The '70s Boogie Down!

Disco down and check out the show! It's the 1970s cluster of lodging buildings at Disney's Pop Century Resort. Here, the balconies are adorned with mood rings, platform shoes and dancers doing The Hustle and The Bump, and the rooftops ask "What's your handle?" and invite you to "Have a nice day!"

The '70s is the one cluster without its own pool. Instead, the center courtyard is designed to be a giant rec room. Rec (short for recreation) rooms surged in popularity in the 1970s as increased leisure time inspired people to dedicate space in their homes for fun and entertaining. This outdoor rec room is dominated by a giant foosball table, players at the ready. In the corners, you'll even find a couple games of Twister. Twister was created in 1966 and became a staple of 1970s parties. The games here are actually playable, with a spinner positioned nearby and a nice, soft surface for the inevitable tumbles.

Not to age myself too badly, but I was definitely a kid of the '70s. I may not have had a Nehru jacket or a pet rock, but I did have a Big Wheel and a Mickey Mouse phone. In fact, I still have the Mickey phone on my desk today. Mine is the touchtone variety, not a rotary phone like the giant one at Pop Century, but it's still pretty retro cool.

My memories from the '70s also include my grandparents having a CB radio. CB radio use grew in the 1970s, especially among truck drivers during the oil crisis, and it soon became a widespread fad. This image on one of the 8-track tapes at Pop Century reminds me of those times when folks would ask, "Ya got yer ears on?"

I never had an 8-track player, but my uncle did. In a bid to outdo cassette tapes, 8-tracks were set up so you could push a button and switch "tracks" to another song on the tape more easily than having to fast-forward or rewind. Of course, in today's digital age, it all sounds fairly prehistoric.

At the Pop Century resort's 1970s cluster, it's giant 8-track tapes that shroud the stairwells at the ends of each building. They don't completely cover the stairs, though, which allows you to peek around back and see some of the song titles on each tape. They're fictional, just like the songs we saw in the '50s, but they bring back even more memories of the Disco era, everything from Polyester to custom vans and The Godfather.