Dixie Before Disney: 100 Years of Roadside Fun [Paperback]

Tim Hollis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 1, 1999

Before Walt Disney built his mammoth theme park, there were the Fairyland Caverns of Rock City Gardens, the glass-bottomed boats of Silver Springs, and Stuckey's Restaurants around each bend. From the Smoky Mountains to the Ozarks, from the Florida coast to the Mississippi gulf, the Southern roadside was a string of attractions--some based on history, some on pure imagination. Dixie Before Disney chronicles the wonderful and wacky history of these tourist spots.
Tourism rose in Dixie just after the Civil War, when Northern millionaires discovered the joys of spending the winter months in balmy Florida. Locales such as St. Augustine, Daytona Beach, and Miami Beach became snowbird playgrounds. Soon the roadsides were alive with eateries like Kentucky Fried Chicken and Horne's, and motels with names like Big Bear Cottages and the Sea Dip Motel. Later, jungle parks, nature sites, and Wild West towns began drawing funseekers. Then, in 1971, Walt Disney World in Orlando eclipsed them all.
For three decades Tim Hollis gathered family memorabilia and met with collectors nationwide. Lavishly illustrated with his findings--vintage photographs, brochures, advertisements, and postcards--Dixie Before Disney will bring back a torrent of memories for anyone who grew up traveling the South.

Tim Hollis is also the author of Cousin Cliff: 40 Magical Years in Television and of articles in the National Lum & Abner Society's The Jot 'Em Down Journal and the Society of Commercial Archaeologists' News-Journal.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

A certain melancholy strikes halfway through this book when you realize that the majority of the roadside attractions it describes are no longer operating. Fortunately, these gator farms, candy stores, and motor courts have been preserved in postcard collections and treasured brochures, scattered liberally throughout this book. Hollis (Cousin Cliff: Forty Magical Years in Television, Campbells Pub., 1991) writes in a casual yet thorough style that makes him a fine tour guide for the trip. While there is a fair amount of information on the rise of tourism in the South, the majority of the book is concerned with the attractions lining the postwar roadways. There is a great deal to be learned about ourselves by looking at our idea of fun. While the cloth edition seems a bit expensive, this is a good source for anyone planning a trip down memory lane. Recommended for public or academic libraries.Thomas OConnell, Murray State Univ., KY
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From the Inside Flap

A nostalgic look at Southern tourism, with 235 illustrations of favorite stop-off fun spots

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: University Press of Mississippi (April 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1578061180
• ISBN-13: 978-1578061181
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 10 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #577,891 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Travel the South during roadside tourism's golden age, May 25, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Dixie Before Disney: 100 Years of Roadside Fun (Paperback)

During the period between the advent of paved highways and the development of the Interstate highway system, tourism blossomed beside the road across the country. This book focuses on the attractions that sprang up in the southeastern U.S.

Filled with images of postcards and brochures (mostly from the author's personal collection, I would guess from the introduction), this book takes the reader to fairylands, western shootouts, candy stores, motels, and other former staples of the road. The text gives the colorful history of many of these places.

While most of these attractions are just memories, Dixie Before Disney makes them fresher, more vivid memories.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fun, nostalgic trip into the past, June 1, 1999

By 

Charles R. Sexton (Beavercreek, OH) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Dixie Before Disney: 100 Years of Roadside Fun (Paperback)

This book will be of greatest interest to those who traveled south on the old US or state roads before the advent of the Interstate system. It was a period of divergence that existed before the cloning process began to evolve that has made every town look like every other town with chain after chain of look-alike stores and restaurants. Mr. Hollis lovingly recreates those fun stops along the way that remain in the memory years after. The last point he offers is perhaps the most important. He notes we have become a bit jadded with the overabundance of things and things to do and have forgotten the thrill it used to be just to be able to take a long trip somewhere, not to mention the sheer excitement of stopping at one of the roadside fun-sites mentioned in his book. I enjoyed taking the tour and waxing nostalgic for a couple of hours.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Next Stuckeys 15,000 miles!, September 23, 2003

By 

Tony Hughes "stellarossa, From Fear to Flatte... (Cincinnati, Ohio United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Dixie Before Disney: 100 Years of Roadside Fun (Paperback)

To those of us unfortunate enough not to have been alive during the period this book encapsulates, Hollis brings it to life with this thoroughly well researched tome regarding the roadside attractions that littered the South before the Disney Corp came to central Florida.

Pre Disney, pre interstate, pre most things, some of the attractions are cute, some look awful and other just downright bizarre. I wholeheartedly recommed this book for adult readers of any age.