Disney’s Land: Walt Disney and the Invention of the Amusement Park That Changed the World

Former American Heritage editor-in-chief Snow (Iron Dawn) tells the story of Disneyland from the park’s ground-breaking to its five-year anniversary in this immensely readable history. According to Snow, Walt Disney was inspired to create the world’s first “theme” park by the 1948 Chicago Railroad Fair and a visit to Henry Ford’s Greenfield Village outside Detroit. Because it was the first of its kind, Disneyland’s rides had to be built from scratch, frequently on-site, and data-tracking methods, such as “per capita visitor expenditures” and “on-site crowd densities,” had to be invented. Among the many people who helped create the park, Snow profiles Joe Fowler, a U.S. Navy submarine designer who built the Mark Twain steamboat, and landscape architect Ruth Shellhorn, who redesigned whole sections of the park after trees and shrubs were initially planted haphazardly. Expecting 11,000 visitors for its “Press Preview Day” in July 1955, the park got nearly 30,000. Many of the rides failed; none of the water fountains worked. Newspapers declared it a disaster, but paying guests weren’t deterred. By early 1956, Snow writes, Disneyland was “regularly drawing crowds 50 percent above the most optimistic projections.” This joyful, lavishly detailed account will entertain Disneyphiles and readers of popular American history. (Dec.)