The road to Space Mountain
article originally appeared in The Ohio State Alumni Magazine
Bill Watkins used a stepladder, a wagon and a board to create his first roller coaster at the age of 8. He broke an arm on his only ride down that backyard contraption, but the mishap didn’t discourage him from making rides or chasing thrills. Far from it.
He would go on to design world-famous Disney attractions, including Space Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad.
“Ohio State really prepared me to become an engineer,” says Watkins ’53, now 86.
He joined the Phi Kappa Alpha fraternity and met his wife, Elizabeth Trinkler ’52, who was living in the sorority house next door. Elizabeth, who passed away last year, supported the two of them with a teaching job while Watkins finished his degree.
While he loved his time as a Buckeye, by the time graduation rolled around he was ready to escape the Midwest winters he’d grown up with in Cincinnati.
“I started my career with the first recruiter who approached me from California,” says Watkins, who has lived in the Golden State ever since. He ended up at the Lockheed Aircraft research lab, where he designed machines to test aircraft components.
His career took an important turn when he saw an ad seeking a mechanical engineer to design Disney’s ride equipment. The position called to that 8-year-old boy.
Watkins had held engineering jobs with well-known companies by this time, but in the beginning it was his hobby that most impressed the Disney bigwigs.
“I brought along some photos of a racecar I had built for fun,” he says, “and I guess they figured if I could build a racecar, I could probably design vehicles for their rides.”
And so he did, as a project engineer in the mechanical show and ride department. He eventually graduated from stepladders and boards to big time roller coasters when he was charged with designing Space Mountain for Disney World’s Magic Kingdom in Florida.
It was the perfect fit for a thrill-seeker. The coaster’s design was influenced by Watkins’ love of fast racecars and airplanes. As a licensed pilot, he once took a friend’s airplane up to test his own comfort with gravitational force. He determined that if he — a man who’d had a disc removed from his spine — could handle three G’s, then Disney enthusiasts could handle two and a half.
“When Space Mountain opened, there weren’t any signs telling people what kind of ride it was, so some people were pretty unhappy when they realized too late that it was a roller coaster,” Watkins says. Despite the ride’s success, the detail-oriented engineer felt he could do better. He got his chance when he was asked to engineer another Space Mountain for Disneyland in California.
For his new design, he reduced the coaster’s roll rates — the transition into curves, from level to banked — to create a more comfortable ride. The Disneyland version opened in 1977 and has been replicated at Disney theme parks in Tokyo and Hong Kong. Watkins’ credits also include another Disney favorite: Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, a high-speed train ride through a haunted mine.
When Disney reduced his department from 120 people to nine in favor of outsourcing in 1985, Watkins left the company and started his own, Ride & Show Engineering Inc. And although his days of creating coasters ended with the move, Watkins’ company has been involved in other types of ride design around the world, including water rides, one the few engineering challenges this Buckeye doesn’t enjoy.
“It’s a bad environment for mechanical things,” he says, “and it’s hard to design things that work and hold up under those conditions.”
His favorite projects? Space Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad top the list, of course. He also enjoyed designing Disney World’s People Mover, a version of which he created for the George W. Bush International Airport in Houston. His firm also replaced the bodies on Disneyland’s monorail trains and produced equipment for the EPCOT Norway Pavilion at Disney World.
Watkins has never lost his boyhood love of going fast. He has driven 22 racecars in 385 races, and he suspects his engineering education might have given him an edge. He laughs when asked if winning races is more about the driver or the car.
“I’m thinking back to one race where four of us were driving Arnolt Bristols, and I lapped some of those guys. The more you understand about the technical aspects of a car and the racetrack, the better you can drive.”
Unlike his early backyard invention, Watkins’ first professional roller coaster has held up nicely, well into his retirement from ride design. Although Space Mountain runs on new steel tracks and has seen some cosmetic touch-ups and technology updates, Watkins’ design remains unchanged. Perhaps most importantly, it is still beloved by generations of kids and adults who appreciate a good thrill.
by Stephanie Waite
