Walt Disney Family Museum

The Walt Disney Family Museum is an American museum that features the life and legacy of Walt Disney. The museum is located in The Presidio of San Francisco, part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area in San Francisco. The museum retrofitted and expanded three existing historic buildings on the Presidio’s Main Post. The Walt Disney Family Museum is a nonprofit organization and has been formally owned, operated, and funded by the Walt Disney Family Foundation, an entity established by Disney's heirs (including Disney's daughters Diane Disney Miller and Sharon Disney Lund). The main museum building is 40,000 square feet and uses the latest technology, historical materials, and artifacts to turn Disney's achievements into reality. The interactive gallery includes early paintings and animations, movies, music, listening stations, and a 12-foot diameter model of Disneyland. 🏆 The entrance hall displays 248 awards Disney received during his career, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom and many Academy Awards, including an honorary award for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, which includes a full-size Oscar and seven miniature Oscars (representing the seven dwarfs). 🏰Disneyland Model One of the many treasures in the Walt Disney Family Museum gallery is the stunning Disneyland model. The model is officially named "The Disneyland of Walt's Imagination" and the park is seen as a constantly changing vision of a living entity. Walt envisioned the park to be constantly updated and remodeled, reflecting the changing times and cultural ideas. The attractions shown on the model represent the time from the park's opening to the end of Walt's life. All the attractions seen on the model either appeared in Disneyland before Walt's death or at least appeared in the concept planning stage. The Miller family chose Kerner Optical (formerly the model shop of Lucasfilm's Industrial Light & Magic) to build the Disneyland model. Their past projects include milestone films from Star Wars and Indiana Jones to Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean. Tony Baxter recommended artist Nina Rae Vaughn to assist Kerner Optical's designers. Nina is the former concept design and illustration director of Walt Disney Imagineering, responsible for the fun maps of Disneyland's 40th and 50th anniversaries, and created original artwork for the model. The model makers used historical photos, antique paintings, sketches, and floor plans to start building different lands in a jigsaw-like manner. After 9 months of labor, the model was completed and reassembled in the museum. 🚂 The exhibits include a 1/8 scale model of the steam train Walt Disney built for himself. He named it "Lilly Belle" in honor of his wife Lillian. The train ran on a half-mile long track and circled his home on Holmby Hills. It was also at this time that he began to record the idea of "Mickey Mouse Park", where he would build a family park with a train station. In Disneyland, steam trains are not just a means of transportation. They are also an important element of the story, helping guests imagine themselves as part of American train travel in the early 20th century.