A Historical Study Of California’s Tourism Industry (1960-1980)

Tourism is an indispensabale part in service industry in the United States. Itreflects the nation’s lifestyle of majority of people. With the development of theglobal economy, the growth of recreational awareness, and the rapid advancementof transportation after World War II, American tourism moved into a period ofpopular tourism and its economic and social impact became increasingly obvious.California, occupying the largest population in the United States, itsgovernmental and corporate leaders, seeking to promote tourist industry,embarked upon an ambitious program of physical renewal of tourism in the yearsafter World War II. This dissertation examines the growth of tourism as a strategyfor downtown renewal in California by employing a great deal of raredeclassified documents and some second-handed book for reference. Thepurpose is to trace the development and changing of tourism in California, toreveal how tourism influences the california’s economy, and as a result, tohighlight the role of tourism in economy and provides reference for thedevelopment of some tourist districts in China.Arrangement of Contents is as the following:The preface lays out theorigins and make up of the materials and analyzed the related study and data; theopening section introduces the early development of California’s tourism, itcontains the regional natural geographical features, its early history, its initialprominence and its establishment and development as a national state; the secondsection highlights the principal components of California’s high road todevelopment in tourism after world war II. It details the objective opportunitiesfor the rise of tourism, the active promotion and strategic positioning forcalifornia’s economy by federal or state’s elites, and the primary channels oftourism; The third part provides the tourism’s progress and periodic features; thefourth section sums up the significant impact of tourism upon the overalleconomy and development in California; the concluding section reviews andsummarize the viewpoints of the dissertation.