Fun at the Old Cedar Point

Imagine being able to travel back in time to visit your favorite amusement park during its earliest years. Or to be able to experience all of the rides that made up an amusement park from the 1930s. Fun at the Old Cedar Point by Glenn D. Everett is a fantastic trip back in time to experience Cedar Point in 1935 from the perspective of a frequent visitor and amusement operator.

Cedar Point in 1935

Fun at the Old Cedar Point is a reprint of a title originally released in 1989. Ken Miller, the author of Rolling Through the Years, worked with Mr. Everett’s estate to have the out-of-print title re-printed and included some updated photos.  The book is an incredibly detailed visit to Cedar Point from 1935. Mr. Everett worked at Cedar Point as a teen and his father owned The Tumble Inn funhouse. This gave Mr. Everett the time to experience every nook and cranny of Cedar point during the 1930s. He also spends a good portion of the book explaining, in rich detail, the entire funhouse experience. Honestly, the description of the rides are worth the cover price of the book!  There are so many inside stories about the rides, games of chance, and general atmosphere of Cedar Point, that you will feel like you’re on the visit as well. And if you’ve ever been curious about how some of the carnival games worked, Mr. Everett does pull back the curtain to explain how they worked. Many of the rides can’t be experienced any longer, so the opportunity to read a narrative about them is priceless.

The Cedar Point Beach, the Breakers Hotel, and Other Points of Interest

After touring all of the attractions offered during the 1935 summer season, the author takes us to the beach to experience another facet of Cedar Point. This was well before the time when you could wear your bathing suit under your clothes. Back then, you were required to rent a bathing suit and use the many bathhouses to change. Mr. Everett also shares what it was like to frolic on the beach.  We also get a short visit to the Breakers Hotel and see how visitors and staff enjoyed the resort. Mr. Everett pulls back the curtains and shares details about the infrastructure of the resorts, including bringing 100-pound blocks of ice, coal, and food to the resort for guests and staff.  Mr. Everett finishes up the trip to the past with a look at big bands, the penny arcade, and the peep shows of the time. It’s interesting to see how morals and societal expectations changed through time. Sadly, we have to end our trip, and Mr. Everett shares what it was like to leave Cedar Point as we board the G.A. Boeckling and head towards Sandusky across the bay.

Why Should I Buy Fun at the Old Cedar Point?

The book is a treasure trove of information about Cedar Point from the 1930s. Obviously, any fan of Cedar Point will cherish the title. Amusement park historians and fans will devour this title and use it as a touchstone for information about the rides, how’s, and experiences of a golden era amusement park. This book will be adored for many years to come. Honestly, my only issue with the book is the lack of an index (but after co-authoring the Magic Kingdom encyclopedia, I understand the amount of work an index requires). I also would have loved more photos, but photos can be difficult to obtain.  So, yes, grab a copy of this book and enjoy the trip back in time to 1935 Cedar Point. It’s a wonderful trip through time and I am so glad that Mr. Everett wrote it and 1870 Publishing Group for re-printing the title.

George Taylor

http://www.imaginerding.com/

I’ve enjoyed being a writer/author, ever since I was in fifth grade when our teacher, Mrs. Redd, led our class in creative writing exercises. As I matured, both as a person and as a writer, I found so many ways to prepare to write a story: culling through research material; hours of interviewing a subject; and of course using my total imagination. I’ve used all three, as most writers have.

I read “Fun at the Old Cedar Point” last summer and the author took a totally different approach. The readers climb aboard a time machine to experience a summer day in an amusement park 54 years earlier. It’s not a science fiction story. It’s time travel back to a one-day experience at Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. Written by Glenn D. Everett in 1989, it’s a journey of his own memories of that one-day long ago. Imagine being able to travel back in time to visit your favorite amusement park during its earliest years. 

The book was reprinted with additional photos and a new cover by Ken Miller’s 1870 Publishing Group earlier this year.

The journey is quite vivid. Everett paints a poetic picture of what a day at Cedar Point was like in 1935. His description serves as a private tour of not only the park, but of the world around us. Everett worked at Cedar Point as a teen and his father owned “The Tumble Inn” funhouse, so he knew the territory well.

With Everett as our guide, we travel with him to the park. I feel as if I am walking next to him as he includes me in his narrative, referring to “we” quite often. This is a journey back in time, led by a person with knowledge of the present, which allows him to comment on things he would not have known about in 1935, such as wars, advancement of ride technology, and the change in parkgoers themselves.

Following a ride on the “Chute the Rapids,” we hustle over to “Leap the Dips” roller coaster, before making our way to the “Caterpillar.” After a visit to the funhouse, we head to the beach where Everett points out all the lovely girls frolicking in Lake Erie. Then we are off to the peep shows, freak shows, and a flea circus. Later, as the girls attend a fashion show in the Hotel Breakers, we and the rest of the boys run off to watch the shows, where the ticket seller is quite “liberal in checking driver’s licenses to make sure we were 18 years of age.”

As Everett first wrote in 1989, the acceptance in 1935 of the peep shows at a family amusement facility highlights how morals and societal expectations have changed through time.

History telling through a time machine is a clever method. Well played, but I don’t think my agent could sell that concept today to a publisher. As I read Everett’s colorful prose, I visualized the park as I first knew it in 1965 while he whetted my appetite to Cedar Point in the 1930’s. Now, if I could only find the door to that time machine!

Tim O'Brien

Funworld Magazine, December 2022

http://www.IAAPA.org

Tim O’Brien is a veteran attractions journalist and longtime Funworld contributor. He is the author of many books chronicling the industry’s attractions and personalities. He is the only journalist inducted into the IAAPA Hall of Fame.