Disneyland did not invent the theme park. Americans had visited amusement parks and world’s fairs for decades before it opened. What Walt Disney’s park in Anaheim did, from July 17, 1955, was set the standard for what theme parks could and should be. It split one site into themed lands, told stories with its rides and sold the whole thing through television.
more
Where the idea came from
Disney had wanted to build it since watching his daughters ride the carousel in Griffith Park, Los Angeles. He pictured a place where parents and children could enjoy themselves together. Frommer’s traces the seed to 1947, when he began collecting miniatures for his model trains and wanted somewhere to show them.
Money was the obstacle. Disney sold his family home and signed with ABC in 1954 for a television series called Disneyland, which followed the park as it went up. The finished park cost $17 million and took about a year to build, according to Travel + Leisure.
The day it opened
The opening went badly. Invited guests were meant to have the park to themselves, but many people got in on forged tickets. A plumbers’ strike forced Disney to choose between finished toilets and drinking fountains, and he chose toilets. Rides failed as the power ran short. Shoes stuck in freshly laid asphalt in 100-degree heat.
Disney later called it “Black Sunday”.
Television made it a success anyway. ABC’s live broadcast, “Dateline: Disneyland”, had Art Linkletter, Bob Cummings and Ronald Reagan as hosts. The BBC puts its audience at 90 million people across the US. The park went on to double the company’s earnings that year.
Tickets were cheap by today’s standard. An adult paid $1 to enter, and a child 50 cents. Rides cost extra, at 10 to 40 cents each. A day’s entry now often runs to $200 or more.
What made it a theme park
The layout was the new part. A sign at the gate promised to take guests out of today. Beyond Main Street, U.S.A. lay four lands: Frontierland, Tomorrowland, Adventureland and Fantasyland. Tomorrowland opened with a simulated rocket ride to the moon, two years before Sputnik.
The rides told stories rather than only moving people. About a dozen from opening day still run, including Jungle Cruise, Autopia and Peter Pan’s Flight. The Guardian spoke to Felix Barrett of the immersive theatre company Punchdrunk. He described a Disney ride as “a complete hybrid of all the disciplines”.
Disney kept adding to it. The Matterhorn arrived in 1959 as the world’s first tubular steel roller coaster. Pirates of the Caribbean, the last attraction he worked on, opened in March 1967, months after his death.
Disneyland remains the only park Walt Disney oversaw from start to finish. The rest of the Disney resorts opened after he died in 1966. By 2023 the Disneyland Resort drew more than 27 million visitors a year.
