How Disneyland was Built in a SINGLE YEAR

it's hard to imagine a world without disney today the entertainment juggernaut is so ubiquitous that it's hard not to be a fan of at least one of their dozens of franchises in fact in 2019 disney owns nearly a third of the entire box office market share of north america one out of every three dollars spent in the cinema went to mickey mouse however the film industry is just one arm of the company in fact the bulk of disney's income over 60 comes from operating their parks disney owns five different resorts around the world which see millions of visitors a year the largest of these walt disney world in orlando florida is the largest single site employer in the entire world with over 75 000 cast members who run the parks hotels and shops making up one of the world's most visited tourist destinations just about everyone has visited one of their parks somewhere in the world or if not they probably know someone who has what many don't realize is that not even a century ago when walt disney first started to form the idea of a happy place where children and adults could have fun together he was called a madman basically the whole world thought the walt had gone insane when he poured every single dollar he had and the dollars of many friends and associates into his hair brain scheme there was a mickey mouse theme park even when the park opened many was skeptical if it would even be open a year later the rest as they say is history disneyland park became one of the symbols of america almost as iconic as the statue of liberty however the gawking public was not entirely wrong to be skeptical of walt's vision there were so many roadblocks obstacles and difficulties that the park almost failed on numerous occasions before it opened the most amazing fact the entire park went from fantastical dream to magical reality in one year and one day on the morning of july the 16th 1954 there was an empty lot in anaheim california and on july the 17th 1955 tv presenter and future president ronald reagan broadcasted the opening live to the nation as walt's dream was real and there for the taking [Music] [Music] picture walt disney sitting on a park bench he's reading the paper casually the delighted sounds of children playing in the background he looks up to see two young girls his daughters on an old timey carousel the carousel was right between walt's house and his burbank studios which made it the perfect place to meet his daughters during lunch as the carousel slows the two girls begged to go again walt smiles hands the attendant a few coins and sits back down with his paper with the release of his smash feature film snow white money was no longer an issue and it happily let them have one more ride he loves his daughters dearly and was thrilled to allow them to have some fun unfortunately he was also horrifically bored his young daughters were incredibly entertained by the up and down motion of the horses and their circular path but walt could only watch for so long he would keep going for them to be sure but it was a pain why did it have to be like this why were the places that children could have fun and other places for adults to enjoy themselves why wasn't there anywhere where the adults and the kids could have fun together this nagging thought stuck with walt however there were other things on his mind between the wartime production a number of feature films and a riotous strike walt didn't have the time to act on these thoughts as the post-war heights finally started to settle off the idea came back into walt's mind what about that place that it thought about so long ago it was in 1948 that walt picked up the idea seriously he thought that a park then called mickey mouse park could be a good place for his vision to come to life however this park would hardly be recognized as the disneyland of today at first he simply wanted to offer a studio tour like the tours that universal studios had been giving since 1915 but that idea was quickly shelved he didn't think it would be interesting enough to see the success that he wanted to see this was the first time his dreams would be scaled up but not the last from a small studio tour he now wanted an eight-acre park across from the studio the early plans for this mickey mouse park show some play areas and themed areas along with a boat ride and a train that circumnavigated the park as walt scoured the nation and the world looking at how other theme parks operated his vision blossomed again he didn't just want a small park across from the studio he wanted a full theme park another of his inspirations to expand this idea was his love of the world's fairs he was greatly inspired by the 1939 new york world's fair and his father was a carpenter on the famous chicago colombian exposition of 1893. he grew up hearing the tales of the amazing exhibition and the wonders from around the world that it showcased with all of this in mind he had to think bigger he thought of his park as a permanent world's fair as walt's plans for his park blossomed the concerns did as well walt's brother roy disney ran the finances for the studios while waltz was the ideas man roy was the number cruncher who made sure that his brother's schemes could work however at this he drew a line in the sand the amount of money that wanted for the project was enough to bankrupt the studios they simply couldn't take the risk that walt's park would fail walt disney was not a man who liked to hear the word no though when he had an idea he was going to try and make it happen no matter how risky that idea might be in 1952 ignoring the frequent protests of his brother walt formed another company which he named wd enterprises wed enterprises was formed mostly from walt's personal wealth along with taking out as many loans as he could get he even took out a second mortgage on his home and cashed out his life insurance the three employees he brought over from the studio were jacks of all trades who worked on all kinds of different aspects of the park because of this walt thought they needed a new name they weren't architects or even engineers what they were doing was bringing imagination into reality therefore they were dubbed the imagineers with top imagineers on the task a plan for disneyland started to come together he wanted a trip to disneyland to be a journey across the world and across time to do so he wanted to divide the park into a number of themed lands where park goers could feel like they were going from one place to an entirely different place in only a few steps true life adventureland was an exciting trek across all the world's undiscovered places fantasyland would plop visitors down into the world of disney's famous cartoons frontierland would be a homage to disney's love of america and the settlers who trekked across the country lastly the world of tomorrow would showcase all of the cutting-edge technology that would shape the future however the most impressive of the lands was to be the entrance main street usa the entrance to the park would replicate walt's memories of his hometown by having a classically american main street lined with shops in a turn-of-the-century style all of these lands were laid out on a classic but still innovative design called the hub and spoke layout although used sporadically across some cities it was mostly a concept in logistics in order to move goods from place to place as quickly as possible walt thought it would work great for his park with a hub in the middle all the lands radiated out from the center and were connected by easy to navigate walkways although the visitors would go from one far-flung land to another they would never be lost while picked out a plot of land in nearby anaheim that would be perfect and he set about acquiring the land the plans were coming together ride technology was starting to be conceived and even occasionally tested and the public excitement around this new bizarre idea was starting to build there was only one issue walt was completely out of money paying a team of imagineers and acquiring man to completely bled his coffers dry and he had to find some other way of getting an influx of cash and keeping the dream alive after shopping around hollywood and pulling as many strings as he could all found his salvation in an unlikely place television boulder been very reluctant to enter the television market up to that point he believed that producing any content for television would cheapen disney's brand and detract away from their proven strategy of cinematic releases but well it's amazing how money can change one's outlook the party most interested in funding walt's plan was the television network the american broadcast company better known as abc they first offered five hundred thousand dollars about 5.4 million dollars accounting for inflation for a 34.48 stake in the park they also promised to guarantee another 4.5 million that's 49 million dollars today in loans with this liquidity the park could finally continue however that wasn't the end of the bargain for walt he also agreed to produce a number of shows and specials for abc including the mickey mouse club but the program that was to receive the most attention was the magical world of disney the program went through a number of name changes through its run but the concept was quite simple every week walt would highlight the progress of disneyland and show one aspect of the park to abc's viewers it also gave the viewers a glimpse into the animation studios what would show their creative process for the studio in the park the show was a smash hit it was a perfect arrangement for both parties abc had exclusive rights to arguably the most popular entertainer in the world and inside access to his brand new highly anticipated park disney and wd enterprises were paid to run advertisements to huge swaths of the american public because of this the public had week by week updates on the park and its construction while once thought as a pipe dream it was now a dream shared by millions of americans who tuned in while walt was sorting through all of the financial dealings work on the park began at a breakneck pace since walt didn't know how long the funds would hold out his plan was to open the park and start earning back the money as quickly as possible as much as this is a logical plan it was also a logistical nightmare work continued basically 24 7. walt was frustrated that they weren't working faster and harder this inevitably caused conflicts with the workers but wahl was no stranger to labor disputes as he always managed to do he sorted it out and work continued one of the most important parts of disneyland isn't what you see it's what you don't he wanted the park and the lance within the park to be all-encompassing the very first thing to be built in the park was a 20-foot berm the berm is simply a raised mound of dirt or material that separates one area from another most importantly for walt it separated the sight lines you wouldn't want main street usa to look into the parking lot or onto the freeway you should be able to look into tomorrowland from fantasyland this simple ingenious design ensured that the sight lines would remain unblemished disney continues to expand this practice today one of the first rides to be crafted was the centerpiece of adventureland what wanted a boat ride that took guests through all of the greatest rivers of the world the jungle river cruise now simply called jungle crews included the most technically advanced animal animatronics of the time despite it being originally envisioned as a serious ride with real animals it was very quickly realized that it was not realistic when the animatronics didn't look as live-like as they thought they decided to reimagine it with a different tone that fit the less than real look of the animals although they haven't necessarily held up against the test of time the corny and campy doane of the ride does make it work the skipper's the title of the cast members who emcee the attraction get to pick from an assortment of the worst knee-slapping dad jokes imaginable and make this slow-moving cruise a staple for classic disney fans this opening day attraction is still open to this day continuing to tell eye-rolling jokes one of the most difficult areas of the park to design for was tomorrowland now recognized as the tomorrowland problem the issue is actually pretty simple tomorrow is going to come someday and it probably will be soon in order to make a land that has all the cutting-edge technology of the future parks need to be constantly updating overhauling and rebuilding the land usually at great expense this did not occur then and has not now this is why some of the attractions especially the early ones seem very out of place in tomorrowland but make more sense in their original context the prime example of this is the autopia this ride sees a series of vehicles in the mid-century futurism style zip around a course designed like modern interstates it was basically a go-kart track although still a popular ride today many wonder why it is alongside rocket ships and time machines and the simple answer is because the interstate back then was a fledgling project president dwight d eisenhower was astounded by the german autobahn when he was part of the invasion of the country in world war ii he was also concerned at how long it took to mobilize troops across a country as massive as the usa he made it one of his primary goals as president to establish an interstate system across the country he didn't start on the project until 1956 a full year after the opening of the park at the time of this inception the idea of a system of roads that connected the whole country was almost as much a pipe dream as landing a man on the moon thus it was included in the land and remains there today by the way we've done a whole video on the u.s interstate system on this channel so check it out if you'd like more information about that now disneyland needed an icon one of walt's visions that he was completely unwilling to compromise on is that every land needed to have its own icon to draw people towards it also there needed to be an icon for the whole park in order to draw them down main street usa into the hub and eventually into the other lands for what the decision of a park icon was simple he believed that every kingdom needed to have a castle and although sleeping beauty was just in early development he was sure it would be a hit and the castle would inspire all those who saw it therefore sleeping beauty castle was created although it stood only at 23.5 meters tall the imagineers used a number of clever tricks to make it seem larger forced perspective is when the dimensions of something are manipulated to distort the viewer's sense of size for one the further along main street usa you go the shorter the buildings get this makes the castle seem taller in comparison also the turrets and other aspects of the castle were stretched and contorted to make them look like they reached high into the sky based off neuschwanstein castle in germany the castle succeeded looking much larger than actually was however in comparison to the castles in other parks today it does seem a bit lilliputian a year and a day after ground was broken the park was opened on the 17th of july 1955. abc had a live broadcast of the opening ceremony and of the activities on that first day however it was an unmitigated disaster who would have guessed that a park that was rushed together so quickly would have had issues for one the blacktop across the park had just been poured a few days previously but in the scorching southern california heat it hadn't dried women wearing high heels found themselves sinking slowly into the asphalt there was also the issue of capacity the first day was supposed to be a preview day and not open to the general public disney had issued approximately 15 000 tickets for fans to get a sneak peek at the park however they were counterfeited prolifically although no solid numbers exist disney claims that over 30 000 guests showed up that first day there was also the issue of plumbing one of the most frustrating labor disputes for walt was the plumber's union they were on strike and there were few to be found around in the final days of the park not long before opening he was given an ultimatum do you want toilets or do you want water fountains you can't have both walt picked the toilets despite being an understandable choice that scorching sun saw many people suffer from heat exhaustion and there was no water inside some accused walt of trying to sell more coca-cola along with all of that chaos guests ran rampant across the park there were practically no organized lines and guests would push each other out of the way to be the next on the attractions the teacups literally fell apart and welders were called to swiftly piece them back together the mark twain riverboat was so overloaded that it sank into the artificial river on top of all that chaos tomorrowland was almost entirely empty with the exception of the autopia there were no major rides leaving guests very confused on what the land was even supposed to be and how an empty lot represented the future despite all of these missteps the park opened again the very next day and the next slightly but surely the kinks were worked out and the park started to work more smoothly eventually it was a well-oiled machine moving guests in and out and through the park with amazing efficiency walt had done it despite all of the hardships tribulations and numerous non-believers walt's park was a reality when media outlets complained that the park felt unfinished walt quipped back with one of his most famous lines of all time disneyland will never be completed as long as there is imagination left in the world the park has stuck to that legacy even long after walt has gone new rides new attractions and even a whole new land built into the park they even opened a second gate with disney's california adventure in february 2001. what was never satisfied he always wanted to build something grander more amazing more innovative the most amazing part of all of this is that he usually somehow managed to pull success from the jaws of defeat disneyland shouldn't have worked it was too expensive too rushed too ambitious however here we are three quarters of a century later and disney parks are a foundational part of theme park design and culture even though walt moved on to a more ambitious project soon after disneyland was always one of walt's most proud achievements even above his movies or the studio his next plan however would make disneyland look like the griffith park carousel he planned to build an entire utopian city called epcot or the experimental prototype community of tomorrow we've also got a video all about that so check it out when we're finished here there are few aspects of american culture that have stuck quite like disneyland has walt disney was always looking to the future to create a better and great big beautiful tomorrow [Music] [Music]

Channel: Megaprojects

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Length: 17min 30sec (1050 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 21 2022