How Has Disneyland Changed The Theme Park Industry
Walt Disney | Article
Reinventing the American Amusement Park
Walt Disney created a revolutionary vacation destination when he opened Disneyland in Anaheim, California in 1955. The park featured four themed sections: Frontierland, Tomorrowland, Adventureland, and Fantasyland, all accessed from a plaza at the foot of Primary Street, U.Southward.A. Today, Disneyland still features these lands, but it likewise houses 83 attractions -– more five times the number it opened with -– and sees an average of 44,000 visitors per day.
Walt Disney nurtured the idea of Disneyland for years. Throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s he visited other entertainment parks and carnivals with an eye towards creating his own. He began to envision a cleaner theme-based park where families could become a part of the magical earth that his films depicted on the big screen. In 1952, he assembled a minor grouping of artists and designers from his Walt Disney Studio staff and created a new company chosen WED (his own initials) to aid brand his amusement park dream a reality.
Walt and his brother and business partner Roy Disney obtained funding to construct the new venture from ABC, one of the 3 major networks so in beingness, in exchange for creating and hosting an 60 minutes-long weekly television receiver evidence. The resulting program,Disneyland TV, promoted his new park (and his persona of the dear "Uncle Walt") to the largest generation America had ever seen: the Baby Boomers. The Boomers may not accept been old plenty to drive the family car, but they could drive family spending. Disney was gambling that in the flourishing, post-WWII economy, American families would take extra disposable income to spend on travel and amusement, and Disneyland would become a tantalizing destination.
On July 17, 1955, Disneyland had its invitation-merely opening solar day gala, which was broadcast live on ABC. Nearly half the American population watched the festivities from the comfort of their own living rooms. Eleven thousand people were invited to the park; several chiliad more arrived and tried to go far with apocryphal tickets. The twenty-four hour period was filled with record-level rut and mishaps – Fantasyland was airtight by a nearby gas leak, and Mr. Toad'south Wild Ride succumbed to an overload of the park'south power grid – just Walt Disney was ecstatic. When the park opened to the public the next day, visitors were lined up as early as ii:00 AM. TheNew York Times ran the headline, "Disneyland Gates Open up -- Play Park on Coast Jammed -- 15,000 on Line Before 10 AM." Within its showtime ten weeks, Disney'south new entertainment park attracted one million visitors. By 1960, that number would rise to five million visitors per twelvemonth.
When it first opened, visitors could explore the parks' 4 unique lands and stroll down the all-American Principal Street, U.S.A. for an admission fee of $1. Ride tickets were extra – between 10 and 30 cents each. Within four months, all the same, Disneyland began selling ticket books for $2.50 that covered both the cost of admission and viii ride attractions, amongst them Snow White's Scary Adventures, the Mad Tea Party, and the Jungle Cruise. Walt Disney's love of trains was evident throughout the park, which had more than a mile of railroad runway circling the perimeter. Within the first v years of its opening many of the attractions and exhibits saw significant changes from Disney'due south original concepts – the Adventureland alligators were mechanical, not real; guest rides on horse-drawn stagecoaches in Frontierland were eliminated, though pack mule rides through Nature's Wonderland continued a few years longer; a smaller version of the popular Autopia ride was built in Fantasyland, and then closed, and donated to Disney's honey boyhood hometown of Marceline, Missouri.
About visitors were thrilled with Disneyland, as increasing ticket sales showed, but the park also had its share of critics. In a scathing 1958 article inThe Nation, Julian Halevy denounced Disneyland every bit "a collection of midway rides, concessions, hot-dog stands and soft drink counters, peep-shows and advertizing stunts…a sickening blend of inexpensive formulas packaged to sell."
Despite criticism, Disneyland became a destination for not just a national audience, including nine former and futurity U.Southward. presidents, just an international one. In 1959, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev famously protested his exclusion from Disneyland when the Los Angeles police force chief claimed that the leader's safety could non exist guaranteed within the park. Prime number Government minister Nehru of Bharat touched down in the park, as did the King and Queen of Nepal, the Shah of Islamic republic of iran, and political leaders from Europe, Africa and Due south America. For foreign dignitaries and heads of land, Disneyland provided a window into American culture and history. "What introduces all of it, that y'all have to go through when you come into the park," historian Steven Watts explains, 'is this idealized rendering of small-town America, the values, the feel, the ideals, all of that. What Disney'southward trying to do at some level of awareness is to create an epitome of America that people would similar to think exists."
Walt Disney loved the place, spending much of his time at Disneyland until he embarked on his next big venture. In the 1960s, he began secretly ownership up huge plots of land in Florida for a project he called the "Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow." EPCOT would be "the middle" of Walt Disney World. "Disney wanted a customs where people really lived," explains former Disney executive Marty Sklar, "where industry worked with him to showcase and demonstrate new ideas, new materials, and new systems."
In December 1966, earlier Walt Disney could realize his dream, he died of lung cancer. Roy O. Disney became chairman, CEO, and president of the company, overseeing the construction and completion of Walt Disney World; but without his brother, EPCOT, as Walt envisioned information technology, never materialized. Roy passed away merely three months afterward the new park opened in Florida in 1971.
The Disney empire continued to aggrandize after the deaths of its founders. Past the turn of the century, five cities around the earth were home to 13 Disney theme parks, 46 resort hotels, a Disney cruise line and guided vacation experiences. In 2013 lone, Walt Disney attractions saw more than 132.5 million park visitors. The original park in Anaheim, Disneyland remains a popular vacation destination. The Baby Boomers nevertheless visit, now with their own children and grandchildren in tow. More than v decades since its opening, an antique lamp nevertheless burns vivid in Walt Disney's personal apartment above the firehouse on Master Street, U.s.a.A. in memory of the man who dreamt up "the happiest identify on globe."
Source: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/reinventing-american-amusement-park/
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