This day in History

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Wednesday July 17, the middle of the week and nothing exciting going on but do you know what happened on this day in 1955? I bet it was exciting for some especially in the Anaheim, California area. Disneyland opened on this date in 1955. The 160 acre park cost just $17 million to build at the time. Now the park host about 14 million visitors a year and makes about $3 billion. If you think about that, that means on average each visitor spends about $214.28 at the park. Walt Disney is from my home town of Chicago born in 1901. He was a commercial artist and moved to California to start making animated cartoons. His first short film came out in 1928, called "Steamboat Willy" staring the character we all know now, "Mickey Mouse". It was a national sensation and from then on Disney cartoons were in heavy demand. Disney's first full length film was made in 1938. You might have heard of it, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The cartoon took 3 years to make and was a huge commercial success. July 17th was the original opening of Disneyland but it wasn't suppose to be that way. It was originally suppose to be a test date and by invite only, however the tickets were counterfeited and thousands of uninvited people showed up. They were allowed in but the park was not ready, they ran out of food and drink, and the steamboat ride almost capsized from to many people on it. It was not a good start but that didn't stop people from coming. As we know the Disneyland idea was a success. Since then there is Walt Disney World in Florida 1971, Disneyland Tokyo 1983, Disneyland Paris–or “EuroDisney” 1992, Disneyland Hong Kong 2005. Have you ever been to any of the Disney places? I went to Disney World in Florida when I was about 11 and then when I was 18 I was in California and went to Disneyland.