t was July 25th, 1955. Flames danced sporadically on the streets
of Fantasyland from an undiscovered underground gas leak. The Mark
Twain steamship sailed for the first time, but sank as it went down
the Rivers of America from the weight of too many passengers.
The asphalt on Main Street got so hot that women's high-heeled shoes
sunk deep into the newly laid cement. Managers ran armloads of cash
from the ticket windows to the bank, just in time to make payroll.
Visitors jumped fences, and some pretended to be friends of the
celebrated founder just to get into this new place they called Disneyland.
It was the opening day in Anaheim, California. Walt Disney had launched
his first theme park, an adventure in business innovation and a
giant leap forward for a successful film and animation business
that had enchanted viewers around the world with stories about a
mouse named Mickey, and the classic animated film Snow White and
the Seven Dwarfs. In 1955, the original budget for the park was
four and a half million dollars. It would eventually cost seventeen
million dollars to complete. (Disney would have to sell his home
in Palm Springs to finish paying for the project.) All in all, two
million boxed feet of lumber, a million square feet of asphalt,
five thousand cubic feet of concrete, and fifty thousand cubic feet
of earth went into the massive building project. Only a third of
the park was fully operational the day the company decided to launch....
