Dick Nunis learned directly from Walt Disney how to run Disneyland and went on to play a key role in the development of the Anaheim theme park, Disney World, Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris.
The Disney Legend and former Disneyland executive vice president died on Wednesday, Dec. 13 in Orlando, Florida at the age of 91, according to the Walt Disney Company.
“Dick took the values and philosophies he learned directly from Walt and incorporated them into everything he did at Disney,” Disney CEO Bob Iger said in a statement released by the company.
Born in Cedartown, Georgia on May 30, 1932, Nunis made his way west on a University of Southern California football scholarship and took a job at Disneyland on a lark after his dreams of playing professional football were cut short by a broken neck playing the sport he loved.
After graduating from USC, Nunis landed a summer job at Disneyland in May 1955 just two months before the Anaheim theme park opened to the public.
Nunis ended up working for Disney University founder Van France and together they trained future Disneyland employees in Walt Disney’s theme park philosophy. Their first students: Walt and his Disneyland executives.
“Walt believed strongly that what would make Disneyland different was the people — he wanted them to feel that they were part of the organization,” Nunis once said, according to a Disney statement. “That’s why he established the first-name policy — he was Walt, I was Dick and so on. From an overall operations point of view, the most important thing is to work together to make sure that when guests come, they have a wonderful experience.”
Nunis quickly worked his way up the ladder at Disneyland from orientation training instructor to attractions supervisor to mailroom supervisor to park operations director.
Never one to rest on his laurels, Nunis always pushed Walt Disney to expand Disneyland to accommodate the millions of visitors that streamed through the front gates every year.
By 1971, when the Magic Kingdom opened in Florida, Nunis was named executive vice president of Disneyland and Disney World.
In the 1980s, he oversaw Epcot and what would become Disney’s Hollywood Studios.
Nunis consulted on the development of Tokyo Disneyland and Disneyland Paris as a member of the Walt Disney Productions Board of Directors.
He retired in 1999 as the chairman of Walt Disney Attractions after 44 years with the company.
The “Coast to Coast Peoplemoving” window on Main Street USA at Disneyland pays tribute to Nunis and offers a winking nod to his ability to persuade hundreds of Disneyland employees to relocarte from California to Florida for the opening of the Magic Kingdom in 1971.
Nunis was instrumental in the development of the Pirates of the Caribbean attraction as we know it today.
Construction had already started in early 1961 on the pirate-themed walk-through wax exhibit that would serve as a centerpiece for New Orleans Square when Nunis threw a wrench in the project.
A memo from Nunis warned that guest surveys found walk-through attractions had “low appeal.” Nunis wanted to change the wax museum concept into a ride-though attraction. Soon after, Walt Disney chimed in and Pirates of the Caribbean became a water ride.
Following the success of Pirates of the Caribbean, Nunis wanted a log flume attraction that would serve as the next big water ride at Disneyland.
Fellow Disney Legend Tony Baxter came up with an idea to reuse 90 audio-animatronics from the former Carousel of Progress and America Sings attractions in Tomorrowland for a new log flume ride next door to New Orleans Square. The result: Splash Mountain.
Not all of his ideas were big hits. Nunis pushed for the installation of a short-lived wave machine at a Disney World lagoon in 1971 that eroded the shore and was quickly dismantled.
But Nunis was simply a man ahead of his time. Nearly two decades later, a wave machine opened as the centerpiece of Disney’s Typhoon Lagoon water park in Florida.