A-E Tickets - Information On Disneyland Park Anaheim, California

Did you know that once upon a time you had to pay for every Disney ride you went on? That's right, the modern day "admission price" we know today wasn't always a "pay once, ride all day" deal. When Disneyland Park first opened you would buy coupons for the rides. These coupons came in a ticket book and so guests called them tickets.

Each ticket was assigned a letter from A to E that would describe the value of the ticket, and thus the overall entertainment and thrill factor of the ride or attraction it would be used on. A Tickets would be the cheapest and likely provide the fewest thrills while E Tickets would be the most costly and be reserved for the top rides.

Although prices would change over the years, in the 1970's an average A Ticket price would run around 10 cents while an E Ticket would cost 85 cents. It's bad enough when I have to climb up Tarzan's Treehouse today for free, but back in the 70's I think I'd be pretty grumpy if I had to shell out a B Ticket (25 cents back then) to go up there! I mean, that was a $1.00 in 1970's money for a family of 4 to walk up and down stairs!

A Tickets
Examples of how an A Ticket could be used would be on rides and attractions like the Main Street Vehicles, Sleeping Beauty Castle Walkthrough, or King Arthur Carrousel.

B Tickets
B Tickets weren't exactly for anything overly exciting and would be used on attractions like Main Street Cinema, Casey Jr. Circus Train, Alice in Wonderland, and Tarzan's Treehouse. Notice how Alice in Wonderland is in the B group and if you read my review of it you'll understand why my rating is so low. Even Disney knew this ride was sub-par!

C Tickets
Moving up a notch, the C Tickets start to get into the rides that I would consider more fun. These coupons could be used on rides like Mad Tea Party, Autopia, Snow White's Scary Adventures, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, and Dumbo the Flying Elephant. Okay, they're not all spectacular rides but you can see how the overall ride quality and fun goes up with the ticket price.

D Tickets
If you had D Tickets to spare you could hop on rides like the Disneyland Railroad - Main Street Station (or any of the other stations), Davy Crockett’s Explorer Canoes, Storybook Land Canal Boats, and even the awesome (to me) PeopleMover which no longer exists at Disneyland Park.

E Tickets
Enter the E Ticket. E-Tickets or E-Coupons were reserved for the best of the best at Disneyland Park. These were the big time and your ticket (quite literally) to good times. Some E Ticket Attractions included the Matterhorn Bobsleds, Disneyland Monorail - Tomorrowland Station, Jungle Cruise, It's A Small World, and two of the best ever rides which are Pirates Of The Caribbean and Haunted Mansion.

Over time, E Ticket became a term to describe the best of the best and was used quite heavily even outside the Disney parks. Even today, when a new ride like Radiator Springs Racers is built the term E-Ticket is used to describe the level of detail, fun, and overall thrill and excitement the attraction will provide.

Today, coupons / tickets are no longer used and they haven't been since 1982 when Disney completely switched over to the single price for admission system. Of course, with the invention of FastPass it's almost like we're coming full circle to some degree. With FastPass, you basically have a ticketing system to get on the best "E Ticket" rides in the park (though FastPasses are free with admission and usually reserved for the best rides that have long lines). In the future, an upgraded version called FastPass+ is sure to hit the California parks (like it has in Florida) and we'll be back to tickets for rides (luckily we still won't have to shell out extra cash per ride).