanks to the film’s success, Winnie the Pooh suddenly became popular once again.

So, Disney Imagineers began making plans to bring Pooh and friends into the theme parks. The first plan was to introduce a Winnie the Pooh attraction into Disneyland’s Fantasyland, which was slated to undergo a massive renovation in the 1980s. However, that planned attraction never materialized. 

Disney didn’t stop there, though. 

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh Almost Wound Up in Toontown

In the 1980s, Disney’s animated films received another burst of sudden popularity thanks to the success of 1988’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit. A new land was coming to life at both Disney World and Disneyland: Mickey’s Toontown, home to plenty of animated characters. 

Early plans for Toontown included a dark ride based on The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. At Disneyland, Toontown was intended to take guests in honey pot ride vehicles (that could spin in a manner similar to the Mad Tea Party’s teacups) through scenes from each of the film’s three featurettes. 

But as plans for Toontown progressed, that Disneyland ride was also canceled. Elements of the idea did make their way into the final version of Roger Rabbit’s Car Toon Spin, though. That ride not only took over the space planned for the Pooh attraction, but also utilized the spinning vehicle design, turning the honey pots into taxi cabs.

Disney had one more idea in the mid-1990s: A boat ride themed around Winnie the Pooh. Intended for Disneyland, this ride was intended to be partially indoors and partially outdoors. But, since Disneyland is notoriously limited in its expansion space, this final idea was shelved in 1999. 

Winnie the Pooh Wasn’t Greenlit for Magic Kingdom Until the 1990s

Although Disney started planning a ride based on The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh back in the ‘70s, it took more than 20 years for anything concrete to actually happen. And while all of the original plans for a Pooh-inspired ride were centered around Disneyland, it was Disney World that actually wound up with the attraction.

In the mid-1990s, Pooh and friends were seeing a resurgence in popularity. Once again, Pooh was a hot commodity – so Disney decided to finally act on those shelved plans for a dark ride into the Hundred Acre Wood. This time, though, Pooh was headed to Magic Kingdom.

In 1998, 10 years after those Toontown plans, Disney announced that an attraction based on Winnie the Pooh would come to Magic Kingdom’s Fantasyland. 

But, like all of the previous plans for a Pooh-based ride, there was a complication: In order to build the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Disney was going to evict an opening day attraction. 

Longtime Disney World Fans Were Furious About Pooh’s Ride

Photo by Laurie Sapp

Before the news of the new Pooh attraction at Magic Kingdom broke, rumblings had begun to circulate that Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride was slated for closure. 

An opening day attraction at Magic Kingdom back in 1971, Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride was a staple. Sure, it wasn’t technologically advanced or even hugely popular with guests. But when rumors started to spread about the classic dark ride’s closure in October 1997, longtime Disney World guests were furious.

The rumors proved true when in August 1998 Disney announced that the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh would utilize the show building for Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. 

Fans immediately responded with attempts and (quite loud) pleas to save Mr. Toad. A “Save the Toad” campaign was launched, and fans set up websites, organized protests, and even created merchandise devoted to stopping the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh in favor of keeping Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride. No amount of “Toad-ins,” or sit-ins, could save the classic, though. Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride closed despite fans’ protesting, shutting down for good on September 7, 1998.

Mr. Toad Still Haunts The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh Today

The specter of Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride still hangs over the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. A number of fans are still sore about the classic ride’s closure. But Disney Imagineers did leave Mr. Toad in his original building – he’s just now an Easter egg rather than the main attraction.

There’s a tribute in the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh: Guests can spot a picture of Mr. Toad handing over a property deed to Owl. This picture hangs on the wall in Owl’s house.

Additionally, other references and nods to Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride live on in Magic Kingdom. Mole, another character from The Wind in the Willows, can be seen tipping his hat to Pooh in another painting inside Owl’s house.

And perhaps most memorable – and ominous – of all is near the Haunted Mansion. Here, in the pet cemetery, guests can spot a statue of Mr. Toad.

Disneyland’s Version Was Controversial, Too

Photo by Cliff Wang

After the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh debuted at Magic Kingdom, the long-planned dark ride did make its way to Disneyland.

Remember how little space there was to add a Winnie the Pooh attraction? Well, Imagineers decided to use Disney World as a model and add Pooh to Disneyland by utilizing the space of an existing attraction. But here, Mr. Toad was spared – instead, it was the Country Bears that got the axe.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh was a natural fit for Critter Country (which has since been renamed Bayou Country). Here, Pooh and his friends already had their own dedicated meeting spot by 1996 – the Thotful Spot, which sits outside Pooh Corner – and theming. 

So, in 2001, Country Bear Jamboree closed permanently. Disney didn’t make a big deal about the closure, but this was an undeniably controversial choice. While fans didn’t exactly protest in the same manner as they did at Magic Kingdom over Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, Disneyland fans were upset that the Country Bears came to such an unceremonious end after nearly three decades in the park. 

And the decision certainly stung longtime Disneyland regulars. While Country Bear Jamboree wasn’t hugely popular (the attraction was often quite empty on any given day of the week), Disney had entertained ideas about retheming or reimagining the attraction prior to bringing Pooh in. But, ultimately, ideas like the Critter Country 500, which would’ve turned the Country Bears into a race-style ride, didn’t get off the ground. 

So, Pooh moved in, and a new version of the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh arrived at Disneyland. It took decades, but that long-planned ride did ultimately arrive. And, just like the Disney World version, Disneyland’s includes a tribute to its predecessor: the heads of Max the deer, Melvin the moose, and Buff the buffalo are mounted inside.