A Friday Visit with Jim Korkis: Everyone Comes to Walt Disney World

By Dave Shute

Welcome back to Fridays with Jim Korkis! Jim, the dean of Disney historians, writes about Walt Disney World history every Friday on yourfirstvisit.net.

EVERYONE COMES TO WALT DISNEY WORLD

By Jim Korkis

In 1965, Walt Disney told the press, “We love to entertain kings and queens but at Disneyland everyone is a V.I.P.”

Dignitaries, celebrities, royalty and more visited Walt Disney World with the same joy as when they previously visited Disneyland. Of course, there were many celebrities at the dedication weekend ceremonies October 23-25 in 1971, from Bob Hope to Julie Andrews, but during the next twenty years many others enjoyed being guests in the Disney vacation destination as well.

Here are just a very few that you might not remember who officially visited during the first two decades of Walt Disney World to show the wide variety who came to enjoy the Most Magical Place on Earth, as Walt Disney World was originally called.

1971: Mickey Rooney, Astronaut Eugene Cernan, Johnny Bench

1972: Senators Hubert Humphrey, Edmund Muskie and Henry Jackson. Sargent Shriver, West German Chancellor Willy Brandt, Wernher von Braun

1973: President Richard Nixon, Governor of Georgia Jimmy Carter, George Wallace of Alabama, boxer Joe Frazier, Howard Cosell, Billie Jean King

1974: Texas Governor John Connally, Truman Capote, Ginger Rogers, John Lennon

1975: U.S. and Soviet crewmen of the Apollo-Soyuz Mission, King Hussein of Jordan, Michael Landon, Henry Kissinger, Susan Ford

1976: Jose Feliciano, Natalie Cole

1977: King Hussein of Jordan, Mrs. Anwar Sadat of Egypt, Senator George McGovern, Prime Minister Robert D. Muldoon of New Zealand

1978: U. N. Ambassador Andrew Young, Muhammad Ali, John Denver, Phyllis Diller, Empress of Iran, Amy Carter, Donny Osmond

1979: Former President Gerald Ford, boxer Sugar Ray Leonard, the Russian Olympic swim team, Sophia Loren, Maureen McGovern, Marie Osmond

1980: Michael Jackson, Paul Lynde, the Osmond Family

1981: Burl Ives, Debby Boone, tennis star Yvonne Goolagong, Dick Van Dyke, Ricky Schroeder, Chubby Checker, Ray Stevens, Reba McIntire

1982: Former President Richard Nixon, Jimmy Buffet, Barry Manilow, Speaker “Tip” O’Neill, Mel Tillis

1983: President Ronald Reagan, Vice President George Bush, Crown Prince Harald of Norway, John Travolta, Red Skelton, Dr. Joyce Brothers, Billy Idol

1984: Medal winners of the U.S. Olympic team (including Mary Lou Retton), Julius Erving (Dr. J), Vincent Price, Michael Jackson again, Burt Bacharach, Billy Joel, Richard Carpenter, Toni Tenille, Marvin Hamlish

1985: Secretary General of the United Nations Javier Perez de Cuellar, Senator Albert Gore Jr., Kenny Rogers, Morey Amsterdam, the Dallas Cowboys, Chuck Norris, Ron Jaworski, Whitney Houston

1986: Robert Conrad, Alice Cooper, Johnny Unitas, George Plimpton, David and Harriet Nelson, Kurt Russell, twenty Soviet Junior Cosmonauts, Former Chief Justice Warren Burger, Buddy Rich

1987: Alan Thicke, Robert de Niro, Rob Lowe, Ron Howard, Bo Derek, June Carter Cash, Voyager pilots Jeanna Yeager and Dick Rutan, Gene Siskel, Rosemary Clooney, Roger Williams, Keith Hernandez and Daryl Strawberry

1988: Nancy Reagan, Burt Reynolds, Ray Parker Jr., Frankie Avalon

1989: Vice President Dan Quayle, Pee Wee Herman, Willie Nelson, Dustin Hoffman, Steve Allen, George Burns, Vanna White, Bob Denver, Jim Henson, George Lucas, Betty White, Harvey Korman, Buddy Hackett

1990: President George Bush, Prince Ranier of Monaco, Greg Louganis, Mark Hamill, Lou Ferrigno, Billy Joel and Christie Brinkley, Liza Minnelli, the Harlem Globetrotters, Jerry Lewis, Sylvester Stallone, Arthur Ashe

1991: Bozo the Clown, Emmett Kelly Jr., Joe Namath, Crystal Gayle, David Cassidy, Cathy Rigby, Ben Vereen, Bob McGrath

*  *  *  *  *

Thanks, Jim! And come back next Friday for more from Jim Korkis!

In the meantime, check out his books, including his latest, Secret Stories of Mickey Mouse, and his Secret Stories of Walt Disney World: Things You Never You Never Knew, which reprints much material first written for this site, all published by Theme Park Press.

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