Real Fantasy Landscapes 1

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Chapter 7 -- Real Fantasy Landscapes commonly accepted, or even stereotypical, ideas of places. They create “temporary” cultural landscapes that are functionally placeless while convening a sense of place, giving fantasies creditability. The wealth created from the fantasy industries is disproportionally concentrated in real places, such as Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and Bel Air. With a median U.S. family income of only $46,326 and 94 percent of U.S. households earning less than $150,000 in 2005, the real landscapes of wealthy movie stars, executives, and others associated with the entertainment industries are truly fantasy places for the rest of the population. The ultimate culmination of turning celluloid fantasies into material realities occurred when Disney TV cartoon characters were combined with Hollywood fantasy sets to create “real” people and places in Disneyland and later in Disney World. Ironically, often people decide to turn their real towns into fantasy landscapes as they commerate, and often then, sell by-gone ethnicity and western frontier myths about cowboys and miners in historically accurate places like Western ghost towns. Fantasies employ ideas which can remain abstract or be expressed in material forms. Likewise, ideas inform behaviors without requiring real By definition, placelessness lacks distinctiveness; yet manufactured landscapes (although sometimes imagined ones), for example, reading distinctive places are characteristic of postmodern flatscapes, whether for books, watching TV, or producing movies. Yet other behaviors -- shopping or entertainment. In this postmodern era, real places are also vacationing, visiting places, or just passing through spaces -- require actual simultaneously being transformed into placelessness. The concept of landscapes (Figure 7-1). When fantasies take material forms, real fantasy placelessness and the resulting kinds of commercial and residential cultural landscapes appear in varying degrees of reality/fantasy. This chapter landscapes that emerged in the postmodern era were discussed in the examines the continuum of cultural landscape from reality to fantasy. How previous chapter. In this chapter, the concept of postmodern placelessness is have real places been turned into fantasy places, and how fantasy places extended to explicit fantasy landscapes. Three seemingly unconnected real have been turned into real ones? Exploring these themes is useful in their fantasy landscapes are compared and contrasted in this chapter: 1) own right but also, in contrast, enlightens the meanings of all North Hollywood, 2) Disneyland, and 3) Western Myths. The most obvious American cultural landscapes in general. examples of manufactured fantasy places are found in movies and television shows, both commonly require geographical settings. The creation of fantasy places in movies, in particular, requires real fantasy landscapes which in turn provide inspiration for other kinds of kinds o fantasy landscapes. To create these fantasies, the backlots of movie companies provide directors with the building blocks of cultural landscapes: appropriate vegetation, lighting, weather conditions, and buildings based on

Television is a powerful medium, influencing people’s perceptions and understandings especially because the average household views TV for eight hours daily (2005), with 26 percent of U.S. children watching four or more hours of television per day. The United States leads the world in the average daily household TV viewing; the second highest country, Turkey, views TV for 5 hours. And Canada, in contrast to its southern neighbor, averages only three hours of TV viewing. Long exposure to visually engaging material can turn fantasy into reality. For example, CBS eliminated poor people from their TV soaps because too many viewers sent food and clothing packages. Marcus Welby, MD -- a TV doctor -- received tens of thousands of letters asking for medical advice. About half the viewers of the TV show ER said they learned important health-care information from the program. Small town residents, who experienced little or no crime, named "crime in the streets" as the major problem in their communities based on TV shows. Visual media affects not only people’s attitudes towards other people and events but also to real places and

Figure 7-1. Types of real fantasy landscapes. Source: Ingolf Vogeler. landscapes. In The View from Sunset Boulevard, Ben Stein (1979) comments that "U.S. life on TV represents the distorted views of an elite of guilt-ridden Los Angeles-based writers and producers." Whether guiltridden Part I. Hollywood: Turning Entertainment Fantasies into Realities or not, the Hollywood entertainment industries create fantasies and need Hollywood’s nickname, Tinseltown, captures the essence not only landscapes to tell their stories. The movie and television industries, of the movie and television industries but also of the orchestrated public therefore, are powerful shapers of landscape likes and dislikes. lives and places of the stars, and less so, also of directors and producers. California’s Hollywood is where imagination and reality are Tinsel is defined as something that glitters like precious metal but has little expressed in real fantasy landscapes. At its core, Hollywood is the apex of worth; is showy, gaudy, and a splendid sham. As the industry likes to say the U.S. film, television, and music industries and its many associated “Hollywood is where dreams are made and stars are born” but it is also the studios. Its sphere of influence extends to historic pre-WWII movie theaters, place were far more often dreams are never fulfilled or even shattered, and and current studio tours and movie-based theme-ride parks. Farther afield, actors and actresses never make it to the “big league” and are glad to settle the domain of Hollywood includes the widely scattered mansions of the for B-movies. As a place for creating fantasies, Hollywood excels at stars and related-Hollywood elites in Beverly Hills and Bel Air, and the expressing U.S. cultural ideals and myths, like the American Dream and the commercial areas of The Sunset Strip and the most spectacularly expensive American Way of Life, both of which promulgate the idea that “you can be shopping street of Rodeo Drive (Figure 7-2). anything you want,” and if you don’t achieve your dream, it is your fault. In the 1910s, motion picture companies from New York and New The movies and television shows allow the American Dream to be Jersey started moving to Southern California for environmental advantages: actualized, at least during the length of the show and in the imagination of moderate, dry, and sunny Mediterranean climate, variety of natural scenery viewers thereafter. (ocean, beaches, grasslands, deserts, and mountains), and lots of natural lighting -- the best source of illumination for movie production then.

Hollywood's first film studio opened in 1911. Already by the 1920s, Source: Ingolf Vogeler. Hollywood became saturated with so many film studios that many production companies built lots in West Los Angeles, Culver City, and the The make-up industry developed out of the movie industry. The San Fernando Valley. As the film industry grew during the 1920s and illusion of personally looking good fits the industry’s make-believe. Max 1930s, banks, restaurants, clubs, and movie palaces were built in the Factor invented the first make-up used in a motion picture and invented lip classical Beaux Arts style but more colorful and decorative styles were also gloss, pancake make-up, and false eyelashes. Subsequently, the products used. The Spanish Colonial Revival style reflected Hollywood's that were used to make movie actors look artificially good on the screen selfconscious extravagance whereas the Art Deco and Moderne styles were also used by ordinary women to look like “stars,” negating their own expressed the community's sense of glamour and sophistication. The Max beauty and “putting on a show.” Although the Max Factor building has now Factor building is a striking example of this era (Figure 7-3). been turned into the Hollywood History Museum, the original lobby and several make-up rooms have been preserved. Hollywood is one of several media that set the standards of good looks, especially for women. The idealized images of women on the screen become standards by which ordinary women judge themselves. Cosmetic plastic surgery is the ultimate make-over to “improve” lips, hips, enlarge and reshape breasts, remove fat, “tummy tuck,” and hair replacements. The world-renowned Beverly Hills Institute of Aesthetic and Reconstructive Surgery is one of many such centers to “improve” the looks of stars and the wealthy, and increasingly even ordinary people who reportedly sometimes even borrow money for these procedures.

Figure 7-2. Major elements of the real fantasy landscapes of Hollywood.

creating real fantasy landscapes. Initially, only the tours of the movie facilities at Universal Studios attracted tourists. The making of movies usually takes place indoors and outdoors. Although 85 percent of all "shooting" takes place inside movie studios, called frontlots, backlots provide the outside physical setting for the "action." Topographic maps clearly show the distinction between frontlots and backlots in the studios: the former appear as solid black shapes and the latter as outlined shapes with lots of roads and several lakes (Figure 7-5). Similar patterns are found at other studios (Figure 7-6). Filming outside, whether on backlots or “on location,” is far more difficult, unpredictable, and expensive than shooting in the controlled indoor environments of the studios. Nevertheless, movies in particularly, as opposed to many television shows that are set indoors, are invariably set in “real” landscapes. Many of the elements of real cultural landscapes are used to create landscapes in the backlots for films. Movie makers take cultural landscapes seriously. They select Figure 7-3. The Art Deco (1935) Max Factor building in Hollywood. appropriate vegetation (palm trees or deciduous and evergreen tress), night Source: Ingolf Vogeler. or day settings, weather conditions (sunshine, rain, thunder, lighting, or snow storms), topographic sites (sandy deserts, rugged mountains, or hilly In the 1960s music recoding studios moved to Hollywood. And farmland), and building types (by uses and architectural styles) in which while much of the former movie industry has left Hollywood, many their stories unfold. independent studios remained. In addition, a disproportional number of Los Angeles metropolitan FM and AM stations broadcast from Hollywood studios.

Motion Picture and Television Studios After seeing movies and television shows, many viewers want to see how films are made and be part of TV shows as well as see their favorite “stars;” thus, the making of visual entertainment becomes an attraction for its own sake. Of the 18 movie and 11 television studios in the Los Angeles area, seven still give tours to tourists. Universal Studios Hollywood is one of the oldest (1964) most popular of the studio tours (millions visit each year) with over 500 outdoor sets and facades used for locations in movies set in the Old West, New York, and Europe. This and other studios illustrate the interconnection between fantasy and reality in

Figure 7-5. Universal City with the Universal Studios in 1966 and with 1972 (purple) additions. The theme-ride park and CityWalk (1993) were added later. Source: Burbank Quadrangle 1:24,000.

Figure 7- . Universal Studios: potted plants on the backlot. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Universal Studios also allowed visitors to experience weather: a rain storm in Old Mexico, albeit in Hollywood style -- safe and dry. With thunder in the background, a make-believe rain storm pumped water on a cobble-stone Mexican street where the run-off tipped over a tree, falling towards but not on top of the tourist tram (Figure 7- ). As the trams left, the tree was hydraulically erected again and the water was pumped to the top of the hill; ready for the whole scene to be repeated for the next tram! Such tame effects from 1970s movies have been replaced more recently with Figure 7-6. Four movie and television studios with their backlots and violent ones, such as “8.5-magnitude earthquakes,” escaped dinosaurs, and Forest Lawn Cemetery (lower right-hand corner) where some of the the “still-smoldering” movie set from Spielberg’s War of the Worlds. Hollywood stars are buried. Source: Burbank Quadrangle 1:24,000. Backlots are mainly filled with different kinds of buildings used in Because plants are critical definers of places, indicating climatic conditions hundreds of films and TV shows. The designs and conditions of the and cultural meanings, a wide variety of vegetation (trees, shrubs, and façadebuildings are designed to evoke place recognition and emotional flowers) is available on the backlots for movie making (Figure appeal. Western shot-outs require different scenery from a Midwestern 7- ). courthouse square or a Louisiana riverboat setting (Figure 7- ). Universal Studios Hollywood (2007) says that you can “see incredibly realistic backlot shooting sets -- you won’t believe they are just facades” (Figure 7- ). This movie-set “façade architecture” later influenced commercial architecture across North America and even inspired “fake” replica of itself, the Hollywood Pictures Backlot, one of 30 attractions at the 55-acre Disney’s California Adventure, next to Disneyland.

Figure 7- . Universal Studios: tram touring the “Mexican village” in a “rain storm” on the backlot. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. Figure 7- . Universal Studios: tram touring the backlot with the Lakeside Golf Club in the background. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

In addition to the movie and television studios themselves and the backlot studio tours, Universal Studios Hollywood now includes two more spin-offs: a theme-ride park and an entertainment-shopping streetscape, called CityWalk (Figure 7-diagram). The movies and television shows create the viewing audience who want to see and experience what they saw at home. Universal’s successful movies provide the raw materials for creating landscapes in their three themed places -- all in an area only 0.46 miles by 0.32 miles. Universal Studios has turned the settings and actions of movies into a theme park of 14 high-energy, noisy, and scary rides. And to Figure 7- . Universal Studios: backlot façade, or false-front, architecture. complete the circle of “entertainment,” Universal Studios created a safe Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. pseudo-urban retail space, called CityWalk, where you can do 65 “cool things,” among them eat at 13 restaurants and 14 fast food places, listen to music and see movies in nine entertainment places (including 18 different theaters inside the giant Universal Studio Cinemas alone), and shop in nine retail stores. Over eight million people a year visit CityWalk, which was designed by Jon Jerde, who also designed the postmodern Minneapolis Mall of America.

Figure 7- . The interrelationships The success of the fantasy-based Universal Studios Hollywood between imagination landscape, which was at least based on the local motion picture industry, has and real fantasy been reproduced in places totally unrelated to the movie industry: Orlando, landscapes in Florida (where the studio tours were included initially but were quickly Universal Studios abandoned), and then Osaka, Japan, and Singapore (by 2010). As illustrated Hollywood. Source: by this example, real fantasy landscapes are ultimately placeless places, Ingolf Vogeler. anchored only in the minds of people who become manipulators of their own manipulated experiences, first at home in their movie theaters and then at Universal Studios. Outside the studios, Los Angeles also became famous for its many examples of 1930s signature architecture, buildings shaped like the products they sold. By the 1950s signature architecture had influenced suburban strip mall architecture across the country, especially the mass fastfood franchise industry. For example, in the original McDonald’s restaurants, customers walked through the Golden Arches (representing a huge M). The colorful and outrageous signature architecture of CityWalk is reminiscent of those earlier times, but this time restricted to one safe entertainment site: a giant orange slice marks L.A. Juice, a huge copper pot hangs above the door to P.T. Copperpot, a 1957 Chevy sticks in the roof of Hollywood FreeZway, a crashed flying saucer protrudes from the roof of Things From Another World, and a wave machine creates artificial surf in front of Malibu Ranch. Although less dramatic architecturally, many historic downtown streets across the United States and Canada have been transformed in varying degrees to postmodern pedestrian malls, sometimes completely closed to traffic or other times allowing only city bus traffic. Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade is a well-known example of a real pedestrian mall in Los Angeles, contrasting with the fake CityWalk. The Promenade has a wide range of historic (real) renovated shops, mostly upscale, but also book stores, antique stores; and cafes, restaurants, comedy clubs, and 17 movie screens. And yet, here as elsewhere in so much of upscale Los Angeles, spotting famous and well-known Hollywood stars is what makes even this Figure 7- .Citywalk at Universal Studios Hollywood. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. real place part of the real fantasy landscapes of Hollywood. Illusions, an erroneous perception of reality, create realities which in turn create more illusions -- resulting in endlessly re-enforcing cycles of

entertainment. The movie and television industries have even “place” or set own theaters and show only movies from their own studios; thus ended the many of their own movies and TV shows in the very places in which the Golden Age of Hollywood. Several of the theaters from this era however entertainment is made, i.e., Los Angeles and Southern California. From the have survived and have been restored, such as El Capitan Theatre, Egyptian 1920s to 2000s, 233 films and countless TV shows have been set in Los Theatre, Pacific Theater, and Silent Movie Theatre. Grauman's Chinese Angeles alone, with a marked increase in films (over 20) starting in the Theatre is the most famous. It opened in 1927 with the original film King of 1970s (Wikipedia 2007). Examples are L.A. Without a Map, L.A. Story, and Kings. The fantastic Chinese-like architecture on the outside continues the Sunset Boulevard. Two very place-specific TV shows were The Fresh fantasy of the places shown in the movies inside (Figure 7- ). Prince Of Bel-Air, a poor Black relative from Philadelphia stays with a This section of Hollywood Boulevard attracts over nine million wealthy Black family living in Bel Air, and The Beverly Hillbillies (from tourists each year in part because of the Hollywood Walk of Fame with its 1962-1971), an Appalachian mountain family who moves to Beverly Hills. more than 2,000 five-pointed stars imbedded in sidewalks with the names of The main street through Hollywood neighborhoods, Sunset celebrities honored by the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce for their Boulevard, has itself become part of the Hollywood legend, and thus has contributions to the entertainment industries. The Walk of Fame was created inspired many songs, movies, and TV shows. The movie Sunset Boulevard in 1958 and the first star honored Joanne Woodward in 1960; the last one was made in 1950. In the 1960s, the street was immortalized in a television (2,327) was for Donald Trump in 2007. By 1978 the City of Los Angeles series, 77 Sunset Strip. The final scene in Woody Allen's 1977 comedy, had designated the Walk of Fame as a Cultural-Historic Landmark. Annie Hall, was filmed at a sidewalk café on The Strip. In the 1970s, disco Although Hollywood's long decline started in the 1930s with the departure singers sang about life On Sunset, where there were "limousines to hide the of a few movie studios, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce advertised stars, tinted glass to hide the scars." In 1985, Don Henley, founder of the Hollywood as a tourist destination in its own right. By 1991, renovation and Eagles, recorded a song about life at The Sunset Grill. In 1990s, the Sunset large-scale entertainment projects were being built or planned: El Capitan Boulevard musical was created; a TV show was named Below Sunset; and Theater, Pacific Theater, Max Factor building, 36 other renovations, and 69 The Eagles' biggest-selling album, Hotel California, featured a photo of the new developments. The heavily government subsidized tourist Beverly Hills Hotel on Sunset Boulevard. All these references and scenes to redevelopment of Hollywood contrasts sharply with the adjacent decaying Sunset Boulevard became appealing tourist destinations themselves, further area. Indeed, "Hollywood has become a theme park feeding on its own adding to the complexity of real fantasy landscapes. culture industry" (Shiel and Fitzmaurice 2001). In 1985, the Hollywood Boulevard was officially listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Commercial Districts: Hollywood and Sunset Boulevards, and Rodeo Drive The wealth and distinctiveness of Hollywood are expressed in expensive real commercial fantasy landscapes. Hollywood Boulevard, centered at Grauman's Chinese Theatre and the Hollywood Wake of Fame, is the most touristic commercial district of the real fantasy landscapes. With the end of the silent film era in 1927, five major Hollywood movie studios (Paramount, RKO, 20th Century Fox, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and Warner Bros.) owned and operated large, spectacular movie theaters throughout the country. In 1948, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that movie studios could not

In the Beverly Hills section of Sunset Boulevard, movie stars and other Hollywood celebrities come to be seen at the many well-known restaurants, including Chasen's, Trader Vic's, The Grill, Jimmy's, Planet Hollywood, and Spago. Beverly Hills also has posh hotels, such as the Beverly Hills Hotel, “The Pink Palace” with the fabled Polo Lounge (Figure 7- ), and the Beverly Wilshire. The 59th Annual Golden Globe Awards were held at the Beverly Hills Hilton where the stars of the television and motion picture industries showed off their glamorous life styles. The wealth of Hollywood is reflected in luxury automobile dealerships (Figure 7- ). Cars in the ultra-luxury category usually have 12cylinder engines and cost more than $100,000, which assures exclusivity, status, and attention for their owners. Car makes in this high-end are Rolls Royce, Bentley, Maserati, Maybach, Lamborghini, and Bugatti. Upgraded versions of Mercedes-Benz S500, BMW 750, Porsche GT3, and Audi R8 are also included in this high status category. Volkswagen Phaeton W12 and Toyota

Figure 7- . The Grauman's Chinese Theatre and the Hollywood Walk of Century (JDM) are also ultra luxury vehicles but not manufactured by Fame on Hollywood Boulevard. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. luxury car manufacturers. Many of these ultra-luxury models are almost or completely hand-built. In a mass-production society, high-priced hand-made things become the ultimate expression of wealth; thus, unattainable for the Continuing to the west of Hollywood Boulevard is Sunset rest of the society and rendered fantasyful. Ultra-luxury car dealers are Boulevard, one of the most famous streets in North America, expressing the found in the many high-income communities of greater Los Angeles. West affluence and exuberance of the entertainment industries. Luxury shopping Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and Bel Air have their share of such dealerships: and expensive services along Sunset abound in Beverly Hills: 300 luxury three for Rolls Royce; four for boutiques, 23 certified plastic surgeons, and two salons only specializing in Bentley; and two each for Maserati, Maybach, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, eyebrows. “Hair guru” Jose Eber’s opulent beauty parlor in Beverly Hills Audi, and Ferrari; and one for BMW. Here you can find dealers with "by illustrates the affluence of retailing here. A vast series of mirrors, lights, and appointment only" signs who sell $300,000 Bentleys. California had the softly whirring blow-dryers resemble a futuristic spaceship. Celebrity largest number of new registered Rolls-Royces (Florida was next), customers such as model Farrah Fawcett, singer Cher, actress Elizabeth accounting for 35 percent and Los Angeles, and particularly the wealthy Taylor, singer Barbra Streisand, movie star Meg Ryan Hair, and many communities of West Los Angeles, contributed mightily to this total (Kratz others pay $300 just for a hair cut. But this hair dresser also gives advice to and Burke 2007). women who seek help with their lives and their problems: 15-minutes for $175. In the rest of the United States, therapists or priests would perform this function. Even the Beverly Hills Police Department is into “style,” winning awards four times since 1989 for its fashionable uniforms (Steinmetz 2000).

pooches could possibly want.” Services range from aromatherapy grooming and massage therapy to off-premises physical training, socialization

Figure 7- . Beverly Hills Hotel: an actual and virtual Hollywood landmark. Figure 7- . Sunset Boulevard super-luxury car dealer with a Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. characteristically huge billboard in the background. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

And then there are the luxury boutique pet shops and pet sitting programs, and animal communication by psychics. Dogs with designer services. In Hollywood, cats and dogs have as many services as humans, tastes can enjoy an array of high-end products, from organic treats, including pet grooming, medicine, holistic food, herbs, vitamins, toys, pet seasonally correct collars (leather for winter, fabric for summer), and sitters, massage therapists, doggie shrinks, party planners, and holistic imported beds from Australia. Professional pet sitter Aunt Toby will do doctors. Sparky's in Beverly Hills, for example, even has an on-site bakery everything from walking dogs to cooking and serving them special meals, for pet treats. Organic products, massages, and other exotic products are bathing them in bubble bath, or just watching TV with them. She gets $12 to commonly available. A former television producer became a mobile pet $20 for a walk and up to $50 for an overnight stay. Other pet sitters can groomer, providing aromatherapy massage with tea tree oil and cooling bath charge up to $145 for overnighters, depending on what is involved and the with foaming mousse for the dogs of such stars as Candice Bergen. Some size of the animal. Dogs can even have weddings. Hollywood Hounds, a dogs get washed every week (Steinhauer 2007). In Beverly Hills, dogs walk Westside pet concierge, specializes in doggy parties and even weddings. around in Louis Vuitton ($1,000 each), Gucci, Paul Smith, Tiffany, or “Muttrimony” are held in gazebos with wedding cakes and white Rolls Burberry pet carriers and with dog leashes and collars ($1,500) from Pet Royces delivering the “bride and groom” to the event. And for “Jewish” Jewelry Beverly Hills. dogs, “Barkmitzvahs” is available with kosher food, rabbi, and special Pet hotels or daycare spas indulge animals in the good life. The music. Birthday parties for dogs are also popular, costing $250 for two high-end doggie spa of Chateau Marmutt in West Hollywood provides hours (Talbert 2000). West Los Angeles has at least 19 such pet services stressed pooches with everything that “self-actualized, upwardly mobile and 20 veterinarians. One veterinary service does house calls for routine medical pet care.

Billboards are another distinctive feature of Sunset Boulevard. Huge, custom-made, and unique billboards appeared in the 1960s. In the past, mammoth billboards were hand-painted to advertise new movies, television shows, and music records and to get the attention of Hollywood producers and deal-makers as they drove to work in Hollywood from their homes in Beverly Hills (Figure 7- 1980s). The billboards also feed the egos of stars; hence, the industry calls these billboards Vanity Boards. For a long time, the most famous image was the Marlboro man with smoke coming out of his mouth. In the 1990s, billboards covered the windowless sides of whole buildings, often now advertising non-Hollywood products such as clothing and cars (Figure 7-2 005). Video billboards are a recent addition.

Figure 7- . Free-standing and building billboards on Sunset Strip in 2005. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

The best known portion of the 20-mile Sunset Boulevard is the 1.5 mile stretch between Hollywood and Beverly Hills, called Sunset Strip (Figure 7-1st map). Upscale boutiques, restaurants, rock clubs, and Hollywood nightspots are concentrated here, where being “seen” is more important than the food and drinks. At night, the Strip is especially vibrant with gaudy neon signs, heavy car traffic of young cruisers (especially on weekends), and crowds of people-watchers and celebrity wannabes (Figure 7-old world).

Figure 7- . Huge billboard lined Sunset Strip in the 1980s. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Two Rodeo on the new (1990) Via Rodeo Drive, re-creates an illusionary historic European curved street (only 410 feet long) with cobblestones, classic architectural styles, archways, and fountains (Figure 7- ). Of course, valet parking is available for shoppers. The 24 clothing and jewelry boutiques and restaurants on this short street resemble an upscale version of Universal's CityWalk or an urbane version of Disneyland’s New Orleans Square. The street is filled with designer clothing shops like Armani, Gucci, and Coco Chanel; jewelry stores like Cartier, Tiffany, and Harry Winston; and the most expensive store in the world: Bijan, where shopping is by appointment only. With a pair of socks costing $50 and a suit costing $15,000, spending $100,000 at Bijan is common. The status and fame of Rodeo Drive has spread to Seoul, South Korea, where the nouveaux rich indulge themselves buying luxury foreign brands at exorbitant prices along their own Rodeo Drive, a deliberate copy from Beverly Hills. In true Hollywood fashion, Rodeo Drive even has its own version Figure 7- . "Old World" restaurant -- hardly; such a place is in Europe -- of the Hollywood Walk of Fame: the Rodeo Drive Walk of Style, where but in fantasy places like Sunset Boulevard, anything goes! Photo: Ingolf sidewalk plaques honor contributors to the world of entertainment through Vogeler. fashion. In summary, all the fantastic characteristics of Rodeo Drive express par excellence postmodern landscapes, albeit as a very expensive and What Sunset Strip is to restaurants and nightclubs, Rodeo Drive in exclusive elite version -- so typical of the real fantasy landscapes of Beverly Hills is to expensive shopping. This three-block street is the most Hollywood. expensive, famous, and architecturally distinctive shopping street in North The artificiality of Beverly Hills is also expressed by the absence America (Figure 7-2). Rodeo Drive is the center of the Golden Triangle, of “ugly” urban lands; these are relegated to other Los Angeles formed by Wilshire Boulevard on the south and North Santa Monica communities. Beverly Hills has no factories, billboards, McDonald's, Boulevard and North Crescent Drive on the north. Here is where the rich cemeteries, hospitals, and funeral homes. But it does have three times the and famous shop, and almost all the tourists only window-shop! Rodeo percent of information, professional, and scientific sector employment boutiques sell everything from designer revolvers to cashmere-and-mink compared to all of California. And although Beverly Hills is 86 percent blankets. The Rodeo Drive Merchant’s Association estimates that 50 White, it has a disproportionally large percentage of wealthy, upper-class percent of all merchandise is of European origin or design. Some shops even foreigners, many of whom have fled political and economic instability in serve their customers espresso and white wine. Rodeo Drive is distinguished their home countries. In 2007, residents using bilingual English-Farsi ballots from other expensive shopping streets, such as the Magnificent Mile on elected the first Iranian mayor, reflecting the large and influential Iranian North Michigan Avenue in Chicago and Fifth Avenue in New York City, by immigrant community. its architecturally exuberance and flamboyance. This is another spectacular example of the real fantasy landscapes of Hollywood. Befitting a real fantasy landscape, the latest shopping experience,

Figure 7- . The mansions of the “stars” are concentrated in the separate municipality of Beverly Hills and in adjacent Bel Air, a part of Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Vogeler with help from Brady Foust, based on data from Seeing-Stars 2007. Figure 7- . “Two Rodeo” shopping street. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. After seeing their stars in movies, on television, and at live Residential Districts: Movie Star Mansions concerts, tourists come to Hollywood to visit the hundreds of past and The wealth and distinctiveness of Hollywood is also expressed in current homes of movie stars, TV personalities, and famous musicians. real residential fantasy landscapes. Because as Barbara Rubin (1979) says: Their grand mansions line such streets in Beverly Hills as Roxbury Drive, “those that make taste [visual entertainment in the case of Hollywood] make Carolwood Drive, Bedford Drive, Crescent Drive, and Benedict Canyon money and those that make money make taste.” Consequently, the stars and Drive (Figure 7-1st map). For well over 30 years, several companies have the associated well-paid supporting staffs of the Hollywood entertainment published and sold maps of suggested self-guided driving routes to visit the industries live disproportionally in the posh residential neighborhoods of stars (400 in one edition) in Hollywood, Hollywood Hills, West Hollywood, West Los Angeles: Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Brentwood, and Malibu. Of the Trousdale, Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Brentwood, Malibu, and Malibu Beach 297 past and present addresses of movie, television, and music “stars” listed (Figure 7-tour map). Tour buses also show tourists where the stars live(d). on the Seeing-Stars in Hollywood web site (2007), 50 percent lived in For the serious entertainment buffs, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts Beverly Hills and Bel Air, another 25 percent were concentrated in West and Sciences is located in Beverly Hills. Fourteen million tourists each year Hollywood, Los Angeles, and Malibu (Figure 7-star map). come to see the homes of the “famous” people who work in the movie, TV, and music industries in Beverly Hills and Bel Air (Figure 7-2 photos houses). Sports stars, business tycoons, lawyers, and doctors also live in these two communities.

Befitting a real fantasy landscape, it is reproduced out of its own concentrated in West Los Angeles in the northwest and in the horse country original imaginary and geographic context. At Disney-MGM Studios in of Palos Verdes Estates and Rancho Palos Verdes in the southwest (Figure Orlando, FL, a truly artificial Hollywood Boulevards leads to all the 7-LAincome map). When the Internal Revenue Service adjusted gross attractions, among them the Studio Backlot Tour, Star Tours, and Sunset incomes were mapped by zip codes in Los Angeles, the highest returns were Boulevard. strikingly concentrated in the Hollywood communities of Universal City, Beverley Hills, Bel Air, and Malibu (Figure 7-zip code map).

Figure 7- . Former home of Dean Martin in Beverly Hills. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figure 7- . A portion of a souvenir map of starland estates and mansions. Source: Welton 1977.

Hollywood and wealth are synonymous. In 2000, the median family income in Beverly Hills was $102,611 whereas in the City of Los Angeles it was $39,942 and in Los Angeles County, $46,452. The highest median family income block groups in the Los Angeles area were

Figure 7- . Former home of Diana Ross in Bel Air. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figure 7- . Median family income by block groups in Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Vogeler, based on data from the 2000 U.S. Census.

of Bel Air appeals to the exclusivity of fame and wealth that is Hollywood (Figure 7-close-up census map).

Figure 7- . The highest incomes by zip codes for Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Figure 7- . Mansion on the flats in Beverly Hills. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler with help from Brady Foust, based on data from Mongabay 2007. Vogeler.

West Los Angeles, and Beverly Hills in particular, are not The Prudential California Realty (2007) listed 169 single family uniformly wealthy, but family incomes and house values generally houses for sale in Beverly Hills in the last two weeks of February 2007. correspond to topography. The wealthiest families live on cul-de-sacs and House values ranged from $31 million to $599,000. Houses south of North curved roads in the wooded hills north of Sunset Boulevard of Beverly Hills Santa Monica Boulevard (zip codes 90211 and 90212) were around and Bel Air (homes ranging from $600,000 to $30 million) -- above the air $600,000 whereas those in the curved streets northward but south of Sunset pollution of Los Angeles. The less wealthy, but still rich, live on the Boulevard were higher priced; and the highest values were in the hilly areas palmlined grid streets on the flat land south of Sunset, and especially south north of Sunset (zip code 90210). The zip codes in the hills of Beverly Hills of Santa Monica Boulevard (Figure 7-house photo). The television series had twice the average house values and incomes of the zip codes in the Beverly Hills 90210 (1990-2000) made this U.S. postal zip code famous, flatter areas (Figure 7-modern house). The 2007 median house value in although the West Beverly Hills High School was fictional! Here the truly Beverly Hills was $2,299,990. Even in the high priced housing market of wealthy families live but Beverly Hills also has two less wealthy and southern California, the median house value in Los Angeles was only prestigious zip codes: 90211 and 90212. Furthermore, the gated community $392,066.

Venetian palaces, and classical French mansions. Many have 10-car garages, several kitchens, and over 4,000 square foot bedrooms suites -- almost twice the size of the average U.S. house! The average income of the rich 2,585 families here was $4,642,1661 (Steinmetz 2000).

Figure 7- . Highest median family income block groups in West Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Vogeler, based on data from the 2000 U.S. Census.

Of the 847 block groups in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, all Figure 7- . Modernistic mansion on the flats in Beverly Hills. Photo: Ingolf 14 block groups with 85 to 100 percent of the houses valued $1 million or Vogeler. more in 2000 were found in the hills of West Los Angeles (Figure 7-map). Interestingly, the highest median asking price for houses ($1 million) was Topographic maps identify wealthy areas (Figure 7-topo map). greatest in the block groups just north of the highest valued houses, i.e., in House symbols of mansions are much larger and irregular than conventional the 45 to 85 percent blocks (blue areas on the map). Almost all the houses in houses, shown simply as squares. Unfortunately, no symbols are used for the hills of Beverly Hills sold for more than $10 million. A typical example swimming pools and tennis courts on topographic maps. Air photos provide was the $29 million mansion with 10 bedrooms, 15 bathrooms, 40foot high a better way of identifying wealthy neighborhoods. The air photo of the entry, huge living room, and a two-story paneled library on six acres. The houses identified with the red box in Figure 7-topo map shows that almost down payment was $5.8 million and monthly mortgage payments might be every mansion has a swimming pool and three have tennis courts (Figure $140,000 -- more than three times the U.S. median family income! In the 7air photo). secluded 200-acre real estate development of North Beverly Park, houses start at $8 million and resemble Tuscan villas,

Figure 7- . Mansions in the hills of Bel Air in 1995. The Beverly Glen Highway, also called Brown Canyon, is the main road traversing the map. Source: Beverly Hills Quadrangle 1:24,000. The 12 mansions identified in Figure 7-air photo ranged from $1.51 million to $11.5 million and averaged $5.34 million on large lots, from 0.61 to 4.6 acres (Zillow 2007). Although the average size of new houses in the United States increased from about 1,100 square feet in the 1940s and 1950s to 2,340 square feet in 2002, the houses here are especially large, ranging from 3,225 to 13,212 square feet. And the number of garages increased rapidly too. In 1967, 48 percent of new single-family houses had two or more garages; by 2002, the percentage had increased to 82. In addition, 84 percent of the houses in Figure 7-Zillowmap had swimming pools and 25 percent had tennis courts. On average, these houses were situated on a 1.52-acre lot and had 5,674 square feet of house space with a total of 14 rooms (of which four were bedrooms) and five bathrooms (one house had 10) (Figure 7-diagram on Zillow). Of the ten highest states with

Figure 7- . Percent of houses valued at $1 million or more by block groups houses valued $1 million or more that were sold in 2006, California and in Western Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Vogeler, based on data from the Florida out ranked the other states by a wide margin with 107 and 83, 2000 U.S. Census. respectively. In fact, California alone accounted for 20 percent of the sale of such expensive, luxury houses (Kratz and Burke 2007). The name “Beverly Hills” has become such a popular symbol for wealth and high status that 87 official place names of settlements, churches, schools, parks, cemeteries, and trails use this name in 23 U.S. states and Porto Rico (GNIS 2007). Thousands of businesses use Beverly Hills in their names across the United States, over 20 alone in Chicago from car washes, jewelry stores, churches, tennis clubs, and art galleries. The largest houses, as measured by the percent of houses with five or more bedrooms, were disproportionally concentrated in the hills of West Los Angeles, particularly in Beverly Hills and Bel Air. Figure 7- shows that 74 to 40 percent of all houses had five or more bedrooms in these communities. The median number of bedrooms for the Los Angeles metropolitan area was only three.

Figure 7- . Mansions on the Bel Air Place cul-desac (left) and Bel Air Road. Circles indicate street and house gates and arrow shows view across the

Figure 7- . Street gate to Bel Air Place. Source: Ingolf Vogeler. canyon - illustrated below. Source: Google Earth 2007.

Figure 7- . Hedges, walls, and gate for one house on Bel Air Place.

Source: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figure 7- . Secluded mansions across the canyon from Bel Air Place. Source: Ingolf Vogeler.

Chapter 7 -- Real Fantasy Landscapes 21

Figure 7- . Characteristics of wealthy houses on Bel Air Place and Bel Air Road, Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Vogeler based on data from Zillow 2007.

Chapter 7 -- Real Fantasy Landscapes 22

exclusivity of occurrence and access are mere fantasies for almost everybody elsewhere. Thus, the real fantasy landscapes of Hollywood are manufactured. With 6,490 golf courses in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, golf courses are not as diagnostic a feature of wealthy communities in sunny Southern California as they are in northern regions. West Hollywood, Beverly Hills, and Bel Air do have 10 private golf courses and six country clubs. In other wealthy communities such as the Northshore communities of Chicago, the concentration of golf courses and country clubs is far more pronounced and therefore indicative of wealthy areas, as is illustrated by the topographic map exercise in Chapter 9. Cemeteries are another element of the real fantasy landscapes of Hollywood. Stars are buried in 15 cemeteries in the Los Angeles area (Figure 7-map). The Hollywood Memorial Park, west of Highway 101 on Santa Monica Boulevard, is probably the most famous cemetery for the Figure 7- . Percent of houses with five or more bedrooms by block groups history of Old Hollywood. Over 1,000 film industry personalities and in West Los Angeles. Source: Ingolf Vogeler, based on data from the 2000 musicians have been documented in this cemetery, including Rudolph U.S. Census. Valentino, Douglas Fairbanks, Nelson Eddy, Peter Lorre, Janet Gaynor, Tyrone Power, and Clifton Webb (Scott 2007). Appropriately enough, the The extremely high values of family incomes, house values, house cemetery sits next to the Paramount studios (Figure 7-photo & topo). The sizes, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, and the spectacular topographic concentration of Hollywood stars is particularly striking in the Westwood sites highlight the peculiarity of Beverly Hills and adjacent Bel Air cemetery (Figure 7-map). Contrary to the affluence, glamour, and compared with the rest of Los Angeles, Southern California, and almost all exuberance of the stars when they were alive, their tombstones are rather other places in the United States. The mass consumption of fantasy ordinary and real like other people’s grave markers. The graves of some landscapes in the movies and on television, which are often placed in stars do reflect their wealth, but again much like other wealthy people postmodern placeless settings, produces ironically the wealth that allows (Figure 7-fairbanks). real distinctive places to be constructed in only a few places, which in their

Figure 7 - . Air photo a nd topographic versions of Hollywood Forever Memorial Park and Paramount Studios. Source: Google Earth and Hollywood Quadrangle, 1:24,000.

Figure 7- . Cemeteries with buried Hollywood stars in the greater Los Angeles area. Source: Ingolf Vogeler, based on data from Seeing-Stars 2007.

Figure 7- . The grave of Douglas Fairbanks Sr. and Jr. in Hollywood Forever Memorial Park. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. Figure 7- . Hollywood star burial sites in the Westwood Memorial Park. Map source: Seeing-Stars 2007; photos: Ingolf Vogeler. Part II. Disneyland and Disney World: Turning TV Fantasies into Realities The Hollywood entertainment industry greatly contributed to the creation of another kind of real fantasy landscape: Disneyland in Anaheim, CA. Cartoon figures from The Mike Mouse Club on television became the basis for a theme park: imagination was turned into a real fantasy landscape. Real “messy” landscapes were replaced by imagined “clean and fun”

places. Although Disneyland in Anaheim was built first (1955), Disney incomplete or false information. Stephen Fjellman (1992) calls it Distory: World (1967) in Orlando, FL, exemplifies the same basic principles “These theme parks conveniently censor those aspects of U.S. history that which were proclaimed in Disneyland’s 17 July 1955 dedication plaque: conflict with White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant, middle-class values and behaviors. These theme parks portray one vast vanilla-flavored American To all who come to this happy place . . . WELCOME. Disneyland melting pot that never existed.” is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past . . . and Themed-amusement parks like Disneyland and Disney World by here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future. their explicit or omitted content re-enforce and even create visions of the Disneyland is dedicated to the ideals, the dreams, and the hard world that can lead to negative attitudes and discriminatory behaviors facts that have created America . . . with the hope that it will be a towards others. What would an accurate and social justice Disneyland look source of joy and inspiration to all the world (italics added). like? A question almost too absurd to ask. Such a Disneyland would include sections on U.S. slavery and plantations, Indian wars and reservations, Fond memories, ideals, and hard facts of something as Mexican removal and land grabs by the United States, abusive labor complex as U.S. history and geography do not exist; reality was and practices of Asian immigrants and exclusionary laws, religious persecution, continues to be far more varied, unpleasant, and confrontational. Indeed, discriminatory sexist practices and laws, labor strikes, and civil the geopolitical hegemony of the U.S. government over racial, religious, disobedience protests -- to name only a few. But of course such truths and labor groups often had even deadly consequences for some would not be entertaining and certainly would not be fit for children; better members of these groups. “Happy and joyful” places of entertainment to ignore such truths, or even better, to forget them all together. expunge such unpleasantnesses. In fantasy landscapes, words, images, and indeed places are manipulated to manufacture idealized and Disneyland in California: The Happiest Place on Earth When romantized landscapes at best and racists, sexist, and classist landscapes Disneyland opened in Anaheim in 1955, many people had already learned at worst, overtly or by exclusion of “unpleasant” information. about it from Disney's weekly ABC television shows. Millions recognized Disneyland can not and is not a culturally neutral place, despite it being the map of the heart-shaped theme park. Michael Sorkin (1992) calls this “just” about entertainment. As Herbert Schiller (1975) says, place the "Holy See of Creative Geography.” The original 76-acre park “entertainment is education; education is ideology.” Despite Disney's attracted 3.8 million visitors in its first year. By 1972, visitors had stated objectives, Richard Francaviglia (1975) labels it correctly: increased to 21 million per year -- more than the attendance at all major “Disneyland is a singularly undemocratic, thoroughly paternalist, and league baseball games and twice the attendance at all National Football ultimately an escapist place.” League games. By 1983, a total of over 250 million visitors had already Walt Disney’s personal conservative political ideology was passed through Main Street. explicitly expressed in the “happiest place on earth.” For example, a Disneyland transformed the city of Anaheim. At the time of sign for free enterprise, “America’s fifth freedom,” and the liberty bell, Disneyland's opening, Anaheim had 87 hotel and motel rooms; by 2005 it “Let Freedom Ring,” are sponsored by the Gulf Oil Company whose had become one of the top convention and vacation destinations in the logo is prominently displayed. In actuality, free enterprise or capitalism United States, with nearly 20,000 hotel rooms. About 18 hotels and motels is not a freedom guaranteed by the U.S constitution but only in the are found immediately around Disneyland and within half a mile, another conservative fantasy land of Disneyland. Disneyland and Disney World 36 hotels (Figure 7-photo). In contrast, in Florida’s Disney World, the Walt easily obscures their propaganda, the intentional dissemination of Disney Corporation captured most of the tourist food and lodging revenues.

Over the years, other major tourist attractions were built in Anaheim fantasy of disneylands has become the standard by which reality is created, too: Knott's Berry Farm, Movieland Wax Museum, and Medieval not only for professionals like planners and architects but also for the public Times. The area now attracts about 44 million visitors per year. at large as various forms of disneyification appear across North America. Walt Disney was inspired by the Henry Ford Museum in The Walt Disney designers, appropriately called “imagineers,” created real Dearborn, Michigan, which in 2005 celebrated the 50th anniversary of fantasy landscapes in Disneyland and later in Disney World. The three of Disneyland at the museum's Greenfield Village. When Walt Disney the landscapes in Disneyland that are relevant to this book are visited to Greenfield Village in the 1940s, he was intrigued by its old- Main Street, Frontierland with Tom Sawyer Island, and New Orleans fashioned Main Street and by the Henry Ford Museum's transportation Square (Figure 7-diagram). collection, in particular the railroad pieces. Andrew Dahl, the designer of the Disneyland exhibit, said that “Walt Disney presented a mirror to Americans. We fantasize. We still want to cross frontiers . . . He just really presented who we are. He was a genius" (Chan 2005).

Figure 7- . Main Street is the entrance to all the “Lands” at Disneyland. Source: Ingolf Vogeler.

Main Street Once visitors buy their tickets, they must all enter Main Street (unless they know about the trains) -- a physically and historically shared Figure7- . Themed motel outside of Disneyland. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. experience, at least in Disneyland. Main Street is a childlike place, unencumbered by real social, political, and economic problems. Main Street Architects and urban planners who have studied the designs of really is a deliberate propaganda landscape using the best of film-making Disneyland and Disney World have developed ideas for building new techniques (Findlay 1992). communities, called the New Urbanism. Instead of studying real 1) All the buildings are painted pastel colors, not bright “threatening” architectural traditions and designs in the United States and abroad, the colors, normally associated with children’s rooms (Figure 7- ). 2)

Although unnoticed by visitors, the heights of the buildings are at threefifth scale of real structures, making people feel taller and happier (?). The second and third stories of all buildings on Main Street are each in turn shorter than the ground level. This technique of "forced perspective" was borrowed from movie sets in Hollywood. 3) While the architectural styles of the shops are historically very accurate, they are uniformly from only one era, the late-nineteenth century. 4) Land uses are restricted to only restaurants, fast foods, and souvenir shops emphasizing Disney images. The architecturally authentic City Hall building is actually used as a visitor center. Missing are the multiple land uses, many architectural styles from various eras, rundown buildings, empty lots, and street- and -off street parking. 5) No cars and trucks and their associated noise and air pollution and pedestrian risks interfere with visitors. Figure 7- . Main Street in Disneyland. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. 6) No telephone and electric poles and wires are to be seen. The landscapes of Disneyland are designed to encourage 7) No poorly maintained streets, sidewalks, buildings, and consumption. Regardless of which Lands visitors see, their journeys always vegetation are to be found; litter and “undesirable” people are start and end in Main Street, where the largest number of tourist shops is absence. 8) No racial and income problems, political located. In Disneyland as in the rest of the United States, personal confrontations, or environmental crises exist here. consumption is made to be fun; the financial consequences lie in the future 9) All Disney workers have strict dress, hair, and behavior codes. In when visitors return to reality, figuratively and literally. fact, they take acting lesson to be friendly and pleasant. In the 1960s Disneyland’s fabricated Main Street contrasts with real main “Hippies” and later in the 1970s “gay” men were actively excluded streets (Figure 7- ). What is the different? Why do so many people prefer from the park. 10) In summary, Main Street is fundamentally a movie visiting and paying to see a fantasy Main Street rather than enjoying freeof- set, albeit a threedimensional one rather than a two-dimensional one on charge the many real historic main streets? What are the consequences in backlots, with the staff as actors and actresses. Fantasy landscapes are our personal and collective lives (see Kunstler 1994)? In subtle ways fake particularly well developed in such really fake places. Only the visitors landscapes often become standards by which we judge our own real lived are really real, or have they too been altered by these fantasy places? landscapes, transforming them to look more like fantasy landscapes, a process commonly called disneyification.

“our country’s past,” but the only group mentioned and praised for its “faith, courage, and ingenuity” are “the pioneers” and four “exciting” modes of pioneer transportation are featured, riverboats being the only “romantic” ones. In the absence of much cultural content, transportation technology (a fetish of Walt Disney) is emphasized and made the major attractions: Columbia sailing ship, Mark Twain steamboat (built at fiveeight scale), keelboats, Tom Sawyer rafts, and canoes -- except for the hand- paddled canoes, all boats run on underwater tracts. The hazards of real western travel have been conveniently eliminated as well as the “fun” of gambling and prostitution. Yet appropriately, Frontierland does have a shooting gallery and a Wild West saloon show at the Golden Nugget Theater. This is a much sanitized and romantized story of White settlement in the West. Where are the many Indian tribes who had occupied the continent for thousands of years before European exploration and Figure 7- . A real main street at Christmas in Minnesota. Photo: Ingolf colonialism? And what about the U.S. military campaigns against the Indian Vogeler. nations and their subsequent removal to reservations? Where is the story of the expansion of slavery into western states? What about the persecutions of Frontierland Mormon settlements in the Utah Territory? How did cowboys and settlers While Main Street was based on Walt Disney’s fond childhood alike deal with environmental and economic hardships on the Great Plains? memory of small towns, the design of Frontierland was inspired by 1) In summary, the conquest of the West was/is fun, safe, and convenient for Hollywood western movies in general, 2) the TV series Davy Crockett, “all” -- only in real fantasy landscapes of course! first screened in 1954, in particular, and 3) the “authentic” Wild West Tom Sawyer Island, which can only be reached by boat-motored buildings at Knott’s Berry Farm, built in southern California in 1940. In rafts (now that is authentic!), is a major part of Frontierland. The island has the words of numerous paths and trails leading to tree houses, pontoon and suspension Walt Disney, Frontierland tells bridges, rock castles, “secret” passages, a walk-through cave, and a western frontier fort. The story of the settlement, exploration, and conquest of the The portrait of Indians on Tom Sawyer Island reflects prevailing American West. Here we experience the story of our country's past racist views expressed by what is shown and what is excluded. In several . . . the colorful drama of frontier America in the exciting days of Disney brochures, European settler cabins are shown burning (Figure the covered wagon and the stage coach, the advent of the railroad 7colorful diagram), presumably set by Indians, but on Tom Sawyer Island and the romantic riverboat. Frontierland is a tribute to the faith, itself no such burning cabins exist. While children can play in Fort courage and ingenuity of the pioneers who blazed the trails across Wilderness (Figure 7-photo), built by Europeans as they seized the lands America (italics added). from the Native Americans, children can not even enter the Indian tepee village. Children can pretend to shoot from Fort Wilderness towards the Without much reflection, Frontierland seems to be inclusive of Indian village (shown in one Disney brochure), but they are kept out of the Indian village itself by a barbwire fence and a locked gate, because, as

another Disney brochure says, “terms of treaty prohibit entry” (Figure 7greenish map and - Indian village photo). The top of the wire fence around the Indian village is tilted outward. What is being suggested about IndianWhite relations or it just a security issue? Can Indians can get out and assimilate but Whites can not get in and identify with Indians? The portrayal of Indians living in tepees is only accurate for Great Plains Indians but not for Southwest Indians who lived in permanent villages of abode houses with kivas and ovens as the Pueblo people did or in hogans used by the nomadic Navajo. So, whose "fond memories” are enunciated in Frontierland? In reality, Indian lands that were supposed to be protected by treaties were routinely violated whenever White settlers wanted the land for mining or farming. Indeed, the U.S. government repeatedly made illegal White squatter settlements in Indian territories legal. In Disneyland, Fort Wilderness is appropriately commanded by Andrew Jackson, the U.S. President who advocated the removal of Indians from the Eastern States to the Western Frontier when he signed the Indian Removal Act in 1830, and Davy Crockett, a popular figure of the “American Frontier” (Figure 7- greenish map).

Figure 7- . On an illustrated map, Fort Wilderness, stockade guardhouse, (Indian?) burial grounds, Indian tepee village, and burning (European settler) cabin are shown on the northern end of Tom Sawyer Island. Source: Walt Disney Productions 1976.

Figure 7- . Fort Wilderness in Frontierland. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figure 7- . Fenced off Indian tepee village in Frontierland. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

The only Indians visitors are allowed to see in Frontierland are the imaginary “Pinewood Indians band” of “audio-animatronic” Native Americans, who live on the banks of the illusionary “Rivers of America.” Audio-animatronics is a registered trademark of Walt Disney Imagineering for designing robots to move and speak and/or sing in Disney theme parks. Using mechanical and programmed “Indians” is so much better (in White racist terms) than the complicated reality of Indian-White relationships. The portrayal of Indians in the real fantasy landscape of Frontierland, of course, Figure 7- . A map of Fort Wilderness with restrooms and Indian has negative consequences for cultural understanding between Indians and Territory on Tom Sawyer Island. Source: Walt Disney Productions non-Indians and hardly fosters “joy and inspiration to all the world,” let 1976. alone for the United States itself.

New Orleans Square Of all the “places” in Disneyland that could show case Black

African culture, New Orleans Square would be the logical place. But here Disneyland and Disney World employ a total of 90,000 workers; as elsewhere “fond memories” and “the hard facts” exclude important by contrast, the United Nations and all its agencies employ only 53,589. In events, institutions, and people: slave auction halls, wealthy White and Orlando, three-quarters of Disney's own employees need housing assistance Black slaveowners, postbellum Black churches, Black jazz funeral because they get paid such low wages that they can not afford local marching bands and saloon blues, Creole and Cajun people, Voodoo, and housing! Yet in 1997 Walt Disney Company gave Michael Ovitz, the Southern foods, now renamed Soul Food. The appeal of the real New Hollywood agent who spent 14 months as Disney's president, $38.9 million Orleans is its authenticity in the form of sights, sounds, and smells: old historic buildings (often run-down), quaint B&Bs, street performers, in cash and $54 million in stock options to leave the company. What do you cheap eats and great restaurants, bars of all sorts, jazz everywhere, strip think workers who actually ran Disneyland received when they are fired? joints, and the special places of Bourbon Street, Royal Street, and Jackson Real fantasy themed-parks are enormously popular. In 2005, the ten most Square -- all set in a sub-humid tropical climate on the natural and human- visited parks were: Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World in Orlando with built levees of the Mississippi River. Disneyland’s New Orleans Square 16.1 million visitors, making it the most visited theme park in the world; captures neither the cultures nor the environmental conditions of this Disneyland in Anaheim with 14.5 million; Epcot at Disney World with 9.9 fantastic real place. Indeed, the “seediness” of the real New Orleans has million; Disney-MGM Studios at Disney World with 8.6 million; Disney's been sanitized in Disneyland. Those visitors who prefer the fake to the Animal Kingdom at Disney World with 8.2 million; Universal Studios real have become their own sanitizers of their worlds, the ultimate triumph Florida in Orlando with 6.1 million; Disney's California of propaganda when victims become their own manipulators. Adventure in Anaheim with 5.8 million, Universal's Islands of Adventure in Orlando with 5.76 million; SeaWorld Orlando (at least the animals are real Disney World in Florida but the settings are artificial) with 5.6 million, and Universal Studios Disney World in Orlando, Florida, continues and elaborates the Hollywood with 4.7 million (Theme Park Insider 2007). In all these and themes of Disneyland (Mills 2007). Consisting of the Magic Kingdom other theme parks, indeed post-modern landscapes in general, experiences (1971), Epcot (1982), Disney-MGM Studios (1989), and Disney's are detached from contexts, and forms are extracted from substances, and Animal Kingdom (1998), this premier theme park of 40 square miles is then all are sold as better than reality (Allman 2007). Popularity means only one of many theme parks in Orlando. About 70 million people a crowds and long waiting lines for rides, for example, visitors to the “Pirates year visit the Orlando parks, making Orlando is the first massive theme of the Caribbean” ride can wait over one hour; and yet people keep coming. park city with more hotel rooms than Chicago, Los Angles, or New Back home, grocery stores and big-box retailers open up additional York. Disney World is the largest tourist destination in the world with checkout counters whenever more than five people line up! often 100,000 visitors a day and 43 million visitors a year (in 2005). Disney's theme parks have expanded not only to Orlando but to More than 5,000 employees are used to just maintain the park, including Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Paris and their architectural styles have spread to 750 horticulturists and 600 painters. Disney spends more than $100 shopping malls and resorts across the United States. Indeed, Disneyland has million every year on maintenance at the Magic Kingdom alone. The become a metaphor for U.S. entertainment culture and a synonym for what streets in the parks are steam cleaned every night. A tree farm in the trivializes or sentimentalizes authenticity. park provides mature trees to replace, for example, thirty-year-old trees The reality of the Disney fantasy landscapes is revealed by how (Orlando Sentinel 2004). If real cities had the staff and funds to Disney World was created. While the Walt Disney Company preaches free maintain their cities like Disney World, people might find their own enterprise in public, it practices monopoly in secret. The land for Disney cities attractive enough to enjoy, and not leave for fantasy landscapes. World was bought in secret with the collusion of local governments. A special municipality was formed to exempt Disney World from state and

county land use controls. In 1967, the Florida legislature created the Part III. Ghost Towns and Ethnic Towns Reedy Creek Improvement District which exempted it from local and Hollywood and particularly Disneyland influenced real places as state zoning laws, land use, and building codes. Even now, the rides in well. Many have turned themselves, in varying degrees, into fantasy places, Disney World are exempt from state safety inspections. Just like real in other words fantasy real places. Place branding, as the advertising municipalities, the district controls all services -- water, sewage, roads, industry calls, is used to sell real places as entertainment throughout the and transportation -- and has the power of eminent domain and to issue United States and Canada. Two types are 1) Western cowboy and mining tax-exempt bonds, which were used to build the park with lower interest ghost towns that sell themselves as tourist attractions. They contrast with rates than from banks. The District internalizes much of the economic “forgotten” ghost towns which appeal only to history buffs and treasure activities (hotels, camping, restaurants, and golf courses) within the hunters. 2) Small towns with ethnic concentrations have rehabilitated and 25,000-acre park (size of Liechtenstein) and excludes undesirable and exaggerated their “colorful” past to attract visitors. These fantasy real places competitive land uses. In the smaller Disneyland (300 acres) much of contrast with ordinary towns which, depending on location, have a specific the economic benefits from the park are not internalized; thus, lowering mixture of racial, ethnic, religious, and economic diversity and cultural the profitable of this park (Fogelsong 2001). landscapes, which are rarely explored and appreciated by the people who In Disney World, officials and top managers constitute the live in these places and by outsiders. Ironically, ordinary places are not only 100 full-time residents yet the 30,000 park employees must perceived as worthy of tourism. commute long distances for (affordable) housing. Expensive schools are also avoided. Disney World’s private financial success, in part, rests on Movie Tourism externalizing much of its costs to surrounding public communities. Walt The nineteenth-century cowboys and Western cattle and mining Disney Company espouses free enterprise for everybody, except in its towns have been popular in movies and television shows. Landscapes that own markets. Walt Disney’s Experimental Prototype Community of viewers see on the screen motivate them to see where movies are set; alas, Tomorrow, or better known as EPCOT, was to be a utopian movies are rarely filmed in the places indicated. For example, Gunsmoke, technological city of the future, an antidote to real organic (messy) the second longest (1955-1975) TV series (only Disney’s Disneyland, in its cities. Although concept failed and was never built, it resulted in yet various names, ran longer), was a Western set in Dodge City in Kansas, another theme park! By the early 1990s the Walt Disney Company had but filmed in California. Hollywood put Dodge City, a place of barely built an actual planned community called Celebration, resembling a 20,000 people, on the tourist map. Historically, cattle were driven from small pre-1940s U.S. town, with many restrictive rules than real towns Texas (1875 to1885) to the rail head in Dodge City from hence cattle went would never have (Mackenzie 1994 and Marshall 2000). Reminiscent of to Eastern markets (Figure 7- ) but the television series popularized Dodge fantasy landscapes, Celebration has a city hall but no actual local City’s gun-toting past. All fantasies are based on partial realities, much like government. With only 5,000 residents, discontented residents are all prejudices are partially based on facts. During the 1960s, around 400,000 already complaining about shoddy house construction and non- tourists came each year even though most of the town's original buildings competitive education at the local school (Ross 1999). One planner were long gone. Replicas have replaced the originals. Even thought the TV concluded: "I have seen the future and it does not work." show has long been terminated, local tourism officials say that 100,000 people still pass through the Boot Hill Museum each year, from all 50 states and 47 foreign nations. Visitors drink at the Longbranch Saloon, watch “gunfights,” and visit tombstone markers in the “world-famous” Boot Hill

Cemetery. Dodge City wants now to capitalize on its historical tourism Dreams (1989) was filmed and has become one of the state's top tourist by offering casino-style gambling in keeping with its authentic historic attractions in the 10 years since the film opened, attracting about 55,000 image. Supporters say that a casino could bring five times as many people annually. Few folk visited Fort Hays in Kansas, for example, until visitors annually to the city where the main street is called Wyatt Earp Kevin Costner's Indian saga, Dances with Wolves (1990), which was set Boulevard, after a gun flight in Tombstone, Arizona (Draper 2004)! there. People flocked to Fort Hays, even though the film had been shot in South Dakota. The film The Bridges of Madison County (1995) set in rural Madison County, Iowa, has attracted thousands, including package tour groups from across the USA, Japan, and Western Europe.

Western Frontier Myths The ideals and folklore of individualism, freedom, mobility, technology, and messianic perfectionism are peculiar to the United States, being much less common in Canada and even less so in Mexico. Rugged individualism, self-reliance, and violent self-defense are peculiar U.S.

Figure 7- . Large feedlots, seen in the background, continue the historic cultural traits, past and present. Canada and Mexico, on the other hand, have cattle industry, as the sign indicates. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. far more communal values as surveys have shown. The concept of the "American way of life" encompasses many of these values. To remain Beyond the Western legends, landscape creation by Hollywood relevant, the “American way of life” has been updated periodically to fit the influences viewers to seek out places they see in the movies -- places economic realities that prevailed. One of the enduring myths of rugged were the movies were actually shot or the places that supposedly the individualism has been exemplified by cowboys and gold miners. Their movies took place in. On a farm near Dyersville, Iowa, Field of stories have been used to turn real western cattle and mining towns into mythical places. The legends of the Wild West and Cowboy Culture illustrate particularly well how facts and events are filtered, screened, and interpreted by particular individuals, groups, and institutions to fit certain values and contemporary viewpoints of race and gender relations, nationalism, states' rights, foreign policy, etc. Dominant institutions continually "invent" history and geography to justify and explain "romantic" or "heroic" struggles which manipulate people’s view about the past and thus inform the future as well. In a free society, these fantasies and myths must be continually challenged to get at the "truth"-- the more perspectives from contrasting and often conflicting viewpoints, the more likely people can truly think for themselves and come to their own conclusions.

The Western Cowboy captures the imagination not only of people in Figure 7- . Main street in Tombstone. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. the United States (but not in Canada, even though it had similar

environmental and economic conditions) but also abroad. Karl May, a Gun fights are a common staple of cowboy and western television nineteenth-century German fiction writer who had never been to the USA, shows and movies; much less so than in the real lives of working cowboys. wrote extremely popular western novels in Germany -- 100 million copies Places like Tombstone keep the fantasies of the past alive and allow . “The most famous gun tourists have been sold to date, translated into 30 languages! to actualize the fantasies that they have learned Historic preservation frequently ends up making real places into outdoor museums, some real and others disneyified. People have been battle of all times” took place in the O.K. Corral (Figure 7-tall sign) -- hyperbole is used to make the ordinary seem special, indeed exotic. At the socialized to think that sanitized historical events and places are much more shoot-out in the O.K. Corral (actually, behind the corral), nine men and enjoyable than confronting complex real events and places and thus avoid two horses were confined in a lot only 18 feet wide. They turned revolvers, unpleasant truths. The uniqueness of place and time are erased to make a shotgun, and a Winchester rifle on each other in this small area, which room for fantasies. Myths sanitize places like they do historical events was quickly filled with smoke. Only three of the men were killed (Figure- (Smith 1992). Many western towns in the United States nurture the myth of lot). the cowboy. Tombstone is the best example of places that sell this Western In actuality, sheriffs and marshals used their revolvers mainly as myth. clubs when arresting people. In fact, rifles and shotguns, whose longer Tombstone, Arizona, celebrates the myth of rugged individualism barrels gave greater accuracy and more control, were more effective in and the fight between good and evil through violence. This former silver killing people than revolvers. Furthermore, a lone marshal shooting bad mining ghost town, which in 1881 had 1,000 people, was designated a “historic” National Historic Site in 1961 (Figure 7-main street). guys with his quick draw rarely happened, except in movies and signs (Figure 7- diamond shaped sign). This was the only gunfight that Earp took part in. In the "real world" gun fights rarely killed people. Nevertheless, the Western myth of guns, violence, alcohol, saloons, and show girls has been exploited by movies in general and Las Vegas in particular with great success. When police were not doing “law and order,” they were doing the less “glamorous” work of sanitation and repair work (Willis 1999). Figure 7- . A sign detailing the O.K. Corral gun fight. Death becomes Why were the three men who were killed at the O.K. corral more important than the many others entertainment. Photo: who died in other gunfights throughout the West? In addition, the gunfight was rather insignificant compared Ingolf Vogeler. to the larger economic and political context of this showdown. The Earp clan was viewed by their enemies as badge-toting pimps who ruthlessly enforced the business interests of the town. The McLaurys, Clantons, and their “cowboys” were viewed by their enemies as cattle rustlers, thieves, and murderers. In this region,

“cowboys” referred to outlaws. Contrary to popular views portrayed in films and writings, the "cowboy" faction was fairly popular in Tombstone.

Figure 7- . The O.K. corral in Tombstone. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figur

e 7- . less colorful, and was recreated for tourist to visit and photograph. The real people, mostly men, in Signs these, largely unmarked graves had been forgotten until the place became "famous" and then they identif are only remembered as part of the Western legend (Figure 7-cemetery). ying Tomb stone’ s “invis ible” histor y. Photo : Ingolf Vogel er. The myth of frontier Figure 7- . “Tourist” boothill in Tombstone. Photos: Ingolf Vogeler. individualism -- men with their guns and rifles defending themselves in a hostile About half a million tourists come each year; or 300 tourists for each permanent resident. world without social norms from family Mass tourism is threatening what the National Historic District calls "one of the best preserved and religious obligations -- dies hard. specimens of the rugged frontier town of the 1870s and 1880s." Inappropriate alterations to the Indeed, the mere entertainment of gun Tombstone’s historic district include fights in movies becomes the conservative ideology of individual rights for the • Placing "historic" dates on new buildings National Rifle Association, which thinks • Failing to distinguish new construction from historic structures that gun control laws would destroy the • Covering authentic historic elevations with inappropriate materials frontier spirit that made “America” great. In fact, guns did not actually tame the • Replacing historic features instead of repairing them West; the Western state and local • Replacing missing historic features with conjectural and unsubstantiated materials governments tamed (regulated) the use of • Building incompatible additions to existing historic structures and new incompatible individual firearm users. buildings within the historic district • Using illuminated signage, including blinking lights surrounding historic signs • Installing hitching rails and Spanish tile-covered store porches when such architectural To satisfy tourists’ fascination features never existed within Tombstone (National Park Service 2007). with killing and death, the graveyard in Tombstone is appropriately called Boothill, not a “cemetery” which is much

Hundreds of “real” ghost towns Museums throughout the West also celebrate cowboy culture and their contents reveal exist in the West, particularly in Colorado, their ideology. The National Cowboy Hall of Fame in Oklahoma City is one of the best known Montana, and Wyoming. Texas alone has of such museums. Originally, it only contained large-scale sculptures and paintings of Western 1,000. But visitors have to make an effort environmental and Indian themes; gun and rifle collections; a rodeo star gallery; and paintings of to find them and use their imagination to Hollywood cowboys and cowgirls. Mythical and entertainment Western cowboys, of the rodeo appreciate the few historic artifacts that and movie types, always played a dominant role in the museum’s displays. An action-posed are still left, without the statute of William Frederick "Buffalo Bill" Cody decorates the front of the museum (Figure 7- commercialization that characterize places ). The Buffalo Bill's Wild West show started in 1883 and ran for over 20 years, playing in Europe like Tombstone (Figure 7-WY). The idea several times and at the Chicago World's Fair (1893). The extravaganza included as many as of ghost towns grips the imagination of 1,200 performers, including Sitting Bull and 20 “braves.” They re-enacted the Pony Express, people, particularly in the United States. Indian attacks on wagon trains, stagecoach robberies, and usually ended with a melodramatic re- As backdrops for movies, children’s enactment of Custer's Last Stand. books, and theme-park rides, they ironically capture the sad reality of Figure 7- . Buffalo fortune hunting, whether on the ground, Bill statue outside the casinos, and stock markets. National Cowboy Hall of Fame. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figure 7- . Ghost landscapes: the main street in the gold mining ghost town of South Pass City, WY. Photo: Ingolf In the museum, the only portrayal of “real” cowboys was a small wooden carved model Vogeler. of camp life in the basement. The lives of cowboys were hard and not well paid; most went only on one cattle drive. By 1996, the museum had tripled in size and is now called, more appropriately, the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum. Since the expansion, an

exhibit on the life of working cowboys, a full-scaled nineteenth-century cattle town with 19 buildings, and a Native American Gallery were added. Imagined cowboy culture has taken hold beyond the Western. Dressing like cowboys (who never dressed like this most of the time) is now big business: distinctive cowboy shirts, bolo ties, buckles, belts, boots, and hats are now worn by “city slickers” and foreign tourist alike, whether men, women, or children. High slanted-heeled Figure 7- . A Western frontier scene in snow in St. Cloud, MN. Photo: boots, tough blue jean pants, large- Ingolf Vogeler. brimmed hats, and bandanas were functional items for cowboys out on the Mining Ghost Towns open range in rain, snow, and heat. Discovering precious minerals, particularly gold and silver, was based on the appeal of Interestingly, cowboy wear is the only individualism, risk taking, and survival of the fittest. working class clothing to have been The boom-and-bust mining towns were based on a “casino” economy where luck would make you absorbed into the mainstream. Some rich. Former mining towns in the West are now selling their history and what is left of their people even have built Western forts, buildings to tourists. covered wagons, and cowboys on horses Jerome, Arizona, southwest of Flagstaff, was the fourth-largest city in the Arizona out of snow in the Midwest where rodeos Territory and the most famous copper town (Figure 7sign). Jerome's 1860s population of 15,000 are popular even in small dairy farming consisted of Yankees, Mexicans, Croatians, Irish, Spaniards, Italians, and Chinese. The United towns (Figure 7-photo). Verde Mine produced in excess of $1 billion in copper, gold, silver, zinc and lead. Since its

mining demise in 1952, the town has been reborn as a center for artists, retirees, and tourists while retaining much of its ghost town features (Figure 7-town).

extracting minerals have left scars on the landscape. Individual miners used metal pans to pan for gold and silver -- the simplest and least environmentally destructive technique of extracting gold from placer ore. Large operations, on the other hand, used shovels and sluice boxes to find gold and left more disturbed river beds (Figure 7-stream). The past lives of real people who lived in these real mining towns is told in their cemeteries (Figure 7-cemetery).

Figure 7- . Jerome, a copper mining ghost town. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Figure 7- . Consequences of gold mining in Idaho. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Ghost towns have also been preserved in state parks. California alone has at least 15 authentic mining ghost towns preserved in state parks. Bodie State Historic Park in California, a genuine gold-mining ghost town northeast of Yosemite National Park, is one of the largest and best persevered. Waterman S. Body discovered small amounts of gold and founded the settlement. In 1877, the Standard Company struck “pay dirt” and the ensuing gold rush transformed Bodie from 20 people to a boomtown of about 8,500 people and more than 2,000 buildings. More than 60 saloons and dance halls lined the streets. Gunfights, stage holdups, robberies, and street fights contributed to its reputation of lawlessness. The Reverend F. M. Warrington described Bodie in 1881 as “a sea of sin, lashed by the tempests of lust and passion.” Even outside Christian circles, Bodie was known as the wildest, toughest, and most lawless mining town in the West. Figure 7- . Main Street in Jerome. Photo: Chinatowns were common in Western mining towns because of discrimination by Ingolf Vogeler. Whites and their own cultural preferences. Bodie’s Chinatown was a town within a town. Chinatown contained general stores, laundries, boarding houses, gambling halls, saloons, and a Aside from the excitement of Taoist temple. The Chinese also earned income by selling vegetables, making charcoal, and finding minerals and of life in mining working on the Bodie railway. towns, the environmental consequences of

Bodie’s heyday was short-lived. Figure 7- . Ghost town cemetery in Idaho. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler. By 1881 the mines were depleted, mining companies went bankrupt, and businesses Ghost town landscapes range from barren sites; places with rubble and roofless building closed. By 1886 Bodie’s population had ruins; standing abandoned buildings without roofs and population, except maybe caretakers; dropped to approximately 1,500 people. semi- or near-ghost towns with many abandoned buildings and small resident populations; Six years later a disastrous fire destroying historic parks; and touristic sites with historically-accurate and inappropriately restored buildings many homes and businesses. Another fire and abandoned structures. in 1932 destroyed all but 10 percent of the town. Designated as a National Historic Ethnic Towns Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the Hollywood and the Disney Parks are the most spectacular real fantasy landscapes in remains of Bodie are being preserved in a North America, but real places have turned themselves into fantasy places too. In contrast to state of "arrested decay." To maintain “dead” places, inhabited places with distinctive ethnic groups have re-made themselves for ghost town atmosphere, no commercial tourists. Since the late 1960s, hundreds of towns with specific ethnic concentrations have facilities are allowed in Bodie. Today marketed themselves as tourist destinations. These real places are “dressing up” their landscapes visitors can walk the deserted streets of with disneyified signs and fonts, foreign languages signs, “Old World” architectural facades, the town as it was over 50 years ago when traditional foods, ethnic music, and folk museums (Schnell 2003). Annual or semi-annual ethnic the last residents left (California State festivals in these towns accentuate these attributes and draw large crowds seeking “unique” Parks 2007). experiences. Ethnicity, like history, is always invented and reinvented by different groups depending on their ideological agendas. People everywhere have “a sense of place,” but ethnic or heritage tourism requires that places fabricate more visually colorful pasts than they rarely ever had:

Original ethnic cultural landscapes in North America were always more subtle than that. For ethnic tourism, the cultural landscapes must be exaggerated, often with stereotypical images. Even in these real places, ordinariness is too “boring” to attract tourists. We have once again become the manipulators of our own manipulated experiences. This time in our own backyards and not in far away Disney Parks. Every-day life is turned into “an experience,” without the ethnic isolation or discrimination that these communities experienced in the past, and some still do. According to the Canadian Tourism Commission, heritage tourism is one of the fastest-growing kinds of domestic tourism. The Travel Industry Association of America estimated that the number of historical and cultural travelers increased 13 per cent from 1996 to 2002. Only a few examples well-known “ordinary” ethnic towns that sell their cultural heritage are cited here. The largest Icelandic community outside Iceland is in Gimli, Manitoba, on Lake Winnipeg, north of Winnipeg, where the native language is still routinely spoken. A museum highlights local history and the town has a Viking statue and Viking boat tour around the lake. In 1911 Danish educators

founded Solvang, California, inland from New Braunfels. New Braunfels' historic district includes homes, stores, and a beer hall dating Santa Barbara, and today descendants from before 1850 and boasts the largest collection of fachwerk (half-timber) buildings in Texas. constitute about two-thirds of its 5,300 The Hummel Museum in New Braunfels has the world's largest collection of people (Figure 7- ). Authentic Danish Sister Maria Hummel. German towns in Texas have made themselves more architectural churches, schools, and tourist Bavarian looking than the actual numbers of original German immigrants would justify. shops, restaurants, and hotels abound. A hundred Swiss pioneers settled in New Glarus, Wisconsin, southwest of Madison, in Windmills, wooden storks atop thatched 1845. In "America's Little Switzerland," fake halftimbered facades are common on chalet-style roofs, and blue and white bunting buildings and Swiss-German conversations can still be heard on the streets. Two museums tell the decorate the town. Famous too are the story of Swiss immigration. many “Danish” bakeries. A museum Ukrainians in Kalyna Country, an area from northeast of Edmonton, Alberta, along the devoted to Hans Christian Andersen North Saskatchewan River, built about hundred onion-domed churches. Vegreville has the world's features exhibits on his life and books. largest Easter egg and Mundare, the largest sausage. The Heritage Village Provincial Historic Site Solvang's fame has grown with the Oscar- recreates a Ukrainian community from the 1890s to 1930s. Portuguese in Bristol County, nominated Sideways film, much of it Massachusetts, south of Boston, settled in New Bedford and Fall River, where half the actually filmed there. population traces their roots to Portugal and its colonies in the Azores, Madeira, and Cape Verde. Whaling attracted early immigrants; later arrivals worked in textile mills. The Museum of Madeiran Heritage exhibits carvings, costumes, and embroidery. Greek divers settled in Tarpon Springs, Florida, north of Tampa, in the early 1900s to develop its sponge industry, which today provides half the world's supply. The sponge docks are a National Historic District. Greek-themed gift shops line the old Sponge Exchange. St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Cathedral is a replica of St. Sophia's in Constantinople; its marble is from the Greek pavilion at the 1939 world's fair (Johansen 2005). In summary, ethnic groups did settle in specific places and continue to give these places distinctive flavors, albeit dressed up for tourists. Ghost towns existed in the past as mining or cattle towns, but are now largely abandoned yet make really interesting, if not spectacular disneyfied, historic places. Finally, thousands of real towns have interesting cultural landscapes expressing religious, ethnic, racial, and economic diversity. The vast majority of real places and landscapes in which people actually live are not tourist destinations yet they constitute the dominant cultural landscapes of North America and give true meaning and importance to all the people of North America. This book has highlighted those critical cultural landscapes that are important in their own right to understanding the settlement processes of North America and by extension to appreciate the Figure 7- . Danish themes in Solvang. ordinary cultural landscapes in which we spend our daily lives. Photo: Ingolf Vogeler.

Germans settled in the Texas Hill country towns of Fredericksburg and