Walt Disney fans know that Marceline was a special place for Walt. He once wrote to the Marceline Newspaper “More things of importance happened to me in Marceline than have happened since – or are likely to in the future.” Disneyland’s Town Square and Main Street came from Walt’s memories of Marceline.
Disneyland and Walt Disney World are reasonably easy places to visit. There’s plenty of flights to Orange County and Orlando airports, lots of hotels, buses, car services, and more to see when you’re in those places. But if you’ve read and studied Walt’s life, you know it all started with a mouse in Marceline – Walt’s boyhood hometown.
If you’re from a big city (or even a medium sized city,) visiting Marceline is little bit of time travel. There’s no McDonald’s or Starbucks. The 3-blocks of Main Street USA really is small town America, perfectly imagined. And the people are wonderful. Any shop you stop in will find someone willing to visit and chat, and they’ll probably share their stories of Marceline. One of the amazing things about this little town is how many life-long residents there are there. Sure, plenty of people grow up and move to other places, but there’s a huge number of native-born locals who still live there and help run the community.
If you’re interested in a guided tour of Walt’s life in Kansas City and Marceline, check out www.AWalkInWaltsFootsteps.com for available dates, and to ask questions. Or, if you’re looking for an in-depth class about Walt Disney, Walt University holds multi-day classes in the heart of Marceline.
If you’re near Kansas City or St. Louis, Missouri, take the extra time to drive to the middle of northern Missouri. It’s a magical experience to visit the town – especially if you make the time to just sit on the benches along Main Street USA (without looking at your phone,) and listen, absorb, and imagine being there when Walt was a kid…
