Riverview Park Ride Tickets

You never know what fun things you'll find as you search your local thrift ships. Today, I found this very cool framed photo of Riverview Park with 18 ride tickets. I didn't know anything about Riverview Park. A quick google search and I found this: Riverview Park was an amusement park in  Chicago, Illinois which operated from 1904 to 1967. It was located on 74 acres on Chicago's north side. Among its ride collection, it had 6 roller coasters.

The ride tickets included with this framed picture are: 

Tilt-A-Whirl

Wild Mouse [Wild Mouse coaster]

Chutes [Shoot the Chutes old fashioned water ride]

Comet [Roller Coaster]

Bobs [Wooden Roller Coaster]

Boomerang

Water Bug

Pair-O-Chutes

Aladdin's Castle [Fun house]

Rollo Plane

Jet Stream [Wooden Roller Coaster - Philadelphia Toboggan Company]

Flying Turns [Wooden bobsled ride]

Space Ride

Tunnel of Love

Flash [Silver Flash Roller Coaster]

Miniature R.R. [ Coal-fired miniature steam engine]

Fireball [Roller Coaster]

Bump 'Em [Bumper cars]

A Couple of Disaster Novels

Ok... who doesn't enjoy a good disaster movie? I know I do! Here are two great novels I found recently based on a couple of disasters. One is based on a movie, and the other is the basis of a movie "coming soon".
Roller Coaster is a novel by Burton Wohl and based on a screenplay by Richard Levinson & William Link. I am actually very interested in seeing this movie as I am a big coaster fan and was a subscriber of the Coaster Radio podcast. When the movie was rereleased on DVD a year or two ago, they did a podcast commentary that you could listen to while watching the movie. Being as I found the Coaster Radio guys so much fun to listen to, I am dying to get a copy of the movie so I can watch the flick while listening to their commentary. The problem is I am having a tough time finding any video rental places around town that have a copy of Roller Coaster. It looks like I will have to finally break down and buy a copy from Amazon.ca.
The second novel is The Tower by Richard Martin Stern. The cover of the book says "Coming soon as Irwin Allen's productions of The Towering Inferno. A film based in part on this novel". This movie I remember seeing the Towering Inferno at the Drive In back in the 70's, and still enjoy watching it any time its on TV.
Since I found these, I have been keeping my eyes open for novel versions of Earthquake and Airport to fill out my disaster novel collection.

Coaster Mania

Today I was listening to the current Coaster Radio episode "#223 - All Good Things..." in which the hosts were talking about that fact that they were thinking of ending the show after two seasons of weekly podcasts.
I know how hard it can be doing something such as the podcast for such a long time - I did Firehouse Magazine for 18 years! Although I will miss the podcast for which I have become accustomed to listening to each week, I can understand that nothing can last forever. The fact that they could do a weekly podcast (for free no less) for two seasons is to be commended.
If you have any interested in roller coasters and/or theme parks, you will want to check out their site where you can download and listen to the current show as well as all the past episodes.
If you don't know what a podcast is, in simple terms, its a like a radio show that you can download to your computer to listen to any time you want.
And speaking of things that don't last forever, the Scream Machine coaster that was here in Vancouver at Expo 86, was removed shortly after the Expo was over. The Scream Machine was moved to Six Flags St. Louis and is now known as the Ninja.
Here is a great photo of the Scream Machine coaster from a promotional kit I found a few years ago.

A little bit of trivia: The Scream Machine was used for the establishing shots in the "Terror on the Hell Loop 2000" episode of Get A Life, one of my all time favorite TV shows.

Playland at the PNE

I have been collecting promotional flyers and brochures for as long as I can remember. I'm always happy to add a new promo brochure to my collection. Today I picked up the new 2006 Playland brochure. Playland is the amusement area at the PNE (Pacific National Exhibition).

Playland is your basic exhibition midway with the usual assortment of rides, with one exception. Playland's signature attraction the large wooden coaster named "The Coaster" was designed by Carl Phare and built in 1958, is an ACE Coaster Classic. If you are a fan of coasters, this is a 'must ride'.
As a child, I would always visit the PNE during the summer. It was worth the admission price for 3 things; The Coaster, The Smash Up Derby, and "Those Mini Donuts". The PNE has undergone many changes over the years, which for me have made the experience less appealing. The number one being the elimination of the smash up derby - I'm guessing because of environmental concerns (watching the smoke belch out of those cars was half the fun!). Nowadays, I wait until the last few weeks of Playland sometime at the end of September, and I go first thing in the morning on a Sunday. I usually have the place to myself and am able to ride most of the rides as many times in a row as I like before moving on to the next. Last time I went, I spent about 1 hour on the bumper cars, having fun as they brought me a fresh batch of victims every 5 minutes!

Abandoned Amusement Parks

I love amusement parks, and I also love seeing old abandoned things such as Drive Ins and old buildings etc. So the other night when I stumbled upon a web site full of photos of old abandoned amusement parks, I was thrilled to say the least! I have no recollection of how I found this site, and as you will see if you click the link for yourself, the site is in a foreign language (perhaps Japanese). But if you are like me and love seeing photos of old rusty roller coasters and overgrown fields with amusement rides in them, then this is a site you will want to check out, even without being able to read whats on the pages.
I am not sure of the web sites name, but check out all the great photos of abandoned amusement parks and other stuff.
Here are just a few of the amazing photos you will find on the site.