Retlaw Enterprises

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Retlaw Enterprises is a privately held company owned by the heirs of entertainment mogul Walt Disney. Disney formed the company to control the rights to his name and to manage two Disneyland attractions that he personally owned. It is the successor company to WED Enterprises.

[edit] History

Retlaw was formed after Walt Disney Productions, bought WED Enterprises. Walt Disney created WED Enterprises in December 1952 to oversee the design of his theme park, Disneyland. He also assigned the rights to his name and likeness to the company as well as ownership of two Disneyland attractions, the Disneyland Railroad and the Disneyland Monorail, that Disney personally owned. The theme park design business, now known as Imagineering, became so integral to the Disney studio's operations that the studio bought it in January 1965.

Walt Disney kept the rights to his name and to the two theme park attractions, however, and on February 5, 1965, he assigned those properties to a new company, Retlaw Enterprises. (Retlaw is Walter spelled backwards). Retlaw paid rent for the attractions' rights-of-way and employed the attraction administrators. It also owned the small apartment atop the fire house on Main Street, U.S.A. Finally, in 1982, the Disney family sold the naming rights and rail-based attractions to the Disney film studio for 818,461 shares of Disney stock. The remaining divisions of Retlaw, after the majority of the company was sold to Walt's larger public company, were several television stations and real estate holdings that continue to be owned by the Disney family. ^[1]

In 1999 Retlaw sold its remaining 11 television stations to Fisher Communications, including all of the related assets to those propersties. ^[2]

In 2005 the remaining divisions of Retlaw officially became part of the Walt Disney Family Foundation, a non-profit organization led by Diane Disney Miller.^[1]

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