For as difficult as it would be for Angelenos of the present to imagine a world where the Beverly Center didn’t exist at the corner of Beverly and La Cienega, it was even more unfathomable for the Angelenos who lived in L.A. between the years of 1943 and 1974 to imagine a world without Beverly Park. Because, for thirty-one years, the “Kiddieland” (as those types of parks were once generically called) dominated that intersection, capturing the hearts and imaginations of children all over the county. And eventually, thanks to its influence on Walt Disney, the hearts and imaginations of children all over the globe.
That Beverly Park arrived around the end of World War II was not a coincidence. And perhaps more than many other towns in the U.S., Los Angeles felt the dark pall cast over the nation by the war. Starting with its close (or close enough) Pacific proximity to Pearl Harbor, the “instigating incident” that finally prompted Franklin D. Roosevelt to enter the war officially. Or the fact that Hollywood celebrities getting involved in promoting the “war effort” (e.g., the Hollywood Canteen) were just a stone’s throw away from the mere mortals of the city.
And while Hollywood might have done its best to keep things “light” (relatively speaking), there was no denying that the yearning for a return to normalcy (the phrase many learned again so well during and after the Covid pandemic) was in the air. This being a key aspect as to why there was such an uptick in the building of amusement parks after the war. In other words, it was time to have fun again and stop thinking about death, doom and destruction all the time (even if bomb shelters were about to become all the rage). Plus, the baby boom was bound to furnish an amusement park boom, too—offering a place where parents could take their children to unleash all that excess energy.
Beverly Park was just one such place, emerging from the rural-looking fairgrounds (plus a baseball field) then owned by a company called Arden’s Milk. Located next to Ponyland, a property owned by Leo and Viva Murphy, it seemed like a perfect spot for the Frock & Meyer (as in Elden Frock and William Meyer) Amusement Company to establish another Kiddieland after the one they had built near Watts in 1941. But just two years after their second park was built in ’43, Meyer sold it to Dave Bradley after Frock died of a heart attack.
The sale was kismet for Bradley, who had been considering a life in amusement parks ever since traveling around the country with saxophonist Freddy Martin and his band (Bradley served as the manager), with many performances done outdoors in venues like fairs and parks. Getting a feel for that type of setting, it appeared to activate the dormant fascination within Bradley that had begun ever since seeing those rides at the Venice Pier when he himself was just a child. Besides that, he had long had an itch to put his skills in the fields of entertainment and mechanics to good use. And what more highly specific way to do that than operating an amusement park?
However, even the most talented people need a partner in crime, which is where Bradley’s wife, Bernice, came in. In fact, she actually left her job to help him run Beverly Park. No small ask considering she had a rare gig (particularly for a woman in that era): leading the story research department at Disney Studios. Therefore, it was her link to Walt Disney that ended up “aligning” these two men together. After hearing about why Bernice left the job, Walt started going to the park regularly in the late 1940s, as research for what would become Disneyland started to ramp up. And Disney would grill the kids at Beverly Park as much as he did Bradley, asking them what kind of rides they liked and what else they would want to see at an amusement park. Bradley’s counsel, in addition to making the park like a second office to Walt (Disney Studios was right nearby), was indispensable to the eventual final product that would become Disneyland.
So indispensable, in fact, that Walt even hired him as a consultant, sending Bradley off to Europe to gather more intel on various theme parks, taking plenty of photos for reference along the way. It was also Bradley who suggested two key theme park innovations that would become staples of all theme parks going forward: 1) that there be a “Main Street” of the park and 2) that themed photo opportunities were offered to patrons.
While some might insist that Disney exploited Bradley or “ripped off” his idea entirely, it can’t be emphasized enough that Bradley was a willing and eager participant in helping the animation mogul birth a new breed of theme park. A theme park that, to this day, remains in a competitive class all its own. As for its blueprint, provided by Bradley, it can be said that inspiration is a cycle. One inspiration begets another, and so and so forth. That much was made clear by the fact that Bradley himself was inspired by the rough-hewn version of an “amusement park” at Venice Pier when he was child.
In 1974, shortly after the 1973 oil crisis that plagued L.A. in particular (see: Licorice Pizza), the Beverly Oil Company announced to Bradley that they were raising the price of the lease. Bradley, both unable to afford the higher price and lacking the same enthusiasm for the park as he once had, did not renew. And it marked the end of an era in L.A.
But while the Beverly Center might have Beverly Park beat in terms of amount of time in existence, it’s the latter that will remain forever in the hearts of people not just in Los Angeles, but all over the world. For Beverly Park is what forged the foundation of Disneyland (though, to be honest, not everyone is grateful for that).
Featured image credit: Jay Jennings, author of BEVERLY PARK: L.A.’s Kiddieland, 1943-74
Genna Rivieccio
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