Adventurers Club (group)

**The Adventurers Club** is a group from the Adventurers Club restaurant of Pleasure Island.

## Description

The Adventurers Club was an organization of globe-trotters, collectors and explorers based out of Pleasure Island in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. The group held festivities in their club on Pleasure Island where they also held the annual Balderdash Cup competition on New Year's Eve.

The Balderdash Cup is an annual competition held on Pleasure Island by the Adventurers Club, every New Year's Eve. In the cup, club members must compete by telling or demonstrating true to life adventures they partook in. The winner is determined by club attendees based off of their applause and subsequently awarded the titular cup trophy.

## History

The Adventurers Club was founded in the early 20th century (prior to 1913) in-part by Merriweather Adam Pleasure, an industrial tycoon who settled Pleasure Island in Lake Buena Vista, Florida. Pleasure himself was a member of the *Society of Explorers and Adventurers*, an organization similar to the Adventurers Club which was founded in Porto Paradiso, Italy during the 16th century. Pleasure was dissatisfied with the stuffiness of the Society, giving rise to his commitment to the Adventurers Club which was much more joyous, progressive and hedonistic.

The club was also descended from a 19th century group of colonial thieves known as the Pillagers Brigade, an affiliate group of the Society of Explorers and Adventurers. Pleasure himself might have been a member of this group due to him having been present in a lineup of members on a portrait which was hung in the Adventurers Club on Pleasure Island. The Adventurers Club was not proud of their shared history with the brigade but were willing to admit their faults and not hide them.

The first Balderdash Cup was held on the New Year's Eve of 1927 with the victor of the event having been Merriweather Adam Pleasure himself. The club president of the club would come to be elected as one Pamelia Perkins. In 1932, the club's headquarters on Pleasure Island were constructed by architects Sir Edwin Luytens, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, and Eliel Saarinen. On the New Year's Eve of 1937, the group held an open house in the club headquarters in-which new potential members and onlookers would be let into the otherwise exclusive club.

The 1937 open house was however strife with mayhem as the six-year winning-streak of club-member Hathaway Browne was broken by club newcomer Emil Bleehall, several members were missing due to a slip-up from club curator Fletcher Hodges, and the club was at the brink of losing its lease with a need to acquire $2000 dollars. To acquire the money needed to keep their lease, club members Otis T. Wren and Pamelia Perkins lead a version of their weekly old-timey radio broadcast "Tales of the Adventurers Club", in which half of the cast is missing and must be replaced by audience members with them ultimately acquiring the necessary funds.

By 1944 Pleasure Island was famous among the “in the know.” A corrupt syndicate of developers attempted to capitalize on this by turning the Island into a spa and retreat for the rich and famous. The only problem was that Merriweather would not sell his land as he was not about to compromise his obligation to the spirit of the Funmeister. Through a series of bribes, the developers were able to have a court declare the title to the land null and void and were granted the ability to take possession as of the first of the year, 1945.

On the New Year’s Eve of 1944, *Hurricane Charlotte* headed across Florida toward Pleasure Island. Merriweather Adam Pleasure evacuated everyone but his family from the property. Once the storm had passed, there was no trace of the Island or its inhabitants left. The topography was so drastically altered, creating an uninhabitable marshland worthless to the developers. The power of the hurricane’s destruction was so great, it was even impossible for them to determine the former site of the Island. Many members of the Adventurers Club survived however and the Adventurers Club seemingly lived on though Merriweather Adam Pleasure himself was presumed dead as he was never seen again.

At some point in the 1940s/1950s, the club became acquainted with S.E.A. member Jock Lindsey who ran a hangar bar in the Central Floridian town of Disney Springs where he often invited other adventurers and his fellow members of S.E.A.. The Adventurers Club would even leave certain artifacts from the Adventurers Club headquarters in the possession of Lindsey such as the stone idol of the goddess Babylonia. In 1955, the Adventurers Club teamed up with Jock to assist him in opening up, "Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar", a bar constructed from his airplane hangar which the club would frequent.

## Appearances and allusions

### Adventurers Club

This attraction was themed around being the headquarters of the Adventurers Club on the New Year's Eve of 1937.

### Aunty's Beach House

Aunty's Beach House in Aulani is run by Aunty, the wife of the late Dreamy Ka'imi. It is decorated with artifacts from the Adventurers Club, a portrait of the Pillagers Brigade and messages from members such as Pamelia Perkins and Hathaway Browne.

### Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar

In this Disney Springs bar is a photograph of the Adventurers Club celebrating in the bar of SEA-member Jock Lindsey, artifacts from the club such as the head of Babylonia, and the passport of Samantha Sterling.

### Trader Sam's Enchanted Tiki Bar

Several artifacts from the Adventurers Club are in the possession of Trader Sam and hung in his bar, including Zeus' fishing pole, a box of Jinkies and the ventriloquist dummy "Slappy". Sam also has letters from Samantha Sterling, Pamelia Perkins, Hathaway Browne and Fletcher Hodges. Photographs of Hathaway Brown and Theodore Roosevelt with messages from and about them are also present in the bar, identifying them as frequent compatriots of Trader Sam.

## Connections

### Big Thunder Mountain Railroad

Around 1880, the SEA president Jason Chandler contacted Madame Zarkov at the Museum of the Weird c. 1880 to advise Barnabas T. Bullion of the Big Thunder Mining Company. Zarkov believed that Bullion should leave Big Thunder Mountain due to the rage of its wrathful spirit.

### Haunted Mansion

Madame Zarkov was retconned into being the proprietress of the Museum of the Weird, a setting which was a proposed extension of the Haunted Mansion.

### Jungle Cruise

At the Magic Kingdom's Fastpass kiosks, trunks and crates are being shipped to Adventurers Club members Pamelia Perkins and Emil Bleehall. Pamelia's tag was also addressed to the Adventurers Club headquarters in Lake Buena Vista.

#### Skipper Canteen

The Adventurers Club's president Pamelia Perkins is the namesake of the "Perkins Thai Noodles" which is described as one of her favourites. There is also a book written by Merriweather Adam Pleasure which is titled *Another New Year.*

#### Tropical Hideaway

On a wall commemorating river voyages of different S.E.A. members in this restaurant is a paddle and plaque dedicated to Merriweather Adam Pleasure.

## Trivia

* It is possible Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar implicates certain Adventurers Club members as becoming members of the Society of Explorers and Adventurers by the 1940s/1950s. This is because the Hangar Bar's description indicates that Jock used his Disney Springs property to host members of the S.E.A., however no officially known members of S.E.A. are referenced in the bar outside of Lindsey himself with other non Indiana Jones character references being to more miscellaneous characters such as Howard Stark, the Rocketeer, and Chief Nah-mee. There *are* however multiple references to the Adventurers Club having attended the bar meaning it is possible that some of their members joined S.E.A. by Jock's time.

## References

1. ↑ https://www.flickr.com/photos/frikitiki/6096356553/
2. ↑ http://jimhillmedia.com/web\_site\_team1/b/max\_schilling/archive/2008/09/29/last-call-at-the-adventurers-club.aspx
3. ↑ https://www.instagram.com/p/BdK88XzFdXc/
4. ↑ http://www.mainstgazette.com/2008/09/valiant-to-end.html
5. ↑ https://allears.net/walt-disney-world/wdw-planning/archives-adventurers-club-pleasure-island/
6. ↑ https://www.mouseplanet.com/8570/Adventurers\_Club\_Final\_Farewell\_Part\_Two
7. ↑ https://insidethemagic.net/2016/07/five-years-of-adventuring-at-trader-sams-enchanted-tiki-bar/
8. ↑ https://twitter.com/SocietyofEandA/status/1159647485842690048
9. ↑ https://www.mousesteps.com/2011/09/25/detailed-look-at-trader-sams-enchanted-tiki-bar-disneyland-hotel-from-august-2011/
10. ↑ https://twitter.com/Figment\_Jedi/status/1002616803166773249