Design
You Just Lost Your Chance to Own a Piece of the St. Louis Disneyland That Never Was
An indoor, vertical Disneyland nearly went up in Missouri.
St. Louis, the most magical place on Earth. It may not have quite the same ring to it, but the Missouri city almost was the second site for Walt Disney’s line of theme parks.
As soon as Disneyland opened in Anaheim in 1955, various cities began to virtually harass Disney for the privilege of hosting his next project. In Neal Gabler’s 2006 biography of the entertainment tycoon, the journalist ticks through the options: Secaucus, New Jersey, ran a feasibility study in 1958; Brasilia promised Disney a trip if he was interested (he wasn’t); Niagara Falls was—shockingly—deemed too cold to support a year-round operation.