Bob Gurr has developed more than 100 designs for attractions ranging from Autopia and Matterhorn Bobsleds to the Disneyland and Walt Disney World monorails.
Born in Los Angeles on October 25, 1931, young Bob was fascinated with tools, mechanical devices, and cars. He often crawled through a hole in the fence of nearby Grand Central Air Terminal in Glendale to sneak into the cockpits of idle transport airplanes, while at school he decorated his test papers with sketches of automobiles.
Later, he attended Art Center College of Design in Los Angeles on a General Motors scholarship, studing industrial design. Upon graduation in 1952, he was hired by Ford Motor Company, but soon purchased a rubber stamp marked “R. H. Gurr Industrial Design” and went into business for himself.
Soon after, WED Enterprises, today known as Walt Disney Imagineering, hired Bob to consult on the design of miniature cars for Autopia. Walt Disney was so impressed with Bob’s knowledge and skill that he invited him to join the Imagineering family, which then was solely dedicated to the design and construction of Disneyland.
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