Disneyland celebrates its 59th birthday with plans for its 60th

July 17, 2014, 10:31 AM · The original Disneyland, in Anaheim, California, turns 59 years old today, and Disney marked the occasion with an announcement of a year-long "Diamond Celebration," starting in the spring of 2015, to celebrate the park's 60th birthday.

Disneyland Diamond Celebration logo

Disneyland's Twitter account introduced the #Disneyland365 hashtag, which it will use to note a daily "moment" from around the resort each day leading up to the 60th birthday on July 17, 2015.

And Disneyland will give away a trip to the Diamond Celebration kick-off, via an online photo contest. Readers can tag a photo of a past visit to Disneyland that they post to Twitter or Instagram with #Disneyland60Contest to enter. Disney will select finalists and readers of the Disney Parks Blog will pick the winner.

Update: So, Disney offered no announcement of the expected new parade or any other features of the Diamond Celebration, save the photo contest. But in the spirit of that, here are my two (and only two) 1960s and 1970s Disneyland photos:

Disneyland 1968
Chilling in a sweet Disneyland stroller in the late 1960s

Disneyland gear
At home, in full Disneyland gear in the early 1970s

Probably not gonna win with either of those. But good luck to all who enter!

Replies (7)

July 17, 2014 at 1:33 PM · "So, Disney offered no announcement of the expected new parade or any other features of the Diamond Celebration..."

But look on the bright side, they'll have Captain EO and the 55 year old subs reopening any day now.

Can you tell I'm over Disney?

July 17, 2014 at 1:46 PM · At least the diamond-covered castle should look nice.
July 17, 2014 at 6:24 PM · 59 years and still the second most popular theme park in America. What an amazing testament to the vision and greatness of Walt Disney and all the folks who have made this park a favorite for anyone with a love of imagination, story, and wonder.
July 17, 2014 at 6:52 PM · so if you don;t have a smart phone you are not eligible?
July 17, 2014 at 8:55 PM · You can use Twitter on computers and tablets as well as phones.
July 18, 2014 at 8:26 AM · Your Dad seems to be enjoying that ice cream bar, but bless her heart... your Mom looks exhausted! I have a lot of photos from vacations with the exact same look on my Mom's fact too.
July 18, 2014 at 2:04 PM · Actually, that's my grandfather behind me in both photos. It's my mother feeding me the ice cream in the top photo, and my grandmother obscured behind the Mickey ears in the bottom. (Which is a family in-joke, because she *always* was trying to hide from the camera.)

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