History
The Norway pavilion is the most recent nation to be added to World Showcase. It opened on May 6, 1988, however it was not given its official opening until a month later. In June 1988, the grand opening was dedicated by Crown Prince Harald in a ceremony that was broadcast live to Norway. The original idea was to create a Nordic Pavilion that would combine elements from various countries into one exhibit. Three countries were consulted, but it finally ended up with investors from Norway raising the US$30 million required to create an exclusive national pavilion. Disney contributed the other one-third of the construction cost. In 1992, the investors sold their stake to Disney. Since nearly as many people visit Epcot as live in Norway, the government felt it still was a good promotional tool for their tourism industry. The federal government continued to contribute US$200,000 annually for five years to help fund the exhibit. Renewed in 1997 for a further 5 years, the government stopped payments in 2002, against the recommendations from their American embassy.
Read more about this topic: Norway (Epcot)
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“... that there is no other way,
That the history of creation proceeds according to
Stringent laws, and that things
Do get done in this way, but never the things
We set out to accomplish and wanted so desperately
To see come into being.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“I assure you that in our next class we will concern ourselves solely with the history of Egypt, and not with the more lurid and non-curricular subject of living mummies.”
—Griffin Jay, and Reginald LeBorg. Prof. Norman (Frank Reicher)
“Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)