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THE THIRD BATTLE OF BULL RUN
THE DISNEY’S AMERICA THEME PARK (B)
On September 28, 1994, Disney officials announced the end of the Disney’s America
project in Prince William County, Virginia. Two representatives from Disney’s America flew to
Richmond to brief Virginia’s Governor George Allen on the decision. The same day, Prince
William County officials were notified as well.
Peter S. Rummell, president of Disney Design and Development Company, issued a
public statement, saying in part:
We remain convinced that a park that celebrates America and an exploration of
that we can move the process forward. . . .
Despite our confidence that we would eventually win the necessary approvals, it
has become clear that we could not say when the park would be able to open—or
even when we could break ground.
1 Peter S. Baker and Spencer S. Hsu, Washington Post, “Mickey’s Tactical Retreat; Worried about Its Image,
Disney Co. Stunned State Officials by Giving Up Its Park Site,” Norfolk Ledger-Star, 29 September 1994, A1.
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Rummell stated that Disney would try to build an American history theme park elsewhere in
Virginia, but that a site had not yet been selected.
Many Virginia politicians were disappointed, but some tried to remain optimistic.
Governor George Allen’s office issued a statement: “I’m committed to a Disney theme park in
Virginia and the jobs that will be created thereby. I’m pleased that the Walt Disney Company
shares that commitment.”2
Prince William County executive James Mullen said the county would be forced to go
through a time of self-examination following Disney’s exit. He stated, “Mainly I’m disappointed
for the people in the community who supported the project and for our staff, who put so much
time in on this. Disney certainly hasn’t helped our marketing effort. They’ve made it very
difficult for us to overcome the perception that this is a place (where) you can’t do a big project
without a hassle.”4
Other local politicians were not as generous in their remarks about Disney. State Senator
Joseph Benedetti of Richmond stated, “Promises were made that they’d stay, come hell or high
water. Whatever they do is going to have to be written in blood next time.”5 State Senator
Charles Colgan of Prince William County stated, “I think they broke faith with us.”6
Over the next few weeks, scores of municipalities wrote newspaper articles and
petitioned Disney directly, stating that they would welcome a Disney park in their areas.
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In Retrospect
Since the decision to halt plans for Disney’s America in Virginia, observers have tried to
make sense in retrospect of the park’s failure. In 1998, Eisner issued a memoir, Work in
Progress. In a chapter devoted to the Disney’s America project,9 Eisner freely and openly
admits that Disney made many missteps, while still arguing for the vision he had for the theme
park. Among the missteps Eisner identified were
• Naming the project “Disney’s America,” which implied the company’s
ownership of U.S. history. He said, “That was unfortunate because we were
never interested in a park that merely reflected a Disneyesque view of
American history.”
• Believing Disney “could announce the project on [its] own timetable. Our
focus on secrecy in land acquisition had prevented us from even briefing,
much less lobbying, the leading politicians in the state about our plans as they
evolved. The consequence was that we lost the opportunity to develop crucial
allies and nurture goodwill.”
• Revealing to the public “a plan that looked relatively complete [which]
opened ourselves up to every critic with different ideas about what a park
based on American history should and should not include.”
• Making emotional statements that critics latched on to, including being
shocked about not being taken around on people’s shoulders and complaining
that history in school was boring. Eisner reflects: “My comments made me
sound not just smug and arrogant but like something of a Philistine. . . .
Looking back, I realize how much my brief moment of intemperance
undermined our cause.”
To balance his story, Eisner also recollects his well-meaning intentions for the theme
park, describing his motives as the patriotic and socially responsible vision of a son of
immigrants. He wanted visiting Disney’s America to be as multimedia intensive and deeply
moving an experience as the U.S. Holocaust Museum. In retrospect, Eisner explained “We saw
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mill and then putting a roller-coaster through it. To do that, we began to understand, could
trivialize and even demean the attempt to portray the steel mill realistically.”
Of his critics, Eisner complains, “By any reasonable measure, this attack on Disney’s
America was dramatically overstated. . . . Much like negative advertising in a political campaign,
[their] incendiary claims were effective in influencing public opinion and putting us further on
the defensive. I was suddenly the captain of Exxon’s Valdez. . . . By the summer of 1994,
opposing Disney’s America had become a fashionable cause célèbre in the media centers of New
York City and Washington, D.C. . . . Fairness seemed to have given way to polemics.”
In the end, Eisner explains that financial projections made in late August 1994 “showed
that rather than the profit we’d previously projected for Disney’s America, we were now facing
the prospect of substantial losses.” On the cost side, Eisner attributed the losses to the current
The revised figures, coupled with the psychic impact of Wells’ death, Eisner’s by-pass
surgery, and Katzenburg’s departure led to the decision to abandon plans for Disney’s America.
As Eisner concludes,
I still believed that it was possible to get Disney’s America built, but the
question now was at what cost. . . . [A]fter two weeks of soul-searching, we
finally agreed that it wasn’t fair to subject the company to more trauma. The
issue was no longer who was right or wrong. We had lost the perception game.
Others interpreted the situation as one in which Eisner himself needed better handling. In
The Keys to the Kingdom, former Washington Post reporter Kim Masters says Eisner’s dealings
with the media had suffered since late 1992 when he lost his chief of corporate communications,
Erwin Okun, to cancer. “Okun had a shrewd yet avuncular style that worked well with the
press,” wrote Masters. Journalist Peter Boyer said of Okun “‘He somehow pushed that button in
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coverage of Disney’s America would prove most influential.”10 Pat Scanlon, formerly an
Imagineer, speculated that Wells might have salvaged the Disney’s America project.
“There wasn’t anybody at a high enough level to keep Michael in his box,
[Scanlon] says. “Michael was making public remarks that weren’t helpful.
Whatever the cause, Nick Kotz, a member of the Piedmont Environmental Council and
author of the editorial in the Los Angeles Times, observed this about the effects of the Disney’s
America theme park controversy: “Undoubtedly Disney had internal reasons for the decision to