More Flags and Springs

I found two more brochures that are related to two other posts that I've posted this month. First here's a 1977 brochure to Six Flags Over Texas...

This Six Flags brochure prominently features Professor Cyrus Cosmo, which the internet tells me was character created exclusively for the park.  It's reported Professor Cyrus Cosmo came into existence because Six Flag's contract with Sid and Marty Krofft and there characters ended. I wonder if Six Flags Over Texas once had a Krofft puppet show like Kings Island had?

Lastly is another brochure for Silver Springs this time from 1993...

Zorayda Castle

It's June, and that means it's almost time for summer vacation!  As a public service to those who might be planning a big summer vacation trip I thought I'd dig into my stack of vintage brochures and see if I can could come up with some interesting travel destination ideas. 

If someone asks for a list of "World Famous" castles one may think of Windsor Castle, Cinderella Castle or even White Castle.  Or maybe it's just possible someone might think of Zorayda Castle in St. Augustine, Florida...

 
... it says "World Famous" right on the front of the brochure.

Let's take a look at what's inside...

Cool, there's a "SACRED CAT RUG" that's over 2300 years old, and is said to possess a curse.  Heck there's even a "MUMMY'S FOOT!"  Personally I always thought The Mummy's Foot was one of the weaker Universal horror classics.

If you would like to see the "SACRED CAT RUG" you are in luck, it's still on display at what today is called the Villa Zorayda Museum.  If you should visit please let me know if they still have that mummy's foot.

Geauga Lake

I haven't posted a brochure in a long while, so let's take a look at this 1978 brochure for the now defunct Geauga Lake amusement park in Aurora, Ohio...

 As you can see 1978 was the first year for the Corkscrew.  The Internet tells me the Corkscrew lasted from 1978 to 1995.  The roller coaster now resides in India at an amusement park called MGM Dizzee World where it's reportedly been re-named "Roller Coaster."

 

Admission in 1978 was $6.50, and adjusted for inflation that's only $23.15 in 2013 dollars.  How many amusement parks in North America have an admission of less than $25 today?   

Mammoth Cave Wax Museum Brochure

Let's celebrate Independence Day by visiting Mammoth Cave Wax Museum in Cave City, KY. It's appropriate since you can see the cover of this early 80's brochure proclaims "AMERICA'S HERITAGE EXCITINGLY ALIVE."  Albeit it's "EXCITINGLY ALIVE" as much as wax can be...

This next page folds out to show you many of the American historical figures and early movie stars on display.  There's even Jesus too for good measure.

While you're at the Mammoth Cave Wax Museum be sure to check out the Huckleberry Hill Craft Village next door - they even have a 17 foot great white shark.  It's fake, but it's still big and scary.

If you were thinking about visiting you can stop looking at that map above. Mammoth Cave Wax Museum closed it's doors last year, and it's contents were auctioned off a few months ago.

For fun I looked up the auction house, and learned how much some of the figures went for:

Charlie Chaplin - $25,000.00 (highest price for a wax figure)

Jean Harlow - $16,000.00

Rudolph Valentino - no price listed

Jesus went for only $1,000.00.  That's very affordable to have your own personal Jesus. A little Depeche Mode humor for you (very little).

Kings Island Brochure 1976

Still more Kings Island.  It's been a month-long event here, and now it's time for the 1976 brochure...

The above page has a lot of cool stuff, for example, look at that shot of the Kenton's Cove Keelboat Canal...

I don't know about you, but that looks like a 100 foot drop, or at least that's what it looked like to me when I was a kid. Shockingly, my mother rode this with the rest of the family, and she was one to shy away from them thrill rides

Next, and to the best of my knowledge it's the only picture on the ultra-nets from this Kings Island show in existence. It's a picture of the marionettes from the Krofft Puppet Theater...

FUN FACT: The Krofft Puppet Theater was in an inflatable red building. (Can it truly be called a "building" if it's inflatable?)  You can see this building in the first couple of seconds of this Partridge Family music video.  EXTRA FUN FACT: I only recently learned that the Brady's weren't the only 70's TV family to visit Kings Island...


Back to the Krofft Puppet Theater...  I don't remember much about the show.  Basically the only thing I vaguely remember was a Frankenstein Monster skit.  If I remember correctly, it was a black-light segment with the monster's table/slab on the right side of the stage.  A jaunty tune played as a row of disembodied hands past the parts of the creature from the left side of the stage down to the table.  Once assembled the creature rose from the slab and walked into the audience.  That was a neat trick. I was slightly alarmed that Frankenstein was walking into audience, but to my relief he didn't come near me.

Now it's time for the giant fold-out...

 

Kings Island Brochure 1979

Since I recently posted the 1979 Kings Island souvenir booklet, here's the 1979 Kings Island brochure. Unfortunately I think this brochure was damaged in a coffee spill so it's a little less than mint condition...  

1979 was the year the giant wooden coaster "The Beast" debuted at Kings Island.  Today The Beast is renowned as one of the greatest roller coasters ever built, but totally lost in the mists of time is the "New in '79 Hanna-Barbera's Yabba Dabba Doo Caperoo Show."  Hopefully one day some YouTuber will post this forgotten show.

The brochure folds out into this huge thing. Click to see how big it gets...

Kings Island 1975

Kings Island celebrates its 40th anniversary this year.   I wish I had a Kings Island brochure from 1972 to share (the year it opened), but the oldest brochure I've got is from 1975...

I thought I'd point out that the International Restaurant mentioned above with its "splendid cuisine" is no longer operating and is basically closed to the public. The space is now used for employee training and other boring stuff.

This is a shame.  My first memory from our first visit to Kings Island is when my family took refuge from the rain by having lunch at the restaurant when we arrived at the park. Those large picture windows offed a great view.  Well I guess they have their reasons for closing the restaurant.  Maybe middle-aged business men aren't having swanky suit-and-tie dinners at amusement parks like they use too. 

Lastly here's some old timey home movies of Kings Island taken around 1975 that I found on ye olde YouTube...

Homosassa Springs

Here's a late 70's 'brochure card' for Homosassa Springs in Homosassa, FL - back when Homosassa Springs was a privately owned attraction...

Here's little bit of trivia I stumbled across, the photo of the alligator with the No Swimming sign was taken by photographer Bob Moreland who won a newspaper Photo of the Year Award for it.

Okay here's the flip-side...

Now that Homosassa Springs is part of the Florida State Parks  you can't hand feed the animals anymore, and the monkeys are completely gone now. Also making the gators leap out of the water to grab their food is a thing of the past. Although you can still "walk under water,"  but it's more accurately (or boringly) called a underwater observatory.

This is for all the fools out there...

I don't usually talk about stuff like this, but look at that lottery ticket of mine up there.  I don't normally buy lottery tickets, but the feverish hype about the record breaking jackpot of the Mega Millions last Friday enticed me to take a chance.  So I put three bucks down on three easy picks.  If you'll notice not a single one of my numbers matched the winning numbers drawn on March 30:  2-4-23-38-46 and Mega Ball 23.   I didn't really expect to win, but I thought I'd probably match one number at least.

I've been strangely lucky with the number "69" in the past.  This is NOT a cheap attempt at crude humor, and if you check out my post from March 3, 2008 you'll see I'm telling the truth.  Unfortunately, there's no "69" in the Mega Millions game. 

Yeah, I won't be buying another lottery ticket anytime soon.  The odds of winning are so ridiculous it's foolish to throwaway money on this game.

Here's something else foolish to throw your money away on according to these Yelp reviews, and it's something a little more in keeping with the spirit of this blog - it's the World of Illusion in Gatlinburg, TN...

I didn't intend to post this retro brochure since it can be easily found elsewhere on the internet.  In fact some of my fellow blogger acquaintances have blogged, and blogged well about this place.  But then I noticed that my brochure is slightly different than ones I've seen online. The difference is that last bullet point, or more accurately star point on the purple page. It reads, "Create pure energy in a Star Sculpture exhibit." I have no idea what a "Star Sculpture exhibit" is or was, but I'm thinking maybe it was one of those novelty plasma globes.

Speaking of novelties, I pity the fool who hasn't seen the awesome Stunt Rock (1980) trailer.  The reason I mention this it features a bad-ass white bearded wizard that looks similar to the wizard on the front of the World of Illusion brochure...



This movie has been popping up on TCM recently (the last time was late "Mega Millions" night March 30, 2012).  You might wish to check it out the next time it plays.  I'll warn you it doesn't quite live up to its trailer, but then again it won't really cost you anything either.

Bronner's CHRISTmas Wonderland Brochure

Well it's that time of year again, so to get in a festive mood here's a 1990's brochure for Bronner's CHRISTmas Wonderland in Frankenmuth, MI.

Established in 1945 I think Bronner's was probably the first store of its kind to sell Christmas decorations year around.  One thing for sure is the place is huge, and you can buy any sort of Christmas decoration imaginable. For example, maybe you where searching for those upscale mechanical animated figures, like the kind you might find in your local malls' holiday display - well you can buy them at Bronner's. 

Bronner's also wins my admiration for the most information packed into a single brochure.  I now know how to write "welcome" in 57 different languages, the miles to Bronner's from 40 North American cities, what the Bronner family looks like, and a short history Frankenmuth.