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Sleeping Beauty's Castle with Walt and Mickey[/caption]
To all who come to this happy place; welcome. Disneyland is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past...and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future. Disneyland is dedicated to the ideals, the dreams and the hard facts that have created America...with the hope that it will be a source of joy and inspiration to all the world.
On this day in 1955, Disneyland opened to the public in Anaheim, California. While I love carnivals and boardwalks and the liminal spaces they represent, Disneyland is something different - a permanent magical land, always changing but timeless.
This makes today an ideal day to honor Walt Disney as my creative ancestor and someone who helped shape my childhood, as well as the Nine Old Men and all of the Imagineers Who Came Before. So much of my aesthetic comes from Disney, and virtually everything that's been done in animation since is either inspired by, in reaction to, or both.
I didn't visit Disneyland til I was an adult, but as a child I visited Disney World with my family and I still remember it very distinctly. I was a little older than is typical but I was a huge animation nerd and so I was able to appreciate it unironically despite being a young teen. Now I'm looking forward to taking my own child to Disneyland once she's old enough to appreciate it.
And of course I'd be remiss if I didn't remember that Disneyland is also the home of Mara's temple. Most temples and churches in the US could only hope to be so well-attended! Or graced by the presence of Indiana Jones, for that matter.
Hail to Mousehome and to the Master Builders!