Disney World: Pixie Dust Over Florida

FIRST there was Disneyland, an elaborate $128.5 million, 70-acre playground that erupted 16 years ago in the Southern California flatlands outside Anaheim. Its stunning success spawned a host of imitators, including amusement extravaganzas called Six Flags in Dallas, St. Louis and Atlanta. Chicagoans were given the opportunity to celebrate Christmas year round at Santa's Village, Houstonites to take flights of fancy at the 100-ride Astroworld, and animal lovers to join Lion Country Safaris in Los Angeles and West Palm Beach.

It was left to the imagination of the late Walt Disney and to the ingenuity of his staff, however, to surpass Disneyland--and last week they did. In the swamps and scrublands of Central Florida 20 miles southwest of Orlando, a $400 million. 27,500-acre enclave called Walt Disney World was opened to the public. "World" is right. The latest Disney enterprise, four years in the building, includes a spotlessly clean amusement area, two enormous and elaborate hotels with marinas and beaches, two championship-caliber golf courses, lavishly landscaped lakes and a futuristic transportation network linking everything.

Unisex Uniforms. Because Founder Walt Disney was distressed by the sprawling, unsightly commercial ventures that sprang up around Disneyland to take advantage of the influx of tourists, the designers of Disney World were careful to guard against a similar blight: the land area is large enough to keep other entrepreneurs away from the amusement and recreational areas. Sleek thruways lead to turnpike-like toll gates, and from the 12,000-car parking lot a Space Age monorail, operated by youngsters in futuristic unisex jumpsuits and helmets, sweeps visitors off to hotels and amusement areas.

For their first inspection, visitors will rely on the 80-ft.-high Skyway gondola cars, or the narrow-gauge, coal-burning open-sided train that circles the area. The crowds head for the six theme areas of the Magic Kingdom amusement complex: Mam Street U.S.A., Adventureland, Frontierland, Liberty Square, Fantasyland, and the not-yet-opened Tomorrowland.

Thus far the most popular amusement attraction is the Mickey Mouse Review, in which an automated air-driven Mickey Mouse leads 86 mechanical Disney characters through all the Disney hits, including "Three Caballeros" and "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?", and winds up with the Disney Anthem, the Mickey Mouse Club song. Running the review a close second is the Country Bear Jamboree: 18 cleverly animated bear robots, highlighted by a paunchy, off-key, gravel-voiced grizzly named Big Al, that grind out country music and rural humor. Like the robots in the Mickey Mouse Review, the bears are animated by the Disney-patented "auto-animatronic" system, run by computer tapes synchronized with the music. They move so realistically, in fact, that audiences find themselves actually applauding mechanical figures. Some other hits at Disney World:

> Cinderella Castle, a multi-turreted, multi-pennoned edifice intended to look like Everyman's Dream of Fairyland and featuring King Stefan's Banquet Hall (a roast beef dinner for $4.25).

> The Haunted Mansion, a Charles Addamsish house inhabited by an ear-shattering band of ghosts, ghouls, poltergeists and even a singing tombstone or two.

> The Hall of Presidents, a super-American show that opens with a 12-minute film summing up U.S. history and then presents all 36 Presidents, artfully duplicated and carefully robotized (Andrew Jackson keeps whispering to Martin Van Buren as each leader is introduced).

> A Grand Prix auto-racing course where cars nip through curves and down straightaways at just 10 m.p.h.

> Imaginative water rides--including a jungle cruise on the Senegal Sal, a sternwheeler splash on the Admiral Joe Fowler and a keelboat journey on the Gullywhumper.

But it is the hotels, shops, beaches and other recreational facilities at Disney World that really set the new complex apart from Disneyland and its imitators. Disneymen call their creation a "total destination resort"--not just a stopover, in other words, but a place to spend a weekend or a week. Early guests have been staying at the Polynesian Village Hotel, built in Tahitian style along a lake shore, with 500 rooms in five so-called long houses. The Contemporary Resort Hotel, which looks vaguely like a Mayan pyramid and features a 14-story-deep lobby appropriately called the Grand Canyon Concourse, will be finished by January, and two more cavernous hotels--in Persian, Thai and Venetian styles--have yet to be started. The prices at Disney World seem reasonable enough. Hotels range from $22 to $40 for a room large enough for a family of four. Package plans include one that offers three days and two nights at a hotel, three free days in the amusement area, free transport and $18 worth of sailing, riding or other sports--all for $61.50 per person ($25 per child).

On opening day, employees costumed as Mickey and good friend Donald Duck were on hand for 45 minutes of every hour to greet arrivals at Magic Kingdom. The crowds were disappointingly small. In part frightened off by predictions of mobs, only about 10,000 showed up (compared with an expected 30,000). First-day visitors were enthusiastic: "Oh, it just makes you want to cry," burbled Beatrice Agnew, 60, "it's all so happy here." Said Brad Griffis. 8, whose family of five spent $45.99 that day: "It's the best day of my life." The only untoward incident took place when a somewhat confused woman sought free admission because, she told police, "I am Cinderella." The Disney cops, primed for any emergency, lured her away by telling her that their police car was a pumpkin.

Undercover. The 6,200 Disney World staffers, in general, are young: 5,500 are between 17 and 22, and every one of them is wholesome. Their uniforms are designed with all the come-hither appeal of cassocks; one monorail pilot was grounded briefly on opening day because her black bikini panties showed through her lime-green jumpsuit. Boys must be shorthaired, and girls are required to keep makeup at a minimum. Good looks obviously counted when it came to hiring; largely because of that criterion, Disney rejected nine applicants for every one it hired. Once on the payroll, the kids were "Disneyized" at Disney World University, where rose-colored glasses are part of the curriculum. "They told us that pixie dust sort of takes over after you get into the company," reported Karen Crannell, a recent University of Florida graduate. "I wasn't so enthused at first, but it's true."

Disney World's impact on its surroundings has been considerable. The resort's attorneys, operating undercover, bought their property in the early '60s for about $185 an acre--but up to $300,000 an acre has since been paid for locations close to Disney World's gates. Disney's economists indicate that the park's opening eventually may add $6.6 billion annually to state income, including $343 million in new tax revenues. Along with the new regional prosperity, however, have come some eyebrow-raising "special arrangements." Florida's legislature, influenced by skillful lobbyists, in 1967 passed three major bills that make Disney World in effect a city-state. Florida law now gives the Disney interests absolute control of everything within their property lines, including police and zoning powers as well as some startling tax advantages. Eventually, more than 10,000 will be employed at Disney World once the projected hotels and an "experimental community of the future" are completed.

If Disney World encounters any real problems, they will probably center on the weather. "It's different from California, where we could use that beautiful climate most of the year," says Roy Disney, Walt's brother, who is board chairman of Walt Disney Productions. During summer, for example, central Florida is usually hot, humid and subject to daily thunderstorms. The odds are, however, that Disney luck will prevail. "The real strength of our company," said Brother Roy two years ago, "has been that Walt and the staff he built always seemed to be able to reach out and touch the heart of the public." Billfolds too. As Walt said about it before he died five years ago: "It will make money."

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