By John Eckberg
The Cincinnati Enquirer

With Comcast's hostile takeover of Disney gaining traction, some civic leaders in Amberley Village still think back to the 1980s - the last time Disney fended off a suitor - and wonder about what might have been: Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy setting up shop at the Gibson Greetings plant and headquarters in Amberley Village.

According to the book Storming the Magic Kingdom: Wall Street, the Raiders and the Battle for Disney by John Taylor (Knopf, 1987: out of print), Disney sought protection from a hostile takeover in the mid-1980s by pursuing the purchase of Gibson Greetings.

A stock-for-stock deal would have diluted the holdings of financier Saul Steinberg, who was leading the takeover.

Disney executives surreptitiously came to Amberley Village one Memorial Day weekend in the mid-1980s when they knew no workers would be on hand to watch them evaluate the Gibson plant and grounds.

In the end, according to the book, major Disney shareholders walked away from the deal, but not before paying Gibson backers a $7.5 million kill fee and giving the company exclusive rights to merchandise Disney characters.

American Greetings then bought Gibson and agreed to a sale-leaseback agreement with current building owner W.P. Carey, a New York City-based equity firm with $3.5 billion in equity and assets of $6 billion.