BrownAleRVA t1_jebl7nh wrote on March 30, 2023 at 8:42 PM

Reply to comment by kingsumo_1 in TIL that Walt Disney World began as "The Florida Project". Dummy corporations were used, by Walt Disney Productions, to buy up 27,000 acres of land to avoid bursts of land speculation in the Orlando area. Early rumors assumed possible development by NASA, Ford, the Rockefellers, and Howard Hughes. by jdward01

IIRC, this is what happened at his California park. Bunch of non-Disney things popped up all around the area. He wanted his own magic place so he secretly bought up land in Orlando.

After it became known that it was Disney, there still was a rush to buy up property around it but Walt planned on that. The land had a large buffer zone to the actual parks. So anything built around the disney owned land wasnt going to be near anything.