The Birth of Walt Disney World

It'd be a great question for Regis to ask: Florida was founded by (a) Juan Ponce de León, (b) Millard Fillmore, (c) Sonny Bono, or (d) Walt Disney. For travelers who can't fathom Florida without Walt Disney World, the final answer is "d" -- in Central Florida at least. The theme park's arrival spawned a multibillion-dollar tourism industry that begat a population boom that begat new roads, malls, and schools that begat a whole new culture.

So how did it happen? Why did Walt pin his hopes on forlorn Florida ranchlands 3,000 mi from Disneyland? In the 1950s, Walt barely had enough money to open his theme park in California, and lacking the funds to buy a buffer zone, he couldn't prevent cheap hotels and tourist traps from setting up shop next door. This time he wanted land. And lots of it. Beginning in the early 1960s, Walt embarked on a supersecret four-year project: he traveled the nation in search of a location with access to a major population center, good highways, a steady climate, and, most important, cheap and abundant land. Locations were narrowed down, and in the end Orlando was it.

In May 1965, major land transactions were being recorded a few miles southwest of Orlando. By late June, the Orlando Sentinel reported that more than 27,000 acres had been sold so far. In October, the paper revealed that Walt was the mastermind behind the purchases. Walt and his brother Roy hastily arranged a press conference. Once Walt described the $400 million project and the few thousand jobs it would create, Florida's government quickly gave him permission to establish the autonomous Reedy Creek Improvement District. With this, he could write his own zoning restrictions and plan his own roads, bridges, hotels -- even a residential community for his employees.

Walt played a hands-on role in the planning of Disney World, but just over a year later, in December 1966, he died. As expected, his faithful brother Roy took control and spent the following five years supervising the construction of the Magic Kingdom. Fittingly, before the park opened on October 1, 1971, Roy changed the name of his brother's park to "Walt" Disney World. Roy passed away three months after the park's opening, but by then WDW was hitting its stride. For the next decade, it became part of Florida's landscape. Families that once saw Orlando merely as a whistle-stop on the way to Miami now made their vacation base at WDW.

Behind the scenes, however, a few cracks began to appear in the facade. In its first decade, growth was stagnant. By 1982, when Epcot opened, construction-cost overruns and low attendance created a 19% drop in profits. Meanwhile, the Disney Channel and Disney's film division were also sluggish. Eventually, in 1984, Michael Eisner came aboard as CEO and company chairman, along with Frank Wells as president and CFO. Their arrival got Disney out of the doldrums. Disney's unparalleled film catalog was brought out of storage with re-releases in theaters and on video. Jeffrey Katzenberg was put in charge of the Disney Studios, and with him came the release of "new classics" such as Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, and The Lion King.

In 1988 the Grand Floridian and Caribbean Beach resorts opened. The following year Disney-MGM Studios opened along with Typhoon Lagoon and Pleasure Island. Five resort hotels opened in the early 1990s. By 1997 Blizzard Beach, Disney's Wide World of Sports, and Downtown Disney West Side had opened; and by 1998 Disney's Animal Kingdom had come to life. Also arriving in this decade of growth were the planned community of Celebration, the Disney cruise lines, the book-publishing arm of Hyperion, and the purchase of Miramax Films and ABC television.

Since the profitable mid-1990s, however, Disney has suffered its share of economic trouble and political unrest. Following a dip in earnings in 2002, and several box-office bombs (think: The Alamo), Roy E. Disney, Walt's nephew, resigned from his position as vice chairman of the board of directors to lead a movement to oust Michael Eisner from the company. When Eisner came up for re-election to the Disney board in early 2004, 43% of shareholders withheld their votes. By September 2005, Robert Iger had replaced Eisner as CEO. Despite the big changes at its parent company, Walt Disney World continues to grow and improve. A score of new shows and attractions opened in 2006, including the much-anticipated Expedition EVEREST.

And it all started with a man who didn't have the cash to buy a little more land in Anaheim.