Walt Disney and a group of his top executives land at Herndon Airport (today known as Orlando's Executive Airport). In the midst of a tour of the eastern Unites States (since November 17) in search of an ideal location for a new theme park, Walt and his team head toward Ocala in 2 rented cars. Upon arriving in Ocala, they check into a local hotel under assumed names (Walt uses the name William Brown). The next morning they will fly over the Orlando-area in search of a spot for Walt's "East Coast Disneyland."
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Disney's Pluto short Pluto at the Zoo, directed by Clyde Geronimi, is released. Jealous of the larger bones in the lion's cage, Pluto decides to take one for himself.
Walt Disney World's new Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground (located at 4510 North Fort Wilderness Trail) opens in Florida. Fort Wilderness was designed with a rustic theme. Tree-lined winding roads loop around to the various regions of the resort. Part of the resort is occupied by campsites where visitors with tents or recreational vehicles can stay. The remainder of the lodging area is occupied by cabins, designed to resemble log cabins.
"FASTPASS" is introduced at Disneyland allowing guests to avoid standing in a long line by taking a "pass" to return and use later at an appointed time. Mickey Mouse stars in Steamboat Willie, the first commercially successful animated cartoon to use synchronized sound. Disney's third Mickey short (but the first with sound) debuts as a sneak preview at Universal's Colony Theatre - located at Broadway & 53rd Street in New York City. It is shown before the feature film Gang War. Steamboat Willie is co-directed by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks and features the first appearance of Minnie Mouse. It is animated by Ub Iwerks, Wilfred Jackson and Dick Lundy. The short also features the work of in between artist Les Clark (who will go on to be one of "Walt's Nine Old Men"). Walt himself supplies the voices for all the characters - although there isn't any real spoken dialogue just whistling, grunts, laughter and other vocal sounds. Walt sits nervously at the rear of the theater to gage the audience's reaction. To his delight, the Colony echoes with laughs and giggles throughout the short! Steamboat Willie will be shown every night for 2 weeks. (Despite the fact that this is not the first Mickey cartoon made or released, it is still considered Mickey Mouse's true debut ... and birthday!) Click the link below to check out the short. In an hour-long televised question-and-answer session held at Disney World's Contemporary Resort, U.S. President Richard Nixon declares "I am not a crook." In front of 400 Associated Press managing editors, Nixon defends his record in the Watergate scandal. He has flown to Orlando this evening from his Key Biscayne, Florida home for this much-heralded event. (It will be a defining moment of Nixon's career and the start of his presidency's downward spiral.)
Disney's The Little Mermaid is generally released in theaters. Loosely based upon the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale about a young mermaid willing to give up her life in the sea and her identity as a mermaid to gain a human soul and the love of a human prince, it is the last Disney feature film to use the traditional hand-painted cel method of animation. Directed by Ron Clements and John Musker, a mermaid princess named Ariel (voiced by Jodi Benson) makes a bargain with Ursula, an unscrupulous seahag, in order to meet a human prince named Eric (Christopher Daniel Barnes) who lives on land.
Walt Disney visits the Disney World site in Florida the day after the news conference in Orlando. Among those accompanying Walt is Joe Potter, the former New York World's Fair executive and engineering/logistical planning genius, who has been hired to supervise the construction. Potter has the Herculean task of transforming 300 acres of land into the Magic Kingdom, while preserving the area's ecology and beauty.
On this day in 1965 the first press conference was held to discuss the first official step toward Disney Parks expansion — when Walt and Roy Disney joined Florida Governor Haydon Burns to share news about their "Florida Project." The Walt Disney World project began under the pseudonym "Project X," when seven Disney officials were selected to work on purchasing land for an undisclosed project in Central Florida. Over a period of nearly two years, a stretch of land twice the size of Manhattan would be secretly acquired at an average price of less than $200 an acre (shortly after the announcement was made, a nearby acre sold at $131,000!)
Walt Disney becomes a grandfather again with the birth of Diane & Ron Miller's fifth child, in Monterey County, California. The baby boy is named Walter Elias Disney Miller. He is a producer and actor, known for Walt: The Man Behind the Myth (2001), Walt & El Grupo (2008) and Our Grandpa, Walt Disney (2011).
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