How Walt Disney World was Really Started
The Truth about how Walt Disney acquired 30,000 acres in Central Florida
The 50-year anniversary of Walt Disney World commenced this month (October 2021). Currently, the theme parks are in a massive celebration mode for the commemoration of the event. Disney World, as it is commonly known, was the most visited vacation destination in the world as of 2018 with average attendance of near 58,000,000, yes MILLION, people. The resort encompasses four major theme parks (Magic Kingdom, EPCOT, Disney’s Animal Kingdom, and Disney’s Hollywood Studios). In addition, there are twenty-seven resort hotels, four major golf courses, a dining, and shopping district called Disney Springs and even a high-end residence enclave of multi-million-dollar homes known as Golden Oak. The NBA hosted the 2020 season during the Coronavirus pandemic in a bubble at the Walt Disney World Resort with games played at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex.
Have you ever wondered how this amazing theme park and resort destination came to be? Walt Disney initially started Disneyland in Anaheim, California with an opening date of July 17, 1955. Disney had his eye set on expanding to a second resort, however, disliked the sprawl that had occurred in Anaheim outside of the original Disneyland. Disney flew over a site in Florida near Bay Lake and selected a huge swath of land to construct Walt Disney World. He wanted to obtain an enormous contiguous section of the property so that the company would be free to develop freely without being landlocked as they were in California.
The Florida Project
Due to the concern that landowners who became aware that a major corporation such as The Walt Disney Co. was interested in purchasing such property, would drive up prices, the property was purchased in secret. Numerous dummy corporations were set up with exotic names such as the “Ayefour Corporation” and the “Latin-American Development and Management Corporation” to throw off sellers. The realtors for the land had no idea that Walt Disney was their client until all the tracts of land had been bought. The tracts of land were purchased for as little as $100 per acre! The land was mostly swamped at the time, however, Tufts University-owned mineral rights to the land, which the Walt Disney Company had to agree to buy for $15,000.
At one point, the editor of a newspaper suspected that the Walt Disney Company was the mystery buyer of all this swampland in Central Florida. There was widespread speculation over who the mystery buyer may be. Some people even thought that it may be an expansion of the space program by NASA.
Many landowners had acquired their property through inheritances and had thus never even seen the land. In order to further disconnect the true buyer from the mystery the company had constructed, all land purchases were made in cash.
The company ended up purchasing the land for $5,000,000. Today, the land would cost an estimated $2.2 billion.
Park Opening
Walt Disney World opened on October 1, 1971. Disney passed away of lung cancer due to a smoking habit that he had had since World War I in 1966. Thus, while his dream did reach fruition, he was never able to see it. Walt’s brother, Roy, took over control of the company after his brother had passed. Roy called the resort the ‘Walt Disney World’ out of respect for his deceased brother. The Park opened with the Magic Kingdom being its only theme park at that time. The opening team selected October as the opening month in the hopes that crowds would be small.
The opening of Disneyland 16 years prior had been chaotic, and Disney World wanted a soft opening so that any kinks could be ironed out. On opening day, a modest 10,000 visitors entered. The other major elements at the opening of Walt Disney World were two resort hotels, the Contemporary and the Polynesian Resort as well as a monorail connecting both of them. If you are a Mid-Century Modern enthusiast as I am, you will appreciate the concept of both hotels.
Personal Reflections
Prior to Shark Tank, Elon Musk, and Bill Gates, was Walt Disney, the true definition of an entrepreneur. I can only imagine what a risk it must have felt like to undertake such an enormous construction project, with so much on the line. The formation of separate land companies to purchase the property was such a brilliant act. There was no guidebook for this, however, Disney had a killer instinct and knew that this was what had to be done to achieve his dream.
When I first took my girlfriend to the Magic Kingdom, it felt as magical then as it did when I went as a kid in 1980. The pandemic has put the world to the test, and Disney World has been no exception. However, they are back stronger than ever. It’s important to remember how much had to occur to bring Walt Disney’s dream to fruition.
