[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: Welcome to the it's all for Love podcast. I'm Charl Mazza, the Healing Dancer, your host. This podcast is all about Michael Jackson and how he continues to inspire love in the world and inspires us to be our best selves.
In this episode I am speaking with Big Al, who worked at Neverland Valley Ranch for Michael for about 15 years. He has some really amazing stories about Michael Jackson and his time at Neverland. I am sure that you will really enjoy this episode. I would really love to have Big Al back on the podcast. So if you have any questions that you would like for me to ask him, please email
[email protected] and I will let you know when that podcast episode will be out where he will answer all of your questions. All of my contact info is in the show notes, so please make sure to reach out if you have questions for Big Al. If you are watching on YouTube, please make sure that you are subscribed to the channel and leave us a comment and let us know how much you love the episode. If you are listening on any other podcast platform, please, if you can, be sure to leave a positive review. Thank you so much for listening and or watching. It's All For Love.
[00:01:30] Speaker C: Hey everyone, thank you so much for joining us on the it's all for Love podcast. I'm Cheryl Mazza, the Healing dancer, your host and today I have a special guest with me. We have Big Al that's going to talk with us. Big Al is here to tell us all about him and his time working at the Neverland Valley Ranch with Mr. Jackson, our favorite person.
So thank you so much, Big Al, for being here and for my pleasure.
I'm so honored to have you here. I really am excited to talk with you and to hear your stories and to get to know you more. So tell us about you and how you started working at Neverland.
[00:02:18] Speaker A: Well, I've been involved in the amusement ride safety and maintenance business my entire adult life. I would say right out of high school. Actually, right during high school, I worked at an amusement park in Phoenix, Arizona. And right after high school, I thought I was going to go on the road for a summer with a carnival until I figured out what I really wanted to do. And here I am 50 some years later still doing it. Basically the same thing. So, but I, I ended up working for a consulting company that did safety and maintenance inspections. And when Mr. Jackson bought Neverland, started putting rides in, we, we went out there as a consulting firm and basically did the Inspections on the rides and told them what kind of tools they needed to buy and how to, how to maintain the equipment and whatnot. And, and I usually. I wound up going out there a couple of times a year for about two years. And then the ranch manager, I was having a closing meeting with the ranch manager and, and we had talked to. Actually when I first started going out there, we talked about they needed. I, I had no idea what went on out there, but I, I just thought it was a bunch of amusement rides in somebody's backyard, which it was. But I, there was a lot more to it than that, which I found out later. But I told him, I said, you need to hire somebody that has a background in this just from a liability standpoint. Because they, they just took people that were from other departments and they said, okay, you're working in the amusement park. Well, you have to have somebody that has a background that understands the equipment. Otherwise you're at a, you're at a, A lot. You put your, yourself and Mr. Jackson in a big liability issue there. So, so anyway, after a couple years they, they basically asked if I was interested in going to work there. And actually, you know, I'm, I'm on full time, so.
Wow.
[00:04:19] Speaker C: So when you were first called in there, you didn't know that it was four Michael Jackson?
[00:04:24] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, I knew it was his ranch. I mean, all the years I've been in there as a consultant, I'd never met him. He was there a couple of times when I was doing some work because they told me, you know, you gotta let us know when you want to be in this area or this area and whatnot, because, you know, the boss was home and whatnot. And one time I went in there and did a maintenance job that required lowering this. It was a. The zipper ride, which stands up in the air about 40ft and you have to take some stuff apart and there's big hydraulic lift rams that lower it down to do this maintenance job I was doing.
And the guy that was helping me was a friend of mine from Phoenix. And he, he said, he said, don't make it real obvious. He was up on the semi, up on the trailer, and I was down working the hydraulic controls. And anyway, he said, he said, don't make it real obvious, but you got to look behind you. So I kind of glanced over my shoulder and like the whole ranch, there's all these vehicles or what. I don't know if they'd never seen this ride be lowered like that before or whatever, but they were like watching it, like it was a movie almost. And one of the people that was over there was Mr. Jackson and his golf cart with some friends. And so, but I, I didn't meet him until after I actually started working there.
[00:05:37] Speaker C: Do you remember the, well, I'm sure you remember the first time you met him.
[00:05:42] Speaker A: Yeah, it's actually kind of a funny story and I, I got to share it with, to his son a while back because he asked me the same thing how I started working there. And, and like I, you know, like I, I knew Michael or met him somewhere and asked him for a job. That's not exactly what happened, but, but anyway, so now I'm, I've been working there about two weeks. I mean, I'm actually on the payroll as a full time employee and he was home and he had some guests and they told us over the radio that the guests were heading down the amusement park. It was kind of a warm day, so I went over to the snow cone. We had these kiosk machines placed around.
You know, one of them had popcorn, one of them had cotton candy, one of them had snow cones. And anyway, so I went over to the snow cone machine to make sure there was ice in there because it was kind of a hot day and it melted. So I'm grinding some ice and it's, it's really close to the railroad tracks where this, this train that's behind me runs right in front of the amusement park.
And in front of the amusement park, the cement where the railroad, where the train is right where it's sitting right now, but right in front of the park, it's stamped to make it look like flagstone. And when a golf cart drives over, you can hear the tires kind of rumble on it a little bit. And I could, I could hear them driving down the railroad tracks and they, they stopped right behind me. And I heard Michael say, it sure is a hot day today, isn't? I glanced over my shoulder and I said, yeah, it sure is. I went back to grinding ice and all of a sudden a water balloon hits me right in the middle of the back.
So that was my, that was my introduction to Mr. Jackson and that was my first meeting with him.
[00:07:32] Speaker C: So that is awesome.
[00:07:35] Speaker A: I, I, I decided right then and there that this was going to be a fun place to work.
[00:07:40] Speaker C: So definitely. Did you ever get to like ride on any of the rides with Michael?
[00:07:48] Speaker A: Not, no, not really. I, I mean, I wrote on the two trains because I operated them quite a bit. But no, I didn't ride any of the rides.
[00:07:58] Speaker C: I'm not a big ride person myself, but I did see that they had. What was that one called with the dragon?
[00:08:07] Speaker A: Sea Dragon, yeah.
[00:08:08] Speaker C: Sea Dragon. That's it. Yeah. That's my favorite ride of all time.
[00:08:12] Speaker A: That was, I would say, either tied for first or a close second. His that he rode the most, I would say.
[00:08:21] Speaker C: Really? Yeah, yeah.
[00:08:23] Speaker A: You like the bumper cars?
The bumper cars, our bumper cars was kind of unique. It was. It had sidewall around, so it's kind of like an enclosed building. And it had special effects. It had fog machines and strobe lights and black lights and a huge sound system. And usually when, when it was just Mr. Jackson and some of his guests, they would ride it for, you know, half hour, 45 minutes, you know. And same with the Sea Dragon. They'd write it quite a. Quite a few times in a row.
[00:08:53] Speaker C: Yeah, that's awesome. I don't know if I could ride that more than stomach dropping thing, you know.
What are some of your favorite moments over the years working there?
[00:09:09] Speaker A: I'd say probably the. My favorite moments are there was a few times where I got to make Mr. Jackson laugh hysterically.
And that's always fun. He. He was, he had a very loud. You could hear him all the way through the whole valley when he, when he laughed. You could hear him a long ways away but one time and you'd have to. And I'm sure that anybody that's going to watch this has probably got to be a Michael Jackson fan. And I'm sure they've seen the video Speed Demon where it was.
Part of it was live actors and part of it was Claymation.
Well, we got a call. It was myself and Dan the mechanic was with me in the amusement park. And Dan was kind of a smaller guy, you know, just, I don't know, 5 foot 6, weighed about, you know, 110 pounds. You know, he was kind of a small guy. And me and security call and said the guests are coming down to the park and Mr. Jackson wanted to have a couple of scooters. You know the little tiny like moped scooters. Yeah. So we kept them in storage up at the train barn. So Dan and I hop on my golf cart, we go up there and we get a couple of these scooters and we're coming back to the amusement park. And if you can imagine a person my size on one of these little scooters, you could barely see the scooter. And of course smoke was blowing out of it because it was having a hard time Carrying me down the road. But as we drive up to the park, Dan obviously is ahead of me because he's a small guy and the scooter's pulling him just fine.
But as we, as we're driving up to the park, I see Mr. Jackson and he is laughing hysterically. And I know he's laughing because he's looking at me on this little scooter and it had to look funny. But anyway, it just, this thought ran. When it ran into my mind, I thought about the video Speed Demon and I drove right up to his, I mean, I stopped within a couple inches of his toes and I looked at him and said, hey, mister, want to autograph my belly?
If you see the video, there's a partner where the two little fat guys on the scooters are. Well, he immediately must have caught on to what I was referring to. And he, again, he was, he was laughing so hard. So that was, that was, that was kind of a fun moment. And then some of my other ones were just where him and I just had, like, it was just me and him and we just had these really nice, casual conversations sitting under a big giant oak tree, you know, just talking about life, Neverland, you know, whatever. Just, you know, just kind of a, you know, a casual, personal, you know, one on one conversation. Those were kind of special moments for me.
[00:11:50] Speaker C: I'm sure he was, he seemed like he was pretty easy to talk to.
[00:11:54] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah.
[00:11:55] Speaker C: Do you have, I know that you weren't originally a fan when you started working for him. Did you have, over the years, did you start listening to his music? And do you have a favorite Michael Jackson song?
[00:12:11] Speaker A: You know, it's kind of hard because he's got so many different styles of music. I kind of like old classic rock and roll and I like really good guitar players. So I, I, I would say the songs that I probably crank up if I, if they come on the radio when I'm, you know, driving anything that's got really good guitar work. You know, the one he did with Slash and the one he did with Van Halen and stuff like that, so. And then a song that I, I really like because I really think it was one of his, to him, I think it was one of his most powerful messages was man in the Mirror.
And it's not one of my favorite songs, but it brings back one of these memories. Like I was just talking about is Earth song and the memory that it brings back. The reason I, when I hear it, I get a little choked up is because he had Been gone for about six months. And he was in New York, working in the studio in New York and on the History album. And History. It wasn't released yet. And he came back and he had. He'd been. Like I said, he'd been gone for, I don't know, like, six months. I saw him pull up into the front of the theater in a golf cart. So I went over just to let him know that there was no projectionist here yet. And. And I wanted to say hello to him because I hadn't seen him in six months. So right as I walked up to the door, he was coming out of the theater. And he opened the door and.
And he gave me a big hug. And I said, you know, he always asked me, you know, he's Big Al. How's it going? And I always tell him every day that I saw him for the first time each day, I would. I would. We would go through this routine. I would. My answer was always just another day in paradise. And he always, like, oh, that always made him laugh. He thought that was funny. And we start. He started telling me about, you know, being in New York and working on the History album and. And he's talking about Earth Song. And like I said, it hadn't been released, so I hadn't heard it. But he was just. He was so excited. I mean, he was talking a million miles a minute. He was. I mean, you could just see that in his eyes, and you could hear it in his voice. He was just. This song really meant a lot to him. And. And. And, of course, the whole time he's talking to me, he heard it because he recorded it. He heard it probably hundreds of times.
And. And I had no clue what he was talking about. But he was so excited. I was just, like. I was listening very intently. Like, you know, I'm thinking, I really need to interrupt him and go, can we go listen to it somewhere? Because I don't have a clue what you're talking about. But anyway, it was. That was another one of those moments. And that's. Every time I hear that song that always, of course, takes me back to that moment. Standing in front of the movie theater, just having that conversation with him.
[00:14:46] Speaker C: Did you ever get to see, like, the main house?
[00:14:49] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:14:51] Speaker C: How was that?
[00:14:53] Speaker A: It's very, very beautifully done. Actually, most of the pictures you see. I mean, a lot of the pictures that are out there available on the Internet are actually from the catalog, or I shouldn't say catalog. The book that was the previous owner did okay and it looked like that. I mean, obviously at Christmas time, we, you know, he decorated the. The main living room up a lot. But the furniture and everything that you see those pictures is. I mean, that's how it stayed. It was. It was very low key, casual. I mean, very tastefully done. A lot of beautiful woodwork. And, and, and we used to, when we do sometimes when we have these events where we'd have groups of kids from the hospital or in our city, we also had what we called auction winners, where they would donate, you know, a trip to Neverland to some charity auction. And the auction winner, we'd have them come out sometimes with these other groups, but we wanted to give them a little VIP treatment so they actually. Normally we didn't open the house up unless Mr. Jackson was home or guessed that he was allowing to go into the house.
But when we have these auction winners, I'd always give that. Either I or Gail or somebody from the house would give them a tour of the house. So. So, yeah, I've been in there a few times.
[00:16:09] Speaker C: Nice. Was there any rides that Mr. Jackson would request to have there, like anything like that that went on?
[00:16:18] Speaker A: Any rides? You mean amusement rides?
[00:16:20] Speaker C: Yeah, amusement rides that he would request. Like, oh, I want this to be at Neverland, or, you know, or he would.
[00:16:27] Speaker A: Well, during, During Christmas time. Well, when I. When I first went to work there, there was, I don't know, probably a dozen rides. And I think we wound up with about 16 or 17. So we added a few over the years. But at Christmas time, he wanted extra stuff, so I arranged, through a friend of mine who owned a carnival in Los Angeles to rent some rides or. So we'd rent like four or five extra rides, which is how we ended up buying the big. The big German swing ride. I rented it one year. Well, I didn't rent it, but I arranged to have it rented. And I knew that Mr. Jackson would fall in love with it because it was a beautiful ride. And he sure did. He had. When the first time he saw it, he goes, oh, Big Al, can we keep it? Can we keep it? I go, I go, well, I said. I said, I think it's committed to some fairs next year, but maybe, you know, maybe next winter we can make a deal to buy it. And we ended up. The following year, we ended up buying it. So. And of course, the steam train was added after, you know, a few years after I started working there, and a couple of kitty rides. Originally, there was no kitty rides, and later on we ended up with about three or four kitty rides. So, so yeah, he, we added some stuff over the years. He did want. One time he had a conversation with me. This is kind of a funny moment he wanted, you know, and when he travels all over the world, you see pictures all the time of him going to these big beautiful amusement parks and Disney and, and, and Magic Mountain and, you know, wherever he's at in the world, he rides big roller coasters and stuff. Well, he, he really wanted a big roller coaster at Neverland. There was a couple of issues. One of them was the ranch was, I think about 2700 acres. And it was in Santa Barbara county, which is a very expensive area to live as far as land tax goes. But we ran cattle. It wasn't Michael's cattle. We just leased the land to another cattle, to a cattle company. And that brings the property tax down to just about nothing because it's considered an agricultural preserve. And. But that also dictates how much land has to be dedicated to the cattle and how much land can be dedicated to structures and houses and whatnot. So we'd pretty much reached our legal limit as far as what we could do. But he wanted a big roller coaster. And I was explaining to him that you can't do that because of the, you know, the land issue thing. And, and he asked me, he asked me how much something like that cost. And when I told him he had no, which I'm sure that, I mean, if he wanted to buy it, I'm sure he could have bought it. But the particular ride that he was talking about was about a 10 million dollar roller coaster. So. So I'm sure you're pretty sure the accountants probably would have had a heart attack over that. But anyway, I had, I had the unfortunate duty of explaining to him why we couldn't have it any. You know, I think a lot of people that worked for him didn't want to tell him anything he didn't want to hear. And I certainly didn't want to tell him anything he didn't want to hear. But I also wasn't going to just lie to him or make something up. So. And I think he appreciated that. I think that's one of the reasons that over the years, you know, we did, I developed a pretty good rapport with him because, you know, I would occasionally tell him things he didn't want to hear. But I was telling him the truth and I was giving him the facts. I wasn't, you know, wasn't trying to cover anything up.
[00:19:39] Speaker C: So yeah, I'm sure he respected that, you know, because he, he was a person just like us. Right.
I know this podcast is going to air after Christmas, but I, I hear that you were Santa.
Were you Santa once or was it multiple times or multiple.
[00:19:58] Speaker A: It was multiple times actually. And that's, I've told that story quite a few times. The fans really like it. I don't know, maybe because I've told it so many times. It doesn't, I mean it was, it really was a unique moment for me. The very first time that I was supposed to be Santa Claus. I didn't have a Santa suit. And, and so the story goes, it was about two weeks before Christmas. We could always count on being.
Normally you could count on Mr. Jackson and plenty of guests being there around Christmas time. Whatever he was doing, whether he was on tour, in the studio or whatever, you know, he would always let everybody have a few weeks off and he would come home and you know, because we decorated the ranch up and ever since the very first time when Liz Taylor did it, you know, it became kind of a, just a normal thing. Well, we got word from the corporate office down in Los Angeles that if anybody wanted to make plans for Christmas, they could because Michael was going to be working in New York and he wasn't going to come home. So there was only, was only two of us at the time, me and Manuel that were, could operate the steam train. So I told all my guys in the amusement park if anybody had plans for Christmas, you know, well, Manuel had had a lot of family in Mexico and he had five or six weeks of vacation. So he took, he wanted to take all that. So I, I approved his, you know, his personnel change notification to give him a vacation. And, and of course the day he takes off, the LA office calls the next day and says, oh, there's been a big change of plan. This is going to be the biggest Christmas ever.
So I just packed a bed. There was an old, old, we called it the ranch house. It was an old ranch hands house down where the zoo is and it was all furnished and had satellite TV and nobody really ever. We never used it for anything. Occasionally, you know, if the bodyguards were there, for which they didn't stay there very often, but it just hardly ever got used. But so I just moved in because I, with the steam train you have to start it at 7 o'clock in the morning and you don't get to shut it off until 10 or 11 o'clock at night.
So. And then I, I lived 45 minutes away, so it was just easier for me to just stay at the ranch, it was much easier, believe me. It was, it was, I was very thankful because I, by the time I got home, it'd be, you know, midnight or 1:00 in the morning. I'd have to get up at, you know, 5:00 to go back to the ranch. So, so it made life much easier for me. The first, you know, week or 10 days, whatever it was, went really well.
And then it was Christmas Eve. I got the steam train put away, I went back to the ranch house, took a shower. I was watching some tv and the phone rings.
Well, I'm pretty convinced that the only people that know I'm there is security and the fire department.
And I'm thinking, you know, I'm in my sweats, I'm drinking a beer and relaxed, watching some tv. And, and I'm thinking I gotta go back to the arcade because there's a, there's a video game in the arcade that requires an attendant. It's a flight simulator and it does complete barrel rolls, you know, 360 and, and there's a safety system built onto it. If a person's arm or leg or piece of clothing or anything comes out, it shuts it the beam, it shuts it off and you have to have an attendant there with a key. So I'm thinking I got to go back to the arcade and run the R360. You know, I'm sure nobody wants to run it riding around. So I answered the phone with a, a little bit of an attitude and I go, what?
And of course, who's on the other end? Mr. Jackson.
And he completely ignored my attitude because he was on a mission. He had something very important for me to do. He goes, big out, he goes, can you get a Santa Claus suit for tomorrow morning?
Now I gotta remind you, this was 11:30 at night on Christmas Eve. So, so I'm thinking to myself, and I actually, I said this out loud. I'm thinking to myself, you know, where am I going to go get a Santa Claus at 11:30? And I actually said, you know, I said, I don't even think Michael Jackson can get a Santa Claus shoot at 11:30 at night on Christmas Eve. And when I said it, I thought that's probably not the right thing to say. But by this time I'd been there long enough where, like I said, we had a pretty good relationship. And I think he knows I wasn't trying to be an ass about it. I was just tell him the first thing that came to my Mind. And he goes, he goes, okay. He was very polite, cordial, as he always was. And he said, he said, okay, thank you. And he hung up. And I thought, gez, I wonder if I'm going to still have a job tomorrow after that.
So now fast forward, you know, another. At least a month, maybe, maybe two months. I don't remember exactly how long it was, but I get a, A call from Michael's manager down in Los Angeles and she's asking me these questions about my, you know, what's my pant size, what's my shoe size? And I'm, I'm like, after about four questions, I, I said, listen, I said, I said, I have a couple of suits and a tuxedo. I thought maybe I was going to go someplace with, with Mr. Jackson, which wasn't my normal. I mean, I normally just stayed at Neverland, but I couldn't figure out what she was talking about. And she started, I said, I said, what's this all about? She started laughing and she goes, michael Bush is making you a Santa Claus suit.
Wow. So now I'm sure everybody out there knows Michael Bush has been making Michael's wardrobe for whatever, 20 or 30 years anyway, so I now own a Santa Claus suit made by Michael Bush. And yes, I have worn it several.
[00:25:42] Speaker C: Times and on the elephant.
[00:25:46] Speaker A: So there I am riding the elephant in my Santa Claus suit.
[00:25:50] Speaker C: How was it riding the elephant? Was it scary?
[00:25:52] Speaker A: No, not really. I, I actually, I'd ridden an elephant before. Not at Neverland, but I have a friend that actually owns numerous elephants.
[00:26:00] Speaker C: Oh, wow.
[00:26:01] Speaker A: He does a lot of. Yeah, he does a lot of stuff in the movie industry. And he used to be here. He used to be in California, but of course California ran him out of state because he had elephants and his elephants, believe me, if you'd ever been to his facility, those elephants were like, treated like royalty. I mean, it was. But anyway, this was actually the girls that ran the elephant department, they did this picture here for another person that had, that owned elephants. That. This was actually his. This was Susie, which was actually his elephant. And he left his elephant at Neverland because elephants like to be together. And his elephants, his elephant was very well trained and he helped our, our girls learn a lot about, you know, taking care of elephants and training them and everything. So this was kind of a thank you card to him for all his help and everything. And that's how that, that came about, that photograph there.
[00:26:58] Speaker C: Well, thank you for sharing that with us. Great story. So after knowing Mr. Jackson for all of those years. Has he inspired you at all in your life to be a certain way or do anything?
[00:27:11] Speaker A: Well, yeah, I mean, I've always been a pretty laid back, easygoing person. But I think the one thing that I learned all the years I was there because we did so much, I guess charity works the right word to call it. But we had so many of these groups in there and some of them were, I mean, some of them were pretty heart wrenching to, I mean the stories behind some of these groups of kids that came up there and, and it had such a huge effect on these kids and their siblings and their families. And I think I took, I took away from. It doesn't matter.
I mean, Michael had a lot of money and resources and whatnot. But, but I think what I really learned from him was it doesn't matter what your resources are, you know, how much money you have, you, there's always somebody worse off than you are and you can reach out and help them. That's.
And that's what he did. I mean he, he, the letters we used to get after these events, you know, the kids, terminally ill kids, he.
[00:28:07] Speaker C: Was great at that.
[00:28:08] Speaker A: I would get, we would get letters from him all the time. I have a big three ring binder full of these letters.
How it was. It was a day that after their child has passed away from whatever their disease or whatever their life threatening illnesses, it's a memory that they're going to hang on to forever. And, and it really, it inspired me a lot to, you know, try to, anytime I can do anything to, you know, to make somebody's life better, try and do it.
[00:28:39] Speaker C: What do you want the world to know about Michael Jackson?
[00:28:42] Speaker A: Michael Jackson the entertainer is going to live on forever no matter what any of us do. I think, I mean, you know, I mean I see when I go to these fan events, I see kids that are just like die hard Michael Jackson fans who weren't even born when he was, before he died.
So I think the song and dance thing is going to go on forever. But I think more important to me the message is the humanitarian stuff. His whole attitude about helping people and trying to make the world a better place, I think that's, that's a message and I think more and more people, you got that Paul Dwyer that did that book, humanitarian and I mean there's a lot of stuff out there available that highlights all that stuff. And, and so for me I really want people to really emphasize on his humanitarian efforts.
[00:29:35] Speaker C: Right. Yeah. Because that, I mean in reality that's who he was? Yeah, you know, that's exactly who he was. He was the humanitarian and, you know, always about love.
[00:29:48] Speaker A: Yeah, I love, I love watching the, the stuff when you see, like, Brad Sunberg's just did a thing and he, he always has all these technical stories about being in the studio and all that technical stuff. I love hearing it. And I remember that when I went to King Benching in London, I was. I was a speaker. And after.
After I'd done a couple of, you know, Q A sessions and whatnot, I was sitting out in the break area with, you know, there's about eight or 10 fans. I'm just continuing telling stories and whatnot. And, and of course, I, and I, I. I toyed with the thought of maybe writing a book, and one of the fans told me, you know, you don't have to convince us of what kind of person Michael was because we're all Michael Jackson fans. But they said, but the stories you tell, which is unlike all the stuff when you hear from people that were worked in the studio or on tour with him. That's all. Like I said, I love hearing that kind of stuff, all that technical stuff. But.
And it tells a very interesting side about Michael, you know, how professional he was. And there's a. There's even some, you know, heartwarming stories from those guys, too. But the stories I tell, really. Tell about what. When you talk about Neverland and what Neverland was about, it really speaks a lot about what he was about, you know, what. From the heart. And so that's why. That's why I kind of look forward to, you know, for a long time, I didn't want to talk to anybody about my time at Neverland, but. But now the. These fans kind of made me feel like it's kind of like my responsibility to help get the story out there about what. What he was really what Michael Jackson the person was about, as opposed to Michael Jackson the entertainer.
[00:31:26] Speaker C: So, yeah, and I think, like, speaking as a fan myself, who never knew him, that's really, like, what we're interested. We know that he is an amazing entertainer that, you know, will never die, like you said, but he just gave off such an energy, and you knew that he was that kind of person, you know, that you speak of, and just hearing your stories and hearing people that knew him and worked with him, it just confirms all of that. And then it also lets the rest of the world know those that aren't, you know, crazy Michael Jackson fans, like I am.
[00:31:58] Speaker A: Right.
[00:31:59] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly who he was, which is you know, basically what we want the world to know.
[00:32:04] Speaker A: So, exactly.
[00:32:07] Speaker C: Does Mr. Jackson ever, like, show up in your life now, besides just music, or.
[00:32:15] Speaker A: Yeah, I would say it seems like.
I'm gonna say probably at least once a month. Ever since he passed away, I'll have a dream that I'm at Neverland and I'm getting things ready for him to come home.
[00:32:33] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:32:34] Speaker A: And then at some point in the dream, I realize he's not coming home. And I. And I wake up and I'm like. I'm in tears when I wake up.
Although I recently had another. This was actually. This was like I was wide awake. I was actually working.
I think he showed up. I'm. I'm kind of convinced that I was actually at Neverland.
And this is just a couple of years ago with. With the new owner. I've been there all day, and it's late afternoon, and most of the employees are gone. And the only thing left I have to do is to go back to the. I'm going to walk the railroad tracks all the way to the back of the ranch where we stored the red train, and just look at the railroad tracks. And then the train was back in the barn. I was going to check out the train. So I get back to the barn and the train's hooked up like it's ready. Like it's going to go out the next day or whatever, I guess. I don't know. And I'm just kind of standing back there, I don't know, for five or 10 minutes, just kind of daydreaming about, you know, all the work I used to do back there and just kind of. Just kind of, you know, reminiscing about the good old days. Then I thought to myself, well, I need to get to work. I need. Because, you know, starting. The sun's starting to go down. I need to get this finished up so I can get out of here. I'm starting to walk over to the train, and all of a sudden the. And of course, everything that Michael had had a sound system on it, including the train and the music, started playing. I figured if I thought that was a little odd because I'd been down there for probably 15 or 20 minutes, and I figured if it was. There was a CD in there and it was on repeat, I would have heard it, you know, before 15 minutes. You know, I've been down there for 15 minutes. It doesn't take that long for a CD to repeat. So that it kind of struck me odd that it all of a sudden started up and then I, then I realized that the CD that was playing was a custom made CD that Brad Sundberg did for Mr. Jackson. He had certain music he wanted playing on the train and that CD was in there, you know, 14 years ago when we took the train out and put it in storage for it to all of a sudden just start back stuff. I then I started looking around like I thought well he's, he's down here watching me, making sure I'm, making sure I'm doing something, you know, so, so yeah, I kind of felt like, you know, I felt like he was in my. Or I was in his presence or he was in my presence or whatever, however you want to say it. But yeah, yeah, I kind of felt that he was. I kind of felt that he was there.
[00:34:55] Speaker C: Oh yeah, I full fully believe that was him. That would be something he would do, I think.
I think, yeah, that is, that's an amazing story. Thank you.
So you've been back to Neverland then since your time there?
[00:35:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I can't really speak too much about it other than Ron Burkle is a super nice guy and he cared very much for him and Michael were friends. He was, he's a very sharp businessman. I'm glad to say that. He bought the place for his family so it's not going to be turned into, you know, whatever and he's taken very good care of it and he's put some rides back in and he does some things similar to what Michael did, some charity events and stuff and.
[00:35:34] Speaker C: So yeah, great, that's great to know. Thank you.
[00:35:38] Speaker A: And they did, they filmed a bunch of the. I shouldn't say a bunch but they were there filming for two weeks during the. When they're shooting the movie that's going to be out next year. Michael.
[00:35:47] Speaker C: So yeah, I was, when I was, I think when I was there I feel like it was I don't even know, two years ago, three years ago now. I can't remember. They were shooting I think in, yeah, Neverland. Yeah. I was like, oh man, how can I get in there and be an extra?
[00:36:02] Speaker A: Didn't have, didn't happen.
[00:36:05] Speaker C: Do you have any other stories or anything that comes to mind that you would like to share with us?
[00:36:10] Speaker A: Oh, let me think. I mean there's a million stories out there. Let's see. I told the Santa Claus story. That's one of the fan favorites.
Well one of those moments I was talking about where it was just, just Mr. Jackson and I. He came home one day and the guests weren't going to come till the next day. So I went in and worked the evening shift by myself because he. Normally, when it's just him, he's not going to come down and ride the rides by himself, but he likes to see the movement of the train. So I would take the small train out for a ride, blow the whistle a few times and a little bit. Then, you know, about a half hour later, I go take the steam train out. And so. So I was there, and I was in my office, which is actually right behind the Sea Dragon room, and my back is to the door. When I'm sitting at my desk, my back's to the door. And I could tell somebody walked in. And I turned around and it was Mr. Jackson.
And also in this room, it's a big. It's a break room. And we have some tools in there. We have some parts for the rides, and we have all the controls for the jumbotron, the big giant tv. And there's also this big, massive hydraulic system that runs the Sea Dragon.
And I turned around and I was about to ask him, you know, what he wanted or just say hello or whatever, and I can tell that he's, like, staring at all this hydraulic equipment. So I got up and I walked up towards him, and he looked at me and he looked back at all, and it was fun. It struck me as odd because he acted like he'd never been in that room before, which is very possible. There's no reason for him to go in that room.
But I just thought, you know, that ride's been there for several years. I figured he would have. And I go in there 100 times a day. But anyway, he looked at me and he goes. He goes, what is all this stuff? And so I. I took a few minutes to explain to him. I didn't. I didn't go into, like, great detail, but I. This is a hydraulic. This is a big tank full of hydraulic oil. This is a hydraulic pump that, you know, pumps, and these are hoses, solenoids, that makes it make the ride go. There's these big tires that come up, make the ride go different direction, back and forth until it gets swinging. And. And I tell people that he was. He was.
You know, when you're talking to somebody, you can tell if they're, like, off thinking of something else or if they're really paying attention to you. And this guy, I mean, he asked me a question, and by God, he wanted to know. He wanted to know the answer, and he really wanted to know. I'm. What does he care what it all does? But he really wanted to know. And I tell people, if he was alive today and you walked in that room, he could tell you what all that stuff did. I mean, he was just like, he was staring at me and paying attention to every word that came out of my mouth. And when I pointed to something, he was looking at it. And I, I just, it was, to me, it was kind of, it was kind of, it was a fun moment to look back on. But anyway, he goes, he goes, hey, is there, is there something else we can play on the Jumbotron? Now when they put the Jumbotron in, they told me that the only thing to play on the jumbotron is the Disney animated version of Peter Pan.
That's it.
But now they had a, it looked like you could run the space shuttle from all the controls for this thing. It had, it had.
DVDs weren't out yet, but it had laser discs, it had vhs. It had a machine that would play videotapes from other parts of the country because they run at a different speed or something. And they had three quarter inch, which is what the TV stations used to use. It had satellite, it had all this stuff. And then I had a big closet full of DVD or laser discs and tapes, you know, all kinds of cartoons, Michael videos, whatever. So I remember when they told me, just play Peter Pan. I'm thinking, why, why do I have all this other stuff? Why don't you just buy me like 10 copies of Peter Pan so if one wears out, I can put the new one. But anyway, so when he asked me if there was something else to play, because now I've, I've listened to Peter Pan 8 million times. I can recite it word for word for you. And of course after a while you kind of just go tone deaf to it. But I was kind of excited that, hey, we get to watch something besides Peter Pan. Which there was a few times, I must admit that when I, when there was no guests there or we had an event that day and, and I, and everybody's, everybody's gone and I have to stay for an hour or two to make sure everything's shut down and whatnot, I'll put in, you know, Eagles or Pink Floyd or whatever, you know. And anyway, so, so I take him back to this closet and I open it up and he's looking, he's looking through all these, you know, laser discs and everything, and he pulls one out, he hands it to me and I, I, I look at it and it's Hook which is, which is basically the same story but it's got live at which I like Robin Williams and I think it was done very well. So, so I put it in and I hit, I put it in. The laser is a big laser disc. I put it in there, hit play. And I said okay, it's, it's playing. So I'm thinking he's going to go out and sit down a picnic table and watch Hook or whatever. So he leaves the office and I start to walk back into my office and he turns around and he comes back to the door and he goes hey. And I look at him, he goes, motions me to come with him. So we go out and we're sitting underneath this, you know, 200 year old oak trees at a picnic table and he just wanted me to sit there and watch the movie with him.
And the whole time, you know, we're just talking. You know, first we just start out watching the movie, then he starts talking about movie, then he starts talking about Neverland, then he starts talking to me about, you know, my days back when I worked in the carnival and then we go back to watching the movie and then he talks about he was there when they did this and he helped design this set. And I mean it was just, and we want, we sat there, him and I just sat at this table for, you know, an hour and a half, two hours, however long that movie is and watch the whole thing. And so that's one of those moments again that I look back and I just, I can't even believe it happened. You know, it's like, I mean, how often do you think you're going to be able to sit in front of the jumbotron and watch a movie with Michael Jackson? Just like, you know, it's like how often do you think you're going to get, be able to get in a water balloon fight with Michael Jackson? I mean just, you know, it's like things happened out there that you got to say this wasn't another day at the office.
[00:42:30] Speaker C: No, absolutely not. Oh, I'm sure that was so much fun. Did you ever throw a water balloon at him?
[00:42:37] Speaker A: No, but I ended up getting Super Soakers.
Yeah, I said, I asked about, I said, well actually after he hit me with a water balloon, I asked the guys in the park, I said oh yeah, he comes out, he does it all the time.
He'll get through, he'll get three or four guests, he'll come down here and they'll throw water balloons at us or whatever. So, so I went out and bought Super Soakers, and. And, of course, I think the guys in the park kind of thought, well, you're gonna. You know, you're gonna get in trouble or whatever. And. And the first time he came down, there was some guests, and they had water balloons, and I had the Super Soakers hidden in, you know, bushes around the park. And I went and got one of the Super Soakers, and I thought, well, this is going to be it. I'm either gonna have to go find another job or he's gonna. And he actually. He thought it was pretty funny. And I was like, oh, another big kid to play with, you know, so.
[00:43:23] Speaker C: Oh, my gosh, that's great. Well, thank you so much for. For talking with me and telling your stories.
Sure. I love hearing them and listening well, too. So thank you again, and it's been a pleasure.
[00:43:37] Speaker A: All right, you.
[00:43:39] Speaker C: Thanks, everyone, for listening.
[00:43:41] Speaker B: Have a great day.
[00:43:43] Speaker C: It's all for love. All right, bye.
