Orlando Sentinel Crowns the Disney Reveal as Its Ultimate Scoop
Looking back at the 1965 investigation that defined a newspaper’s legacy and a city’s destiny.
As the Orlando Sentinel celebrates their 150 years, they have declared their headline about the mystery buyer in Orlando as their number one scoop.
What’s Happening:
- Orlando Sentinel editors have officially designated Emily Bavar’s 1965 Disney revelation as the biggest scoop in the publication's history.
- Initially underplayed by her own editors, Bavar’s intuition led to a front-page headline that scooped the Governor of Florida by five days.
- The scoop wasn't based on a leak, but on a single interview in Burbank where Bavar witnessed Walt Disney look "stunned" by her direct questioning regarding Florida land.
- By tracking Anaheim money in local land records, Bavar bypassed the wall of corporate silence surrounding the 30,000-acre "Project Future."
- The scoop signaled the end of Orlando as a quiet citrus hub and the beginning of its era as a global tourism titan.
The Gravity of the Scoop
- The Sentinel identifies this as its "biggest scoop" not just because of the name involved, but because of the sheer mathematical and systemic impact it had on the region:
- Bavar’s prediction broke through the mundane speculation (washing machine factories) to the realization of an "empire of fiction and fantasy" that would eventually employ hundreds of thousands.
- Bavar succeeded where others failed because she prioritized Walt’s physical reactions.
About the Sentinel’s History with the Mouse:
- Before Bavar’s scoop, the 30,000-acre site was a black hole of information, speculated to be everything from electronics research to aircraft testing.
- The Sentinel forced the hand of Governor Haydon Burns, who had planned a joint announcement for November 15 but was forced to confirm the news on October 26 due to Bavar's reporting.
- The paper’s persistence broke through a shell-company strategy managed by high-level Miami attorneys and former intelligence officers designed to mask the buyer.
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