Site Map For Disneyland Reviewed
August 8, 1953
On the morning of August 8 1953 Walt Disney reviewed the site map that Imagineer/art director Marvin
Davis had been working on for a new California theme park, which would be the
first diagrammatic plan for Disneyland. On that morning, Walt reviewed the site
map that Davis was working on and picked up a No. 1 carbon pencil and drew a
triangle around the plot of land to indicate where he wanted his railroad to
run. That historic drawing still exists today. For two years, Davis worked on
more than 100 different versions of the master plan for Disneyland. While Disney Imagineer Herb Ryman did the
famous sketch over a long weekend that sold the idea of a Disneyland to bankers
and more, his imaginative concept drawing was based on the layout sketches of
Imagineer Marvin Davis, who had been a film art director. Many Disney fans
confuse Davis with another Disney Legend, animator Marc Davis, but Marvin was a
distinctly different individual with a background in architecture and film that
aided him in making Walt Disney's dreams into three-dimensional realities. Walt referred to these art directors who
worked on the early Disneyland like Davis, Irvine, Bill Martin, Sam McKim, etc.
as "brick and mortar men" which irritated Davis because it seemed to
suggest they weren't imaginatively creative.
While it was Herb Ryman who
did the famous sketch of Disneyland that helped sell the concept, it was Irvine
and Davis who presented Ryman with the concepts before he began drawing. When
Ryman had finished after that memorable weekend, it was Irvine and Davis who
grabbed color pencils to add shading and highlights to Ryman's pen and ink
drawing before Roy had to grab it and fly to New York. In addition to assisting
with the earliest layout of Disneyland, Davis worked on Tom Sawyer Island, and
famously argued with Herb Ryman as to which direction the top of Sleeping
Beauty Castle should face. Davis' original front on the model of the castle was
flipped backwards; Walt Disney walked in to the model shop, liked Ryman's
"front" better, and the design remains to this day.
After Disneyland opened,
Davis became an art director for Disney live-action films for almost the next
10 years on films including Moon Pilot, Babes in Toyland, Bon Voyage and
Big Red, as well as television projects like the Zorro television
series. He received an Emmy Award for his art direction on Walt Disney's
Wonderful World of Color. Davis retired from the Walt Disney Company in
1975. He was honored as a Disney Legend in 1994. Davis who master planned both
Disneyland and Walt Disney World, died on March 8, 1998 in Santa Monica,
California. His memory will live on commemorated in the window in his on above
the Main Street Bank on Main Street USA. And that’s what happened today in
Disneyland’s history.
