Did you know that a town in Colorado served as the model for Disneyland’s (and the Magic Kingdom’s) Main Street USA? Fort Collins proudly embraces this heritage and it’s all because of Imagineer Harper Goff who was born in Fort Collins. Main Street USA also draws inspiration from Walt Disney’s hometown, Marceline, Missouri but the similarities to Fort Collins are uncanny. In fact records show that Goff went back to Fort Collins in the 1950’s explicitly for the purpose of building Main Street USA in the future Disneyland park. You can see in the pictures above many commonalities from the trolley all the way down to the look of the street lights.

Main Street USA the first thing guests see upon arrival to the parks and their last memory upon exit. It also serves as a route for parades and a backdrop for fireworks. However, when it was built back in the 1950’s it also helped Walt Disney fund his park. Walt looked to lease out space on Main Street USA to shops and restaurants to help raise money to build Disneyland. This made Main Street USA an even more functional town space than it is today. It seemed like Walt would take anyone’s money as there was even a “Wizard of Bras” lingerie shop by Hollywood- Maxwell Intimate Apparel Shop! The shop only lasted 6 months and is now Fargo’s Palm Parlor on Main Street Disneyland, but it is an interesting footnote in Disney History. In a funny coincidence, Mystique Lingerie and Awakening Boutique both operate in Old Town Fort Collins today.

Main Street USA is by no means a clone of Fort Collins, but instead draws on it for the look of a medium sized town in the heartland of America. Main Street USA was the type of place that would be familiar to anyone of that era, but of course now is frozen 70 years in the past. However, that may make it even more iconic today as a piece of history. The next time you’re in Fort Collins perhaps squint a little and imagine a castle at the end of the road as this was the place where some Disney magic was born.