Time to put Asheville’s Walt Disney myth to bed

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

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Joshua P. Warren, Asheville’s ghost hunter and explorer of all things weird and unexplained, declared last week that Walt Disney never worked in Asheville. His announcement came in conjunction with a new exhibit up at his cool museum in downtown Asheville just around the corner from Pack’s Tavern.

It was good of Warren to put the myth to bed, but he’s not the first do so. The Asheville Citizen-Times started it all with a story it printed in the 1960s, and folks have been debunking it ever since. Here’s part of my column today about the persistent story:

The Disney myth has its roots in a December 1966 story in the Asheville Citizen, headlined “Disney Worked as a Draftsman here.”

The story, which followed the death of Disney, quoted the widow of Cox, who “struggled with her memory” but said Disney worked for her husband.

The story also quoted local office supply man Red Hoyle, who ran errands as a kid near the offices where Disney supposedly worked.

The story got repeated time and again by other writers, and by other Asheville residents.

It also got twisted. In 2003, an antiques dealer in the Grove Arcade was peddling a writing desk he advertised as being the desk that Disney used while he worked – at the Asheville Citizen.