Answer: Ray Bradbury

In the 1960s cartoonist and theme park visionary Walt Disney met Sci-Fi writer and futurist Ray Bradbury. The two hit it off almost immediately as a result of their shared interest in progress and the potential of the future.

In the late 1970s when Walt Disney was laying the groundwork for Epcot–a park intended to serve as a monument to human achievement and diversity–he enlisted the help of Bradbury to develop and design an attraction focused on the history of communication. This attraction became the giant and iconic golf-ball like structure known as Spaceship Earth.

If ever there was a person to match Walt Disney’s passion about the potential of the future, it was certainly Bradbury. In an interview with OMNI magazine shortly after the park opened, Bradbury explained the allure of it:

Everyone in the world will come to these gates. Why? Because they want to look at the world of the future. They want to see how to make better human beings. That’s what the whole thing is about. The cynics are already here and they’re terrifying one another. What Disney is doing is showing the world that there are alternative ways to do things that can make us all happy. If we can borrow some of the concepts of Disneyland and Disney World and Epcot, then indeed the world can be a better place.

We can only hope that in the intervening 30 years between the opening of the park and his death at the admirable age of 91, Mr. Bradbury saw the hope Disney and he shared for the future unfolding.