1974 Ticket Books and Park Guide

Following up on the last post, our visiting family to Disneyland on July 1st 1974 used all but one "A" ticket which was left in each book. They each managed to get 12 ticketed attractions done in one day, it was a Monday but peak season.

I hear there's a new Walt Disney Story in the Opera House, I very much want to see it in person.

The Globe safety paper looks, feels and smells just like 1974.

What an amazing set of attractions. I wonder if they got to see America Sings, it had opened on June 29th, 1974, just two days before their visit. 

Our family were members of the Magic Kingdom Club, getting extra tickets for extra value. If this was the off season the book would be full of "Magic Key" tickets, good for ANY attraction, basically all E tickets!.

Here's the in-park guide for the Summer of 1974. I love these little gems. America Sings was my happy place...

New download link -------> Disneyland Guide Summer 1974 - 10MB (Link)

 

1974 Airline & Motel Trip to Disneyland

Let's fly to Disneyland on July 1st 1974.  Flying from Oakland (OAK) to Santa Ana (SNA) on Air California which had a seriously cool logo, so cool they had it emblazed on the tail section of their planes (Link).  Do airline tickets even come in these cool jackets anymore? 

Classic luggage claim tags, I do miss those.  None of these number work as Air California was bought by American Airlines in 1987.

The Camaro is tempting, but being 1974 I'll take the Monte Carlo.  Looks like our family was interested in Rite Way rental, Google AI has never heard of them but gives a reasonable explanation: "There is no information available about a company specifically named "Rite Way Car Rental" in 1974. It is possible that "Rite Way Car Rental" was a smaller, regional car rental company not mentioned in broader historical summaries of the industry in 1974."  - Erased from existence... 

I loved the red carbon paper the old airlines tickets used, dare I call it "iconic"

The Fantasy Motor Inn appears to be gone, the Castle Inn & Suites stands there now.  Here's how it used to look (Postcard link from MiceChat) $20.75 is equivalent to about $125 today so that seems about right. The motels cash register thinks its 1973.   What's the note about the Fun bus mean?

$54.72 to fly 3 people, round-trip Oakland to Santa Ana.  Interesting breakdown of the taxes, then each ticket with the tax added then totaled. Old school cross-checking!

Best Of Bonus Sunday - New upload

**The downloadable links have gone stale in my old posts, I am updating them one by one and the ones below are now available for download and housed on Google Drive.**

Originally posted September 19, 2010:

Welcome back to Bonus Sunday. Things have been rather busy here as summer winds down, but expect 

From the summer of 1967, this issue (Vol. 2 No.2) of Disney News is seriously "Disneyland" heavy with over half of the issue devoted to Disneyland. You may recognize the cover (which is pretty darn incredible huh?) its the same exact cover used on the summer 1967 issue of Vacationland (New Link) but ironically, this issue of Disney News is even better than the Vacationland.







Below are the pages that are about Disneyland, you can also get the entire issue here:


Disney News Summer 1967 - 81mb    <---New link










The Tomorrowland Terrance must have had its name finalized at the very last moment before the New Tomorrowland opened. Once again it's referred to as "Refreshment Gardens". Climate Controlled yet devoid of walls, it could only happen at Disneyland.

New Orleans Restaurants Lunch Authorization Slip & 1967 Ticket Book

Here's a rare vintage slip. Printed on Disneyland's "Star and Castle" safety paper, that dates this from mid 1966 to possibly early 1968. 

This looks like it might be one of those comp type tickets for PR purposes or for employees maybe? I bet the restaurants in early New Orleans Square were awesome. 

Interesting that its not New Orleans "Square"? did they run out of room or maybe this was early and "square" wasn't common yet? 

Here's a nice gently used ticket book from October 1967 featuring a Star and Castle paper ticket.  What a magical time to to be at the park, hence there is only one ticket left, but its still beautiful.

I'm all over the Swiss Family Tree House.  Now if only Tarzan would move out, oh wait...  Yes I pulled this ticket from the book where its been bound since 1967, it feels remarkably satisfying. 

In case you didn't know, this is a "coupon" and its good at any time during Disneyland's regular operating hours when ticket books are on sale.  Translation = It wasn't valid during special events.   

What a great line up of attractions, Tomorrowland '67 is calling me... 

This is a "Junior" admission ticket book, a price point that faded away many decades ago. $4 in 1967 adjusted for inflation is $38.50 in 2025. Hmmmm.

 

This never gets old...

In case you missed my post from 6,259 days ago, here's a whole lot a Star and Castle tickets (200th Post - Castle and Star Paper Madness)

Come back Sunday for: The Best of Bonus Sunday.

Magazine Monday: Holiday Inn Magazine - August 1965

Welcome to Magazine Monday. Well, yes its been a little while since I've done a blog post, but not much has changed since 2017 right?  Daily blog's will not be occurring, but expect another one in a few days. 

From August 1965 it's Holiday Inn Magazine... For Today's Traveler.  This appears to be the magazine you'd find in your hotel room. 

Did You Know...

Neato (crane shot?) photo of the Castle and crowd.

Decent 5 page article here. Lots of stats of the Park and Anaheim.  The Big Head Mad Hatter is always unsettling. 

Peak employment at the park occurred in 1964 at 4,426! Up from 1300 in 1955.

Cool update on all of the additions in Disneyland's first 10 years.   Let's all meet at the Coffee Host, its Out of this world!

Sea World is just a baby in 1965.  The little island and amphitheater are still there, sort of (Link) 

And how about some neat vintage advertisements?  In 2025 things still go better with an ice cold Coke. 

Free MapQuest service from Gulf, with their gas stations clearly marked of course.

This is technically an article but its also technically an ad.

JFG, never heard of it, it appears to be a commercial brand that's still around (Link).

.

The back cover has these awesome pastel color safety strips. I just moved into a mid-century house and I have the exact same bathtub, tile and fixtures! 

I wonder if anyone will see this?   If so, stay tuned for more.

A New Post! HISTORIC - RARE - MINT 1957 Disneyland pass handwritten & signed by Walt Disney!

Hello Everyone!  Well its been a while since we've had a new post so here goes.

I stumbled across this little gem on Ebay (link). Dated March 24, 1957, this complementary pass to Disneyland is reportedly signed by Walt Disney himself.

These early passes are not totally uncommon as they were available for purchase during the off seasons, here's a nice set from 1962 (link). The complementary ones are less common, one signed by Walt would be ultra-mega rare.

The eBay auction has a "Buy it Now" price for (are you sitting down?) $10,000!!!!  According to the seller "dated two years after the park opened in 1955...stamped .March 24, 1957 .....pass is made out to Robert Cobb....owner (now deceased) of the once very famous Brown Derby restaurant in Hollywood and creator of the world famous Cobb Salad. The name of Robert Cobb on the pass is entirely handwritten by Walt Disney and signed as well."

I'm no handwriting expert but this does look like other "real" signatures of Walt from the 1950's. What do you think?

Here's a check signed by Walt in 1956 (yours for only $2,895!! link) the signatures do look very similar...

The "F" Ticket repost

In June of 1959 Disneyland added the “E” ticket to its lineup of letter attractions tickets. The “E Ticket” has since become part of the American Lexicon. What's not as well know is that in the spring of 1964 Walt was looking for ways to increase Disneyland’s ticket revenue, that World’s Fair thing was costing him a bundle.

As was customary, Walt left the details to his trusted employees and they came up the idea of “plusing” all the existing E-ticket attractions at once and moving them to a new “F” Ticket. Rumor has it Walt was not keen on the use of the letter “F” (as in failure or worse) and the idea was quickly scrapped. What you are looking at here is an extremely rare June 1964 limited test run of Disneyland’s only “F” ticket.





*** Yes it's been three years since I did a post, the dog seriously ate my homework! I'll try and post more soon. ****