Disney Execs Reminisce About 40 Years

Today marks the 40th anniversary of the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World, and two Disney execs were there for the very first day. Recently, they gave an interview to the Orlando Sentinel about their experiences with the company forty years ago.

VP Phil Holmes, who is still employed with the company, began his career at Disney working at the Haunted Mansion. He recalled the park's first day, saying he was responsible for taking guests' E-tickets (part of a ticket system at the time that dictated which attraction a guest could get in to).

Another VP, Kevin Myers, also still a Disney employee, was a busboy in Adventureland at the beginning of the park. He was at the Magic Kingdom's first rope drop. He recalls:

One of the distinct memories that I've got is watching literally hundreds of people come into the theme park. And it was open. The reality was here. We'd been cleaning for nearly two weeks " actually a little more than that. That's all we'd been doing, was getting stuff ready, making sure it was of show quality for guests. And then guests arrived. It was amazing.

Today, though Walt Disney World has grown from one park and a couple of hotels to four theme parks, water parks, some seventeen hotels plus golf courses and time shares, Mr. Myers says the job is "fundamentally the same" as it was forty years ago: making sure "the experience of the guest is everything it should be."

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