Magnetron
(photos below)

Tucked along the walkway in Downtown Disney's West Side area, Magnetron is a store devoted to...well, magnets. It features thousands of refrigerator-style magnets attached to the metal walls, to metal display racks, and wherever else there's a chunk of metal to attach them!

Magnetron, strictly speaking, is the vacuum tube used in radar equipment to generate the short bursts of very high powered electromagnetic energy which is used to scan the skies for aircraft, weather phenomena, and perhaps occasionally flying saucers. It's also the active component of microwave ovens--remember when they were called "radar ranges"? Actually, microwave cooking was developed quite by accident back in the 1940s when an engineer at Raytheon, who was working with radar systems, discovered an unexpected side effect of magnetron operation. It seems that he carried a chocolate bar in his shirt pocket each day as a lunch snack, but he found that it kept melting when he was in close proximity to an operating magnetron tube. Being a curious scientist, he performed a few experiments which established the radar system as a great way to heat food! But enough about that. Back to Magnetron--the store...

Not an actual Disney-operated establishment, Magnetron stocks merchandise to appeal to a general audience--you won't find many Disney characters represented here. However, there's bound to be something that'll make a great gift for that friend or loved one back home--perhaps a magnet shaped like a hot dog , or a tiny frame with a favorite dog breed pictured inside. A nice quality of this store is its low prices. You'll find magnets priced around $2-5 each. The bad things about it is that you might end up with way too many magnets to put on your fridge! Just look around while you're here--do you really want your kitchen to look anything like the inside of this place!!??

In addition to magnets, Magnetron also stock other small novelty items, all of which are affordable, and similar in style to the brightly colored magnets which are this shop's claim to fame.

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Bright and metallic, Magnetron has magnets--lots of them!

Don't be shy--have a look

A close up of just a few varieties of magnet on display at Magnetron

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