Defunctland: The History of Mickey Mouse Park

In the 1940s, Walt Disney took his daughters Diane and Sharon to Griffith Park on the weekends so they could play on the

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's carousel, they would spend hours on the carousel while Walt sat on a bench eating peanuts, it was during On one of those occasions when an idea got into Walt's head, I felt like there should be something to build some kind of entertainment company where parents and kids could have fun together. That's when Walt came up with the idea for Disneyland or at least that's what he and his company would tell people for the next seven decades, which wasn't necessarily a lie about his epiphany on the Griffith Park bench, but Disneyland was not born from a singular event, the fact that Walt was a simplified storyteller. the story of Disneyland, as he had come up with multiple versions of the story of his creation of Mickey Mouse, the colorful story of a father who wanted a place to play with his children was touching and concise, but the truest story and Walt's Park's larger location means more time. people and ideas unlike the short merry-go-round version of the Disneyland story, the longer version is less well known and much less joyful and here it begins in the 1940s while Walt Disney sat on that bench, he was broken and depressed and had no idea what to do about it in the mid-1940s Walt Disney, the once passionate storyteller who had changed the landscape of animation, was as lost as ever; he was worse than the days of the paper route in Kansas City, possibly worse than he was when he had done it.

Lost Oswald, Lucky Rabbit Walt had reached the slow point for multiple reasons: the studio strike in 1941 had destroyed any semblance of what was once his creative family, while Walt was an attentive father to his daughters, his focus was always the study. He longed for a creative work environment, but his bitterness after the strike was evident to his staff, both old and new; His skepticism about communist infiltration into his company and his general disdain for the studio after the strike had sapped any enthusiasm from his work that it had in itself. The box office failures of Pinocchio, Fantasia and Bambi had worsened and had nearly sunk the studio. and many entertainers were being recruited to fight in World War II as a solution and as a sign of their characteristic patriotism.

Disney transformed a studio into a propaganda machine for the U.S. Walt's enthusiasm for these films quickly waned as time constraints and lack of profits weighed on him, while Walt had no problem accessing the films. minds and hearts of his audience during the Great Depression. He struggled to provide entertainment during and immediately after World War II. had no animated feature films in the works, choosing instead to release live-action animated hybrid films or animated short compilation films, most of the financial problems fell on his brother, Roy Walt himself didn't bother, it seemed like he just didn't care.

It didn't matter which one wasn't like Walt Disney, eventually Wal had also given up his passion outside of the studio, the sport of polo. Walter became obsessed with the sport, but gave it up in the late 1930s, partly due to an injury he suffered and partly due to the fact that on two separate occasions one of the people he played polo with died during the game in less than five years Walt had more or less lost his friends lost a studio and lost his hobby fortunately he would soon find a way to escape this routine or at least the lack of hobby Ward Kimball, the talented entertainer and trombonist, remained one of Walt's closest acquaintances even when Walt distanced himself from his employees, this is for two reasons: first, Ward had not gone on strike against Walton 41 and second, and more importantly he loves trains, which was great because he Walt likes trains more, but Ward had a train in 1938, he bought a passenger couch and a locomotive shortly after restoring the engine and building a track in his backyard, it was operational by 1942, and Ward would host Steam Up parties at the ones who would invite friends and family to their home and operate the train for them after learning of their mutual love of locomotives.

Ward invited Walt to one of these parties in October 1945 and even let Walt design the train through the backyard. Walt raised his hand and blew the train whistle just as he had done when he was a kid in Kansas City, riding the train around the electric

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. Walt was transported away from his problems in the studio and into a world of wonder, his passion was returning, albeit in a new way. Walt's lifelong fascination with trains soon became an obsession. He was equally interested in operating large locomotives and owning miniatures. In 1948 Walton Ward traveled together to go to the Chicago Railroad Show, a convention for train enthusiasts held at Burnham Park, the same location. which had celebrated the 1933 Century of Progress Fair that Walt had visited fifteen years earlier, Ward observed a happy child like Walt running through the convention space overwhelmed with excitement.

Walt was having the time of his life but he was also ingesting important sources of artistic inspiration. of the miniature railroads at the fair were featured along with elaborate models that the trains could navigate. These themed miniatures were detailed displays of everything from the Old West to Native American villages to the streets of New Orleans, as haunted as Walt was with the trains he seemed to be equally interested in the models the attention to detail the artist had for his miniatures was similar to the perfectionist nature he had once had for his animation the cover the architecture in the location was reminiscent of and better than real life in the On the way home from the fair, Ward and Walt stopped at the Henry Ford Museum and Greenfield Village in Detroit, which was said to be the country's first open-air living museum.

Walt, who had visited the town once before, realized the scale of the exhibit that focused on showcasing American culture. History and ingenuity It was as if the models he had seen in Chicago had been built to full scale in the villages. The emotional story of Walt's country and its people was equally inspiring. When Walt finally returned home with Ward, he was more invested in his love of trains. than ever before, the following year he would build a new house for his family and build a miniature railroad around the property, much to the dismay of his wife Lillian, who had plans for a garden.

They called it the Carrollwood Pacific Railroad and it was Walt's pride and joy, a guest at the Disney residence, could not avoid a trip on the line designed by Walt himself and even with the Carrollwood Pacific and its miniatures, his obsession could not Hold back, he needed something bigger and he knew exactly where to put it. Walt Disney Productions in Burbank there was an empty lot on the other side of Riverside Drive, the wall had been dying since the early 1940's, many Disney fans wanted to tour the studio and Walt believed that a tour of the studio was combined with some type of The attraction in the Riverside storyline could be a lucrative side venture for Walt Disney Productions.

It wasn't until the late 1940s, after Walt became obsessed with trains, that he gave serious thought to the Riverside attraction concept. Walt's immediate vision was of a small town with a locomotive. track surrounding it, but this simple concept would soon grow in size and scale. Walt continued taking his daughters to Griffith Park seeing the area in a new way, observing what worked and what didn't from a logistics and entertainment perspective. He would also spend a lot of time. in Beverly Park Kittyland Gathering similar information and asking specific questions about the operation of the amusement center's owner, David Bradley, while formulating his ideas for Riverside Park, he expanded his interest in miniatures with a new project he called Disneyland iya , which would be a line of visual jukeboxes into which children could insert coins and see a small scene of miniatures in front of them, the project would not make it past its first showing, but it was just another example of Walt's newfound passion for alternative entertainment experiences. of his staff at Walt Disney Productions was further evidence of a distracted Walt;

There was a growing feeling at the studio that Walt was too busy with his toys to worry about animation, which many believed was true. Walt even lacked interest in the studio's 1950 film. Cinderella, which critics and audiences praised as a return to form for the studio, worse than the ambivalence toward the animations. Walt was poaching some of his best artists to help him with his trains and village concepts, plus Ward Kimball. Walt had hired a mechanical engineer at the Roger Brogue II studio to help him with the Carrollwood Pacific Railroad and the Riverside Drive park train. Animator Ken Anderson was also asked to draw concept art for Walt's Disneyland through models.

Walt had a new passion, a new hobby and was building his new creative family. In 1951, Walt went on vacation to Europe where he had the opportunity to visit Tivoli Gardens, the hybrid amusement park and pleasure garden that was more than A century old at the time of Walt's visit, it was immaculate, the park was elaborately themed throughout its areas and integrated into its attractions, and it was rid of any sense of the carnival atmosphere that plagued amusement parks in the past. USA Tivoli Gardens was designed to evoke emotions and it did so impressively. Tivoli communicated serenity in one area and excitement and in another, more than anything, it was beautiful, while the Park Electric Park of Walt's childhood and Bradley's Kitty Land remained clean, especially compared to the other parks in The Day When Tivoli was a destination, its structure and designs attractions in their own right.

The park's founder, George Carstensen, once said, "Tivoli, so to speak, will never be finished," a sentiment Walt admired and took to heart as he believed he could build on an electric park. the Greenfield Village railroad fare in Beverly Park kittyland but Tivoli Gardens was a standard of quality that he would strive to reach on his European tour as well. Walt would walk into a model train store in London and find a miniature line that he was interested in purchasing and found another The man who was hoping to buy the same set, the other potential buyer also turned out to be an American, a man named Harper Gough Walt introduced himself and after learning that the goth was an artist, Walt told him to make an appointment when you return to the United States United, come and talk to him.

Walt then bought the train before Gough could and left. Gough did as Walt demanded and when he returned to the US, Walt assigned Gough to the Riverside Drive park, which had grown from a simple town to a full-fledged themed amusement park that he called Mickey Mouse. Park sometimes referred to it as Mickey Mouse Village. He wanted Gogh to design the layout of the park and create the concept art for it. He listened to Walt's ambitious ideas and then set to work placing as many of them as possible on the small plot of land next to the studio.

Mickey Mouse Park would have had its entrance at the corner of Buena Vista Street and Riverside Drive with a parking area across the street that guests would enter through the carnival section of the park. This probably would have been very similar to Beverly Park Kittyland with classic children's attractions. a carousel, the path then split in two, if visitors continued beyond the fairgrounds they would enter Newtown a town square with a train station for the park railway this would have consisted of more shops and restaurants the new town would be It seemed more like the beginning of the century small towns in the USA like the Disney Zone Marceline Walt described the area as a green town and explained that in the park there will be benches, a kiosk, drinking fountains, trees and bushes, it will be a place for Let people sit and rest, mothers and grandmothers will be able to watch small children playing.

He wanted it to be very relaxing, cool and welcoming. There was also going to be a town hall serving as the park's administrative office, as well as a functioning fire station and police station that Walt said would be implemented here. Visitors will report all violations, lost items, lost children, etc. there we could have a little jail where the kids could watch, we could even have some characters also in Newtown there was a church cemetery with a haunted house attraction at the top of the The hill beyond Newtown was the old town, which was It would have resembled the cities of the Old West.

The old town had three emblematic attractions: the old mill, a waterwheel that looked like a watermill, the pond of themill, a water ride where children could ride ducks around the old mill. the gravity flow canal boat a boat ride that took up a significant portion of the park space at one point the canal boat would approach the mouth of Pinocchio's monster the plans for the park state that there was supposed to be a castle on boat tours The surrounding area is possibly where guests would travel on their trip after the old town was Grandma's farm, a petting zoo and a cattle ranch based on the much-loved 1948 film to my heart, in this section of the park that was supposed to be the home of the snow dwarves. light that Walt had already recreated for the film's release in 1937, one of the first times he is reported to have mentioned wanting to build an amusement park after Grandma's Farm was the Indian Village, a recreation of a settlement of Native Americans that ran through all of these sections was a horse and cart track that would transport visitors throughout the park, the rest of Mickey Mouse Park would support the park's river, a Mississippi steamboat would circle the waters and offer views From a lighthouse and a school rock from the then-upcoming Disney film, Peter Pan, the ship would presumably take visitors to the island in the middle of the lagoon that would act as a bird sanctuary and walking trail.

There were also rumored to be a donkey ride, a submarine ride and a replica spaceship. Walt even considered bringing Bradley's Little Dipper roller coaster to entertain guests. Another representation showed a river. which surrounded the main park with a bridge to allow visitors to access the island where the ancients were located. Walt's obsession with the park grew over family dinners and entertainment gatherings. The plans for Mickey Mouse Park were not only an important step toward Walt's eventual amusement park, but they were also a step forward in Walt's personal growth. the nostalgia of the time, Walt's longing for his childhood and Marceline had gone from reminiscence to obsession, in addition to the obvious nods to the setting of his childhood, a Mickey Mouse park, and his rekindled fascination with trains, the film Disney's 1948 film, so dear to my heart, was proof enough that Walt's fixation on the best parts of his childhood had gone from nostalgic to saccharine.

Mickey Mouse Park, with its turn-of-the-century western town, Main Street, and his hometown, was to be a physical manifestation of Walt's personal nostalgia and, like Greenfield Village, a display of national pride, yet the Critics of Walt's Americana would label it not as patriotism but as revisionism through some of his films, and Park's critics would accuse Walt of presenting a false narrative of

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, a simplified, sanitized, glorified, and romanticized American

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, which He drew the old town. from the aesthetics promoted by Buffalo Bill Cody and his Wild West Show the same themes and images that were later integrated into film and television these representations in the media and in Mickey Mouse parks Old Town praised the rudeness of the frontiersman ignoring the atrocities of the American West The Newtown expansion showed American life and community again praising the positive ideals of the small town while ignoring the negative ones due to these simplified and inaccurate representations of the past, which would be labeled as a revisionist state and of denial that he was purposely trying to alter.

The historical narrative could be giving him too much credit for his stories and those of his collaborators. Walt's love of cowboys, horses, trains, farm animals and small towns was not complex, it was simply the sites and images of his own childhood with Mickey Mouse Park, he was creating a space. In order to relive the good memories of him from the past, he was creating what he knew in the simplest form of him with the park; That simplicity would be both the core of his critics' arguments and one of the main reasons for his eventual success. Walt's ambition with his films was limited by two things: money and time, but a third factor was introduced with his visions for the Mickey Mouse park space: the Riverside land would only provide about 10 acres and Walt came and went. with two consulting architects that I had.

He was hired to fit all of his ideas into the small plot of land. Roy was concerned about the idea despite all its limitations, historian Jim Korkis wrote. Roy wrote a quote. Walt talks a lot about an amusement park, but I think he's more interested in ideas that would be good in an amusement park than in running one himself. Walt was adding more people to the project, including John Cowles, Dr. Cal's son, who had financed Walt's Kansas City cartoons, the park was in a constant state of flux reflected in an apparent name change in 1952. At some point everyone working on the project stopped calling the park Mickey Mouse Park and changed to use the name Disneyland inspired by Disneyland eeeh Walt's now-defunct model project On March 27, 1952, the Burbank amusement park proposal was announced that the park would cost $1.5 million and Walt believed he could use the park as a filming location for television events to offset the cost.

Walt was now fully invested in making his project a reality. Walt's distance from the studio was so absolute that in December he would create a new company that would be named Wet Companies after his initials. This company would be tasked with creating Disneyland and its attractions. Walt hired one of his animation writers, Phil contrl, as the new company's first employee who went to work creating the Dark Rides stories. Dark Rides art director Dick Irvine would soon join the team, as would Harper's Gothic design artist John Hench, an animator who Mark Davis reportedly didn't exclaim at this last quote, Damn, I love it here, which is what the Hyperion studio used to be like back in the 1920s. that we were always working on something new Walt returned in September 1952, six months after the Burbank proposal was announced.

Walt Gough and the cows went to present his concept to the Burbank City Council board in hopes of acquiring an additional 20 acres to build the park. the board refused, arguing that they wanted to avoid a carnival atmosphere in the city. Walt pleaded to quote, although several sections will have the fun and flavor of a carnival or amusement park, there will be no tossing games, wheels, sharp practices or designed devices. Walt wanted the park to resemble a carnival in the least, but he could not convince the board of directors who maintained their rejection of the proposal. Walt Gough and the hoods were fired.

Walt's persistent paranoia toward members of his animation staff. It led him to believe that the Burbank City Council had been influenced by animators upset by Walt's newfound distraction from the studio; However, the rejection was not the crushing blow it might seem, as in the few months between the project's announcement and the City Council's rejection, Walt had already considered moving his plans away from the small studio plot. He knew Disneyland was bigger than a studio attraction. Roy saw that his little brother was serious about the project and felt the constant need to protect him from the consequences of his own ambition.

Now he was actively helping in the creation of the park, Roy supported the idea of ​​purchasing a larger piece of land for the park on the outskirts of Burbank with the help of his brother and the small team he had acquired. Walt removed the boundaries of Riverside Park and allowed his plans for Disneyland to come to fruition. grow up a year later, in September 1953, Walt recruited her. Ryman, an art director who had left Disney Studios for years before 20th Century Fox, to help draw concept art for Disneyland, working to a tight deadline. Ryman produced the first complete design for Walt's remake.

For the park, he envisioned a park with a unique entrance and exit, a Main Street theme to a turn-of-the-century town based on Marceline, and the new Mickey Mouse Park town concept to enter, yes, they would have to go under a railway station. He would have a view from Main Street to the central axis of the park and the iconic Fantasyland Castle. The park was separated into several lands, such as the real-life adventure land based on Walt's nature documentaries. The Lilliputian land. A world of miniatures. Recreational land. A small park and picnic area with a dance pavilion and kiosk, another concept borrowed from Mickey Mouse Park's frontier country, a large Old West town that expanded the old town concept with stagecoaches, grandma's farm, a riverboat on an Express ride and the Mickey Mouse Club on Treasure Island, this would serve as a filming location. from the Mickey Mouse Club television show, a show inspired by local fan clubs around the country, the clubs' meeting place would be located inside a large hollow tree, there was also a vacation ground, a multi-use space For events and festivals, the new Disneyland was more than four times the size of Mickey Mouse Park, the Burbank park would have required about 25 acres, while the new Ryman and Walt park would need about 100 to find the land for Disneyland .

What was presented to Harrison Buzz Price a surveyor at the Stanford Research Institute asked Walt. price to find a location for their park also in Stanford Disney would hire CV Wood an engineering community planner who would help design the park's layout would become Disneyland's first employee while continuing his research, if not ramping it up by a few months Before embarking on another trip through Europe, this time he stopped at the mature Dom in the Netherlands, which had an extensive display of miniatures. Walt would also reportedly visit the San Francisco Playland on the beach, where he would recruit the owner's son, George K.

Whitney Jr. to consult at the park and direct ride operations Beverly Park Children's Land owner David Bradley was now increasingly helping Walt lead the effort to prepare a 1922 carousel for operation at the park. Bradley would also suggest that Walt lower the buildings on Main Street so that visitors would not feel overwhelmed. Harper Gough would accompany Walt on trips to nearby Knott's Berry Farm, where Walt casually knew Walter Knott. Walton Goff studied the park inside and out. measuring aisles and studying crowd flow. He also studied the shoot-throwing boot park at El Montay and on a trip to New York that summer had a discouraging visit to Coney Island in which, after seeing the run-down park, he exclaimed: I'm almost ready to give up. idea of ​​an amusement park after seeing Coney Island, this whole place is so run down and ugly the people who run it are so unpleasant that the whole thing is almost enough to destroy your faith in human nature your frustration was short lived a trip to Oakland would find Walt in Children's Fairyland where he would recruit park director Dorothy Mane to serve as youth director at Disneyland in the early 1950s, most of Walt's team traveled to parks around the country taking notes.

Some believed there was no park in the U.S. that a Disneyland team member hadn't studied, but Price was looking for a new Disneyland location after Burbank's rejection narrowed the options to Orange County, south of Los Angeles, where the city expanded naturally. He then narrowed the search further to a 160-acre parcel in Anaheim, mostly populated by orange groves, the land only had 17 owners and the price was Affordable Walt took the opportunity to purchase the land for just under $900,000 and this is where the common narrative resumes the Disney 5 version of the Disney Land story, often amid the many parks that inspired the first true theme park, as well as the many iterations that Disneyland itself went through the Disney version of the Disney story has a simple beginning of a father on a bench wanting to play with his daughters is a simple conflict of an idea that no one thought would work on an opening day with too many people and a simple conclusion to a park that changed the entertainment landscape is not technically false, but not holistically true.

Similar items can be found at Disneyland. Walt's version of American history. The simple vision of the past would be seen by some as innocent, others as ignorant, but no one. could deny the power of him. Walt's greatest strength was his ability to reach his audience and for a short period of time he had lost that ability and it was lost in the Great Depression, the country needed escapism and Walt provided it, but during the chaos and pain of World War II and while Walt struggled with his own personal problems, he no longer hadthe answer his audience wanted, but now, with a booming economy and a new position in the world, America needed more than escapism, it needed identity, and while Walt might have been just searching for his, he had found the answer to many more.

Walt Disney's vision of America was one of hard-working people, small-town values ​​and optimism. Walt Park would be a reflection of this image, a land dedicated to the ideals that dreams and concrete facts give. or take the United States created, however Disneyland had expanded beyond Mickey Mouse Park, it was no longer just about the past where America had come from, it is only a part of the Disneyland narrative as Walt also told him It was going to give the country a vision of where they were going. The same principles used for his version of his past. A foundation of simplicity and optimism.

Walt was shaping his own world of tomorrow.