In 1968, Disney actor Fess Parker, who played Davy Crockett, announced plans to build Frontier Worlds in Northern Kentucky. Several years later, Gary Wachs would place a picture in his office of the park during the 1964 flood with the caption, “Kings Island was conceived here.” The 1964 flood would end up costing Coney more than $150,000 in clean up and repair costs. To drive home the trouble that the close proximity to the Ohio River caused, the Ohio flooded in 1964, and crested at 66’, fourteen feet above flood stage. And Sunlite Pool would cost $2 million to relocate, when it was constructed in 1925, it had cost only $400,000. In 1964, Gary Wachs had estimated that it would cost $20 million to reproduce/relocated Coney Island. Both financially and in terms of the amount of time that was required to prepare the park for visitors in the spring after a flood. There was a lack of room to grow due to the Ohio River to the south, the Coney Island Race track (now Riverdowns) to the east, and the southern Ohio hills to the north.Īdditionally, as the amusement rides became more complex, the constant spring flooding became more of a burden on the park. Because of the increasing amount of visitors who visited Coney by car, more space was needed for parking lots. At one point in time, excursion boats such as the Island Queen brought as many as 1/3 of Coney`s customers to the park. The long lineage of steam ships that had transported visitors from downtown Cincinnati was essentially discontinued after the Island Queen blew up in Pittsburgh in September of 1947. In the 1960s, the primary mode of transportation to the park was by car and busses. Eventually, Ralph Wachs` son, Gary would begin working at the park, and assisting in running the park. Wachs had worked several years hand in hand with Edward Schott so that the transition to Wachs would proceed smoothly. Upon his death, Ralph Wachs, his son in law, took over the helm at Coney Island.
Schott died in 1962, and had worked as president of Coney Island from 1935 until his death. Edward Schoot, George`s son, took over control of the park. Schott ran the park until his sudden death on Jwhen meeting with some business men in Moonlite Gardens after the park had closed for the night. After Rud Hynicka died in 1927 of a heart attack, George F. This began a forty five year family ownership of the park from John Winslow Hubbard. By the 1960s, it contained approximately 165 acres. By 1926, the amusement resort had grown to 139.22 acres. McIntyre in 1886, who officially opened Coney Island on June 21st, 1886. The park had grown tremendously from the original 19.729 acres that James Parker had purchased for $2,500 in 1866, which he eventually turned into a picnic grove before selling the park to William F. It had the dubious slogan of being “America`s Finest Amusement Park.” But the seeds of change were in the wings. Coney Island was the amusement park in the Cincinnati area in the 1960s.
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