Used to Be: One of Walt Disney's great experiments in expansion: A year-round, indoor amusement park in a cold-weather city. Or, as Disney called it: "An open-air playground in keeping with the demands of Denver's cosmopolitan and thoroughly discriminating population.” Opening in 1960 as Celebrity Lanes, Disney offered an 80-lane bowling alley, a massive indoor swimming pool, restaurants and a health salon. The name was a nod to an initial ownership group that included Jack Benny, George Burns, Gracie Allen, Burl Ives, Bing Crosby, Spike Jones, Art Linkletter — and Walt Disney. The seven-acre site at Kentucky Avenue and Colorado Boulevard had been a veterinary clinic owned by Leonard and Dorothy Peavy. The Denver Post reported that the bowling equipment, which cost $1.25 million alone, was “the largest single order for such equipment in U.S. history,” and included seating for 2,000. The 165-foot-long swimming pool had a removable skylight. (Three popular water slides were added in 1980.) The penny arcade and game rooms were patterned after the original Disneyland, and included a shooting gallery, pinball games, billiards, bumper-car rides and basement slot-car tracks covering 13,500 square feet. Completion of the original design cost $6 million. By 1962, all other financial investors wanted out, but Disney had his reasons to remain as sole owner of Celebrity Lanes, which he renamed “Celebrity Sports Center." This whole project was a dry run for his much greater ambition: He was creating the blueprint for Walt Disney World in Florida. Celebrity was a training ground for future Disney World employees for decades. His intent was to sell a wholesome, crime-free environment to families. When he once saw train operator being rude to a guest, Disney is said to have said: "We’re selling happiness.” Despite Disney's death in 1966, his corporation did not sell Celebrity until 1979, and for just $1.9 million. After several ownership transfers, the Acquisition Corporation of the Rockies bought Celebrity for $10.8 million in 1994, tore it down the next year and replaced it with a $20 million retail center anchored by Builder’s Square and Best Buy stores.
Is now: Still retail, anchored by a Home Depot, Staples and Whole Foods. The Denver Post remembered Celebrity as a "uniquely Denver landmark," whose demolition left a "void...that cannot be filled."
Today: The wood in the old bowling lanes at Celebrity were re-used for the restoration of the Oxford Hotel in downtown Denver, now serving as the floor of the hotel's ballroom. At least one of the 14-point stars from the iconic outdoor sign is used today as a winter holiday decoration at the Lumber Baron Inn in Denver.