Memories of Mountain Park, Holyoke

"This thing all things devours:
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats high mountain down."

this quote is from the book "The Hobbit" by JRR Tolkien. it's a riddle posed by Gullom to Frodo, who responded frantically with "I need more time!" TIME being the answer.

I open this blog entry with this because over the summer - during a week vacation in the month of august - I made a pilgrimage to Holyoke, MA to bask in the presence of a childhood memory taken away by the hands of TIME. that memory was an amusement park called Mountain Park.

Mountain Park (MP) [1, 2] was once situated on the side of Mount Tom, Holyoke. it opened in 1890, and it had been there nearly 100 years. but due to financial difficulties, and perhaps a lack of interest in keeping the park operational, then owner, Jay Collins, decided to shut MP down in 1987. that was my freshman year of high school. not once did it ever occur in my mind to think that it would ever be closed for good. in fact the decision to close was quite fast and without any warning.

during the mid to late '80s MP wasn't the most elaborate amusement park around compared to other amusement parks like Whalom Park, Canobie Lake Park, Rocky Point, and Riverside (known today as Six Flags New England). but it wasn't without its charm. MP was decorated with aging art and decor from the early life of the park (circa 1897) to designs from the late '70s ~ early '80s.

the park's carousel - dated from the earliest years of MP - carried with it beautiful artworks that would serve just as well as framed paintings in a museum.

after the closing of MP, the carousel did survive extinction. it was moved to the town center of Holyoke where it operates to this day as one of the oldest carousels in the U.S. now known as The Holyoke Merry-Go-Round.

most of the coolest (and darkest) artworks, during the later years of MP, were found on two specific rides; the Pirate's Den, and the Dinosaurs Den.

these rides are (or were) called "dark rides"; a completely enclosed passive coaster ride that moves slowly along a track from one darken room to the next, bumping through double doors, taking left or rights turns. the riders would observe spooky animatronics and visual effects over haunting soundtracks.

i grew up always having an over-active imagination. the hellish and dark images depicted on the outside of the buildings that housed these rides were enough to keep me from riding, but not enough to keep me from standing outside fixated on the artwork with my curiosity wondering what i would see inside.

both the Pirate's Den, and the Dinosaurs Den were two of three rides i never rode until the final days of the park. in the summer of 1986 when i was 12 years old, i finally decided to ride them both. i remember feeling pretty anxious simply because i didn't know what to expect during the rides. it turned out to be quite fun, and i can't remember how many times i went back on each ride.

another ride i waited too late to truly enjoy was the main roller coaster, the Mountain Park Flyer [1, 2].

a wooden roller coaster that stretched alongside of the park. as a kid i had a fear of heights that kept me off the Flyer, but in the end i managed to get over it. getting on the Flyer that first time would begin of my love of roller coasters.

most of the rides in MP were pretty standard rides you'd find anywhere else, even today. recently i visited Canobie Lake Park, and was surprised to see a hand-full of the same kinds of rides that i remembered as a kid at MP still employed today.

though MP is gone, it seems that it may make something of a come-back. Eric Suher, a native of Holyoke, and owner of the Iron Horse Music Hall, the Pearl Street Nightclub and the Calvin Theater in Northampton, bought the property of MP and wants to "bring Mountain Park back to what we remember it being." i'm not sure exactly what that means, but the current plan is to hold outdoor concert venues [1, 2] there. i guess time will tell as to whether or not this memorable mountain site will ever be rebuilt to its old glory, though i'm sure it won't have the same charm i remembered as a kid.

the land where MP once stood - what little trace of the amusement park that once existed - has now been cleared and renovated to accommodate these concert venues. but before the bulldozers and the hardhats, all that remained of MP was nothing more than a desolate land [1, 2]. a ghost town with the remnants of corroded lumber and rusted steal beams of building structures hardly recognizable. vegetation's growing with the dominating force of nature within areas where concrete once paved the way from one enjoyment to the next. the tall iconic skeletal frame of the Flyer torn down succumbing to the will of gravity as its coaster carts once did.

my pilgrimage to the land of MP was short lived due to the construction activity. but from the little i was able to see the only thing that was left was a sign posted on one of the utility poles at the parking entrance. it was difficult to read the faded words "The Great Slide Show". the paint had very little life left.

"This thing all things devours:
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats high mountain down."

this quote is from the book "The Hobbit" by JRR Tolkien. it's a riddle posed by Gullom to Frodo, who responded frantically with "I need more time!"

TIME being the answer.

the very TIME that faded Mountain Park into our memories. :(

peace,
@riel