Hill writes that the park called in 150 Anaheim and Fullerton police officers in full riot gear to control the 200 to 300 protesters who entered the park that day.
(Now, the only real restrictions on what you can’t wear to Disneyland are that you can’t wear anything profane, and you can’t dress in costume as an adult.)īecause of their extensive advance advertisement, the Yippies’ descent on Disneyland was known and anticipated by the park. At that time, miniskirts on women and long hair on men were not permitted. They were angry about Bank of America’s involvement in the park - a sponsor of Disneyland and supporter of the Vietnam War - but also about what they viewed as overly restrictive park rules, like the dress code. On that day, hundreds of Yippies walked through the gates of Disneyland, intent on having their voices heard. 6, 1970 marked the 25th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima by Allied forces in World War II. Their plan: a day full of “deliberately theatrical events, like a Black Panther’s hot breakfast at Aunt Jemima’s Pancake House,” as Jim Hill writes for Huffpost, “not to mention a Women’s Liberation-inspired moment when the female Yippies were to have gathered in Fantasyland to liberate Minnie Mouse.”Īug. So it might not surprise you that, when the Yippies set their sights on Disneyland, they employed similar tactics, attempting to take over the park and exorcise what they perceived were the ills of its corporate nature.ĭuring the summer of 1970, word started to spread of a Yippie gathering at Disneyland, called the International Yippie Pow Wow in the underground newspaper the Los Angeles Free Press. The Yippies, as they called themselves, employed more dramatic, attention-grabbing tactics to amplify their voices and have their protests heard. The Youth International Party was not your average group of young and angry political protesters, who were gathering by the hundreds of thousands in the late 1960s to voice their anger against the Vietnam War and what they felt was a too-restrictive societal structure. But there was another day, in 1970, when Disneyland was overtaken by protesters, whose number and fury - about Minnie Mouse and miniskirts - closed the park early. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, after the Northridge earthquake in 1994, and after 9/11. (Photo by Bettmann Archive/Getty Images) Bettmann/Bettmann Archiveīefore the pandemic shuttered Disneyland in March, there had only been a few days that the park had unplanned closures: the day after John F. About 300 hippies singing the Mickey Mouse Club song march with the Disneyland Band down the Main Street of the 'Magic Kingdom" as part of a "National Yippie Day." Police from several near-by cities were called in and as night fell six had been arrested and the park was being closed.
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