List of Secrets and Easter eggs in Liberty Square

A compendium of trivia, hidden details and other Easter eggs in Liberty Square in the Magic Kingdom.

List

• The bridge accessing Liberty Square represents Old Concorde Bridge, where the first battle of the Revolutionary War was fought.
• In the centre of the pathway is a brown streak, made to resemble the canals of human waste which would be in the road in historic American colonies.
• The architecture and years of the buildings steadily increases in order to smoothly transition into Frontierland.
• With the exception of those found at restaurants, there are no washrooms in Liberty Square, to reflect the lack of indoor plumbing.
• To look more authentically with a colonial village, the blinds are secured by leather straps.
• Some light posts have small golden eagles atop them.
• This area is exclusive to the Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World.
• At the entrance to the park is a gatehouse booth with a Walt Disney World poem inside.
• There is a replica of the House of Burgess. In one of the windows are two lanterns representing Paul Revere who used lantern signals to warn revolutionaries of the British. Particularly it references Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem Paul Revere’s Ride which says "Two by sea".

Columbia Harbour House

• The harbour house is named for the Columbia Rediviva which was the first American ship to circumnavigate the globe and which was replicated for Disneyland's Sailing Ship Columbia. Artwork of Disneyland's Columbia appears in artwork on the sign.
• Parcels addressed to Priscilla Lapham outside identify her as the innkeeper of the Columbia Harbour House. Priscilla is a character from Esther Forbes' 1943 book, Johnny Tremain, adapted into a film by Disney in 1957.
• Another crate at the harbour house is for its proprietor, Harold Stalmaster, tributing the actor Harold Stalmaster who played Johnny Tremain.
• The Flying Dutchman themed area has a window overlooking the Haunted Mansion.

The Hall of Presidents

• This attraction is spiritual successor to Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, a historic attraction in Disneyland.
• The building is made to resemble Philadelphia's Independence Hall.
• The year's building is 1787, which is when the US constitution was signed.

Haunted Mansion

• The setting of this iteration of the Haunted Mansion was inspired by American ghost stories such as Washington Irving's the Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
• Cast-members of this Haunted Mansion once created an unofficial backstory known as the "Ghost Gallery" which while not canonical, influenced later tellings of the Haunted Mansion's backstory with influence such as naming the Hitchhiking Ghosts to Ezra, Gus & Phineas, or associating the mansion as Gracey Manor which was owned by the aging man, Master Gracey.

Queue

Exterior

• This version of the Haunted Mansion looks more gothic and creepy due to not having to follow Walt Disney's idea that the ghosts would take care of the inside while the humans would take care of the outside. It has its wings expand out diagonally, giving the sensation that as guests near the mansion they are going further into its claws.
• In the pavement are hoof prints leading to the hearse with no horse present. These hoof prints actually start in Fantasyland where they depict the prints of Maximus from Tangled.
• The hearse was a movie prop used in the western film The Sons of Katie Elder (1965).
• The mansion's weathervane is a bat.
• Wait times for the Haunted Mansion always begin at 13 minutes, referencing the unlucky number 13.
• An urban legend says that the architecture of the Haunted Mansion depicts every chess piece except for the knight, because it is alway night in the Haunted Mansion.
• A crate outside of the mansion identified the manor as Gracey Manor, located in the Hudson River Valley, and the caretaker as having the name Silas Crump. Gracey Manor is a tribute to Imagineer Yale Gracey and the popularity of the "Master Gracey" character, Hudson River Valley is the same region in which the Legend of Sleepy Hollow is set in upstate New York, and the name Silas Crump tributes imagineer Rolly Crump.
• In the queue there is a bride's wedding ring in the basement. This comes from a cast-member explanation that a ring in the pavement left by a removed stanchion actually belonged to the manor's Attic Bride. A later refurbishment replaced the stanchion with an actual fake wedding ring.
• Many of the crypts and tombstones have names in tribute to Imagineers and performers who contributed to the Haunted Mansion.
  • Paul Frees' "Mister Frees" crypt mentions how his voice is in the breeze, alluding to how he played the Ghost Host.

    

• The tombstone of Master Gracey is in tribute to imagineer Yale Gracey who developed the illusions for the Haunted Mansion and who was shot dead alongside his wife. The use of the term, "Master" was not originally intended to imply the character was master-of-the-house, but rather that he died while too young to be referred to as, "Mister". However, the assertion that Master Gracey was late master of the Haunted Mansion became popular amongst fans, cast-members, and the Walt Disney Company itself.
  • There is a fairly common misconception that the Ghost Host and Master Gracey are the same character. This has been proven untrue for a variety of reasons.
• A rose is left on Master Gracey's tombstone every day by cast-members.
• The crypt of Captain Culpepper Clyne references the mariner seen in a portrait and in the graveyard scene of the attraction.
• The composer's crypt references the Pipe Organist. The name on the tomb is "Ravenscroft", tributing Thurl Ravenscroft who plays Uncle Theodore in the ride.
• The composer's crypt has instruments inspired by Rolly Crump's unbuilt Museum of the Weird expansion for Disneyland's Haunted Mansion, instruments inspired by the Phantom Five in the graveyard sequence, and a one-eyed black cat alluding to the story the Black Cat by Edgar Allan Poe whose eponymous character was planned to appear in one iteration of the Haunted Mansion. Over the pipe organ is a statue of the Raven who appears within the Haunted Mansion.
• The design of the Raven on the crypt looks very similar to Diablo from Sleeping Beauty.
• The crypt poetess has the name Prudence Pock. This references the several Haunted Mansion characters to have been named Phineas Pock.
• The Spectrecom is patented by R.H. Goff, tributing Imagineer Harper Goff.
• One of Prudence's poems goes "Down in the swamp poor Sally Slater was eaten by an alligator" referencing the tightrope walker seen in the Stretching Room.
• The message on the side of Prudence's crypt has symbols related to the Haunted Mansion which translate to "Welcome home you foolish mortal, this mansion is your mystic portal, where eerie sights and spooky sounds, fill these happy haunting grounds".
• The Harriet tombstone (tributing Imagineer Harriet Burns) references her being a lady of the opera and has a carving of a viking helmet. This references the Opera Singer ghosts scene in the graveyard scene, possibly identifying the female as Harriet.
• The lone tombstones of several Haunted Mansion characters can be found including: Ezra & Gus (two of the Hitchhiking Ghosts) as well as Ned Nub & Phineas Pock (two of the Singing Busts). There are also the tombstones for Captain Bartholomew Gore, and Beauregard, these being two characters from Ken Anderson's unused "Captain Gore" storyline of the Haunted Mansion. In the original storyline, Captain Gore's name was Captain Gideon Gorelieu, but the name Bartholomew references historic pirate Bartholomew Roberts who Anderson considered merging with Captain Gore.
• Near the doors there is Madame Leota's tombstone. It occasionally opens its eyes to watch guests before shutting them once more.

Interior queue/pre-show

• The portrait of Master Gracey is based on concept art made by Marc Davis of Dorian Gray from Oscar Wilde's the Picture of Dorian Gray. It slowly morphs as was Davis' original intention for all of the Changing Portraits.
• There are various Jack Skellingtons hidden throughout the attraction due to the Magic Kingdom not having its own Haunted Mansion Holiday. The first is Jack's face appearing on Master Gracey's forehead.
• For guests who wish to skip the Stretching Room, there is a pathway bypassing it known as the "Servants Quarters". The Servants Quarters contain keys identified with the different rooms in the mansion, bells identified with different members of the Gracey family, and what appears to be a piece of the original Haunted Mansion's building.
• Unlike in Disneyland where the original Stretching Room was a disguised elevator to pass under the tracks of the Disneyland Railroad, the Magic Kingdom's stretching room stays on the same level and instead raises the ceiling.
• The portrait of the old woman was revealed in 2006 to be the elderly form of the Black Widow Bride, Constance Hatchaway, atop the tomb of her fifth husband George Hightower whom she inherited the Haunted Mansion from.
  • An unused script would have identified her as, "Abigail Patecleaver" instead.

• The tightrope walker was given the canonical name of Sally Slater in 2011. Unused scripts identified the gentleman atop the keg of dynamite as Alexander Nitrokoff, a name which has been used in some official though canonically dubious materials since.
• The four portraits are sometimes interpreted as representing the futility of beauty (Sally), love/marriage (Constance), power (Nitrokoff) and money (Quicksand Men) when faced by the inevitability of death.

  

  The Ghost Host as he appeared in his corruptible, mortal state

• The portraits in the Load Area come from the Sinister 11 corridor scene where they stared at guests. Amongst the portraits in the load area are an arsonist, Jack the Ripper, Captain Culpepper Clyne (whose crypt appears in the queue and whose ghost appears in the graveyard), the Witch of Walpurgis (alluding to Walpurgis night), a bearded man (originally intended to depict Rasputin but whom Walt Disney objected to out of fear Rasputin's descendants would sue), Count Dracula, and the mortal "Hatchet Man" form of the Ghost Host.

Ride

Portrait Corridor/Library/Music Room/Endless Staircase

• While passing under the staircase, the portrait of a couple to the side also used to be in the Sinister 11 hallway. This portrait comes from unused Marc Davis concept art for a portrait which would change to show the wife strangling the husband to death.
• Concept-art identified the ghost-ship as the Flying Dutchman from nautical folklore, and the skeletal knight as, "The Black Prince", possibly alluding to the historic Edward the Black Prince (1330-1376). Needless to say, the gorgon portrait depicts Medusa from Greek mythology.
• In the library there are books with Jack Skellington on the cover, referencing the Nightmare Before Christmas.
• The endless staircase is inspired by the art-piece "Relativity" by M.C. Escher. It replaced the original scene of various giant orange spiders in webs, and for a short time, an animatronic man caught in the web and pleading for help.

Endless Hallway/Corridor of Doors

• The animatronic Hatbox Ghost was added to the Endless Hallway in 2023. The Hatbox Ghost is a popular Haunted Mansion character from Disneyland's iteration of the Haunted Mansion, due to him having been mysteriously removed early in the attraction's history then later reintegrated in 2015. The Magic Kingdom's installation of the character proved controversial due to him appearing at a section of the ride intended towards building the anticipation of seeing any of the ghosts which is then delivered by Madame Leota's seance, while his effect also distracts from the classic endless hallway effect.
• The installation of the Hatbox Ghost replaced an arm-chair. The removed armchair's face is often described as resembling the face of Donald Duck. The chair itself is similar to an armchair with a face planned for the Museum of the Weird.
• The raven is inspired by the eponymous creature from Edgar Allan Poe's classic gothic poem The Raven. It was originally supposed to speak and quote this poem.
• The corpse in the coffin is voiced by Xavier Atencio who wrote the ride.
• The Hatbox Ghost appears in photographs in the corridor.

Seance Room

• Madame Leota's name is a tribute to imagineer Leota Toombs who provided her face. Leota's voice comes from Eleanor Audley, the same voice-actress as Lady Tremaine and Maleficent.
• A trumpet in the room has, "X" on it, tributing imagineer X. Atencio.
• Madame Leota's spell book contains the spell, "Kree Kruh Vergo Gaba Kalto Kree", a spell from the 1968 Disney comedy Blackbeard's Ghost where it was a spell of Blackbeard's tenth wife Aldetha Teach, used to summon Blackbeard's ghost from limbo.
• The Grim Reaper in Leota's spell book has the Leering Head design used for the Hatbox Ghost and Hitchhiking Ghost, Ezra.

Ballroom

• The scene uses an illusion known as, "Pepper's Ghost".
• The bust over the fireplace is of the, "Aunt Lucretia" bust also found in the library.
• The wraiths resemble spirits from Night on Bald Mountain in Fantasia (1940).
• One of the ghosts coming from the hearse is a sea captain, alluding to the unused Captain Gore storyline.
• At the head of the table is a bald roman emperor, alluding to the expression, "Great Caesar's Ghost!".
• ghost in the red scarf hanging from the candelabra is named, "Pickwick" in the blueprints for the ride and is amongst the few characters given a proper name in the blueprints. His name may be an allusion to Charles Dickens' literary character Samuel Pickwick from his first novel The Pickwick Papers (1836), himself believed to have been inspired by historic businessman Eleazer Pickwick (c. 1749–1837). His name is also believed to be a joke about the Pickwick Center of Glendale, California which the Imagineers may have had to pass by during development of the Haunted Mansion.
• The old lady shares a figure with the grandma from Carousel of Progress.
• The woman ballroom dancers actually lead, due to being reflections of figures where the males lead. This was embraced as connecting to how the Haunted Mansion's inhabitants act outside of typical conventions.
• Before entering the attic, the Doom Buggies pass one of the Sinister 11 portraits.

Attic

• There is a beating-heart heard throughout the attic. This was remnant of how originally, the bride had a beating heart which was planned to be included in Constance's design but wound up unused. The attic scene overall received an overhaul in 2006 which developed the bride's character and backstory while merging her with the old widow in the stretching room.
• In every wedding-photo, Constance gains a new string of pearls.
• Constance has a doll of Sally from the Nightmare Before Christmas.
• Some wedding decorations have beheaded grooms.
• Constance's second husband, Frank Banks, shares his name and familial occupation with the Banks family from Mary Poppins, leading to the theory that he was a member of said family.
• Reginald Caine sits in a prop chair repurposed from the 2003 Haunted Mansion film adaptation and which physically appears in the fortress treasure room scene of Pirates of the Caribbean.
• Constance's fifth and final groom, George Hightower, whom she inherited the mansion from, is portrayed by Imagineer Rick Rothschild.
• George Hightower shares his surname with Harrison Hightower III, a wealthy ghost character from Tokyo DisneySea's version of the Tower of Terror.
  • Incidentally, this character was a contemporary of Lord Henry Mystic, a major character from Mystic Manor which is Hong Kong Disneyland's counterpart to the Haunted Mansion.
• Constance's voice-actress is Kat Cressida while her face is provided by Julia Lee.
• Before exiting the attic, there is a stack of hatboxes right next to a coat-rack with Constance's late-husbands hats on them. This references how Constance Hatchaway beheaded her husbands and kept their heads in hatboxes. This also was an indirect allusion to the Hatbox Ghost story, before his integration in the Magic Kingdom.

Graveyard/Exit Crypts

• The imagery of the flying ghosts is taken from the Night on Bald Mountain sequence of Fantasia (1940).
• Grim Grinning Ghosts' title is taken from William Shakespeare's poem Venus and Adonis.
• The crate outside of the mansion gave the caretaker the name, Silas Crump.
• There is sometimes fake dog poop located near the Caretaker's dog.
• The minstrel players are known as the Phantom Five.
• The Phantom Five appear similar to Marc Davis concept art of the Phantom Drummer of Tedworth, a ghost from folklore.
• The Hellhound is seen howling in sync with the wolf howling heard throughout the attraction.
• The singing busts are (from left to right) Rolo Rumkin, Uncle Theodore, Cousin Algernon, Ned Nub and Phineas P. Pock.
• Uncle Thedore's head is cracked due to an issue in the footage of actor Thurl Ravenscroft.
• The Magic Kingdom gave the mariner the name Captain Culpepper Clyne.
• The Mummy is most often identified with the name of Prince Amenmose.
• One shrouded ghost has a face shaped like a hidden Mickey.
• The two opera singers are a play on the Phantom of the Opera, while the beheaded knight nearby is a play on the expression, "A (k)night at the opera".
• The names of the Hitchhiking Ghosts are Phineas, Ezra and Gus.
• The skeleton arms holding torches are an homage to Jean Cocteau's 1946 film La Belle et la Bête (French: Beauty and the Beast).

  

• The names of the three hitchhiking ghosts are (from left to right) Phineas, Ezra, and Gus.
• Phineas has a case behind him containing a candelabra, a bust of Charles Dickens (referencing the ghosts of his story the Christmas Carol), and a portrait of Cousin Maude surrounded by fire confirming her fate as a resolution to the Dread family busts in the queue.
• Ezra's briefcase has luggage stickers from places like Anaheim, and Tokyo which are parks with their own Haunted Mansions. The sticker for California has a large 13, both referencing the mansion's 13 motif as well as Disneyland's 1313 address.
• Unlike in the Disneyland original attraction, these Hitchhiking Ghosts' mirror reflections are not a practical effect but rather a digital/screen effect used with technology similar to the X-Box 360. This effect, while intended on making the ghosts more interactive, was fairly poorly received as the visuals look far less convincing, it is harder to make out the ghosts, and the tracking technology is somewhat inaccurate.
• Ezra's CGI model is balding while his animatronic has hair.
• The Ghostess is also known as Little Leota due to being both played and voiced by Leota Toombs.

Exit

• One of the crypts by the exit is for "Bluebeard" and his "Seven Wives" with the epitaph "Seven winsome wives some fat some short some thin six of them were faithful but the seventh did him in". This is a reference to the French fairy-tale of Bluebeard, in which Bluebeard murdered his first six wives for learning of his past crimes before being defeated by the seventh. This fairy-tale influenced backstories for the Haunted Mansion.
• Bluebeard's year of death is 1440, the same date of death of the historic Gilles de Rais who is believed to have inspired the Bluebeard story.

  

• The Pet Cemetery has a tombstone for Mr. Toad from the Adventures of Ichabod & Mr. Toad. This is a tribute to defunct attraction Mr. Toad's Wild Ride which was replaced by the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. A popular assertion (which is likely untrue) is that the grave has an epitaph which reads, "Here Lies Toad, it's sad but true. Not nearly as marketable as Winnie the Pooh".
  • Toad's presence is somewhat fitting to the Sleepy Hollow influence, as his Disney iteration comes from the film the Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad.

Liberty Bell

• This bell is made from the same mould as the actual liberty bell.
• There are thirteen flags around the liberty bell, each representing a different one of the original 13 colonies.

Liberty Belle Riverboat

Boats

• There originally used to be two steamboats known as the Richard F. Irvine and the Admiral Joe Fowler. The Fowler was named for Admiral Joe Fowler who assisted in the design of Disneyland while the Richard F. Irvine was a tribute to early Imagineer Richard Irvine.
• The name of the Liberty Belle Riverboat is a play on the real world Liberty Bell (recreated in Liberty Square), while the word Belle is French for "Beauty".
• One of the crates along the docks is labelled 71, referencing Walt Disney World's opening year.
• Another crate is from the Tell City Tool Company. This references the real-world Tell City, Ohio, which was a planned community that could only be reached by riverboat during its construction.
• Multiple crates along the docks are labelled Russell Falls/Russell's Falls, referencing Davy Crockett's sidekick Georgie Russell from the Disney Davy Crockett mini-series,
• A copy of the Swiss Family Robinson appears in one of the shelves in the cabin.

Rivers of America

Note: Here including sections of the ride located in Frontierland,

• The narrators Sam Clemens and Captain Horace Bixby are both historic figures. Sam Clemens is better known as the author, Mark Twain.
• In the safety spiel, Clemens references River Pirates who operated out of the vicinity. This references the River Pirates of Wilson's Cave Inn seen on the attraction, though could also reference Davy Crockett and the River Pirates.
• In his spiel, Sam Clemens mentions keelboats and keelboaters in the area alluding to the defunct Mike Fink's Keel Boats attraction which was on the Rivers of America.
• Sam is identified as having been childhood friends with Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn and Joe Harper; his fictional creations.
• Sam Clemens gives part of the backstory of Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and used to give the backstory for Splash Mountain. When Clemens mentions how the Indigenous peoples of the region named Big Thunder Mountain after the sound the falls made during rainfalls, it indirectly references "Big Thunder" and "Little Thunder" Falls, water-falls from the extinct Disneyland attraction Mine Train Through Nature's Wonderland from which Big Thunder Mountain Railroad received its name.
• On the docks of Big Thunder is a crate labelled, "H. Abiff's Working Tools" covered in freemason imagery. This is a reference to the real-world secret-society the Freemasons, and its mythical figure Hiram Abiff.
• The cabin used to have a burning effect with a fake settler outside who was killed by an arrow. The narration explained that this settler was killed in an attack by Indigenous peoples, before the arrow was removed and he was changed to being a passed out drunk whose house was aflame from a moonshining accident. The effect proved problematic and it was eventually removed, though a smoke effect was later added.
• Beacon Joe is a character from Disneyland's Pirates of the Caribbean where he appeared in the Blue Bayou scene, absent from the Magic Kingdom. The narration references him coming from a bayou as a tribute to the character's origins.
• The Powhatan tribe which the Liberty Belle encounters having migrated far from their traditional territory was implied to be the tribe of Pocahontas.
• The sailors exclaiming, "Mark twain!" alludes to Clemens' pen name.
• Wilson's Cave Inn is named after historic river pirate James Ford (1775-1833), who early writers identified with the name Jim Wilson. Ford and his gang made their headquarters from a cave called the Cave-in-Rock, and who would lure victims into an inn called the Potts Inn.
• Clemens refers to the Haunted Mansion's waters as being called "Howling Dog Bend", referencing the Hellhound heard howling on the ride.

The Liberty Tree

• The Liberty Tree represents how during the Revolutionary War, the Sons of Liberty would meet at a distillery across from an old elm tree.
• The Liberty Tree has 13 lanterns referencing America's 13 colonies.
• Disney's Liberty Tree is over 130 years old.

Liberty Tree Tavern

• The Liberty Tree Tavern is named for how the Sons of Liberty would meet at a distillery across from an old elm tree. The Liberty Tree Tavern itself is located nearby Liberty Square's Liberty Tree.
• A miniature sculpture of Amos from Ben and Me (1953) appears by a Ben Franklin book on a shelf. Amos can also be seen from the window outside of the restaurant.

Memento Mori

• The eyeball sign of the attraction is designed so that no matter where you are it looks like it is staring at you. The pupil has a design of Madame Leota's crystal ball form in it.
• Cast-members wear a brooch with Madame Leota's face, resembling her tombstone.
• Bottles with glowing spirits appear on the upper levels, likely as a play on the alcoholic beverage "Spirits".
• Madame Leota's portrait changes to show the Raven from the Haunted Mansion perched atop her shoulder, a black cat at her feet, and her crystal ball glowing in reference to her fate.
• Madame Leota's face sometimes appears in the mirror, watching guests.
• This shop connects Madame Leota's (Magic Kingdom) backstory to the historic Salem Witch Trials.
• Knocking the wall with Madame Leota's portrait sometimes causes knocking to come from the other side.

Sleepy Hollow Refreshments

• The building is based off of the home of author Washington Irving in Sunnyside, New York.
• This dining service is themed to being the Sleepy Hollow Inn in the village of Sleepy Hollow.
• A crate outside of this building is addressed to Ichabod Crane, appearing nearby one for Brom Bones. The crate for Brom Bones identifies him as Abraham van Brunt, his full name from the book which was not in the Disney movie.
• Brom Bones' crate identifies him as living at Ma Irving's Boarding House. This tributes author Washington Irving, who wrote the Legend of Sleepy Hollow.
• In the window is Katrina van Tassel's Halloween party guest list from the Adventures of Ichabod & Mr. Toad.
• The sign has artwork of the Headless Horseman, and the establishing year of 1790.

Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe

• Outside of this shop is a sign for Ichabod Crane's music lessons.
• In the summer of 2024, a projection of Ichabod Crane's silhouette was added to one of the upper windows.
• The silversmith part of the shop is themed to being owned by the Kepple Family. This is a tribute to Walt Disney's grandfather, Kepple Disney. Their family's establishing year is 1779.

Defunct attractions/services

The Silversmith Shop

• This shop was identified as belonging to J. Tremaine. This was a reference to the character Johnny Tremain.