StoryTown USA

Any remembrances of this Lake George, NY theme park?

Whoops, I posted in the wrong forum. Sorry.

[ Edited by: SoBeTiki on 2002-11-22 08:35 ]

Do you need a thread guide?
Are you collecting this theme park?
Do you want us to collect this theme park?
Possibly "BEYOND TIKI"

AWESOME postcard. I love it...

I know nothing about it, though...

Okay, you made me curious, so I did a little quick searching.

Seems the remains of the themepark that this postcard is from, Storytown U.S.A. still lives in the bowels of the megacorporate 6 Flags Great Escape: http://www.sixflags.com/parks/greatescape/ParkPress/article_history.html

But once upon a time, it looks like it was quite the Route 66-style homemade attraction. Great postcard pics here: http://theimaginaryworld.com/st.html (dig the big blue Tiki in the center of the bottom row!

There's a brochure for the place on Ebay right now: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=736429357

And I also found this great little moonshine jug from the park: http://pages.tias.com/7815/PictPage/1920903262.html

Thanks for the thread. Fun to research!

Great stuff - I love those vintage "Roadside America" type attractions... There were so many of them - small time business people trying to make their own version of Disneyland, but on a smaller & more intimate scale...

Thanks for all those links, which proves again that the "direct link" feature is one of the best aspects of Tiki Central. Makes for fun net surfing!

Sven-

I read your post on this thread in the main dicussion area. According to the Great Escape site, Jungle Land still pretty much exists as it once was. With any luck, that may include the Witco carvings! You should prompt one of the tiki faithful in NY to drive over Saturday and take a gander.

If you look at the pdf park map on the link below, you'll see that the signature entrance building is still shown. What you can't tell is if it's still in mint condition...

http://www.sixflags.com/parks/greatescape/KidsAndFamilies/index.html

This is totally amazing. The combination of Bigfoot chic and Polynesian Pop is making me all a-quiver!

totally of Tiki Topic but a cool site for those long-lost little amusement parks:

Remembering Frontier Village:

http://frontiervillage.net/

Pretty cool site. Lots of great pics.

Hanford

There still is a Frontier Town in Lake George NY (as of about 4 years ago) next to Storyland (or what's left of it.) As I said in the main discussion board, I visited there as a child (complete with Roy Rogers outfit.) Loads of rotin', tootin' fun. pard!

Sorry for reactivating a very old thread but there were some things in this thread, I just couldn't let go. :D

What the original picture shows is entrance to Jungleland which was part of Storytown USA. (Sort of like TommorowLand is part of Disney World.) Jungleland was a walkthrough attraction that was supposed to show the African jungle complete with animals, warriors, cheifs and temples. (All statue type things.) As the years went by other attractions were added to it. There was a large swing bridge and a huge Polynesian fertility god statue added. Then parts started to get old and the owners at the time (Premier Parks who bought out Six Flags and took over the name) didn't really want to pay for upkeep not to mention there were something in it that were considered politically incorrect. Last time I was at the park (called Great Escape since the early 80's)Jungleland was still open. The entrance looks pretty much the same but the moving & talking (audioanimitronics) animals & people were gone. The fertility god was in a section that was cordoned off and the only thing that was really there was the swing bridge.

But the biggest thing I needed to touch on with this post was the comment that this was a roadside attraction that was hoping to be like Disneyland. That is incorrect. News stories attribute Storytown's owner (Charles Wood) as being an inspiration for Walt Disney and Storytown opened a few years before Disneyland.

Also FrontierTown was in North Hudson, NY about an hour north of Lake George and closed in 1999 finally. (Bits and pieces of it closed down years before.) The two parks were not related. But Charley Wood did own another little amusement park in the village of Lake George (Gaslight Village) and someone bought FrontierTown's sign and put it up at a store a few miles up the road from Storytown/Great Escape.

[ Edited by: StorytownFan 2007-10-09 18:54 ]

[ Edited by: StorytownFan 2007-10-09 18:59 ]

Wow, that IS an old thread! I was once considering using that top postcard in Tiki Modern....Witco's male and female dancer are flanking the entrance, after all!