montezooma

Those are some AWESOME pictures, thanks for sharing them. Some of the best coaster pics I have seen in awhile! Great Report!

The Shockwave has had several different color schemes, some of them good, some of them not so good. I think the white scheme with the blue trains shown here in the brochure was the best. What do you think?

SIX FLAGS over TEXAS 1979 Well 79 must have been an off year all that was new was the "Sensational Sense Machine".

^Here is an old one of the Revolution you will love, it is actually before the ride even opened. The rendering of the Ride! Magic Mountain's Revolution it'll knock your socks flat off!

Maybe the reason they have chosen the name "Drop Tower" has something to do with the huge Marquee signs in front of the rides. The Marquee is a great theme element of the ride and it would be a shame to tear it down because they can't use the name Drop Zone anymore...But with the name change to Drop Tower they can save the sign and just make minor changes to it. They need to change the "Z" &"N" but they can keep the "O" and the "E" and just add a "T", "W" & "R". ZONE - TOWER Although the new name is not great I understand this change if they keep the signs. If the signs come down then yes, Cedar Fair has a Creative Department in desperate need of a new leader! A simple change...a GREAT save. I can live with this one.

SIX FLAGS over MID-AMERICA New for 1979- New shows and a bigger Disco. (Mid-America was the Six Flags park that got "looked over" during the 80's) What the hell is that pink thing with boxing gloves on????

Tatum I don't have anything from Conneaut Lake. Back in the 70's theme parks were very new and exciting. There were new attractions and parks opening that would make national news. The traditional older parks where somewhat uninteresting at the time. So as a kid I was focused more on these new theme parks. Also because parks like Conneaut, Dorney & Riverside were smaller they didn't put out new material each year or I may not have even known that they existed. You have to remember that there wasn't a great network of how to find parks. As a matter of fact it wasn't until the 80's when there was a magazine published called "Roller Coaster Fever" that I learned about many of the smaller traditional parks. As far as Dorney & Silver Dollar City go, I do have brochures from them but they are from later years and I focused on the year 1979 in this series. They will show up in some other posts. Riverside will be it's own post coming up soon. I have all the press stuff and photos from the announcement of the Cyclone plus more.

I believe Zonga was sold back to a German Showman and will be traveling the German fair circuit again. It has always been called Mind Bender although when I was working in the Six Flags design department there was talk of changing the name to Enigma when Batman:the ride was added and that section of the park was converted to Gothem circus.

I rode Zonga/Thriller in all three of its incarnations. As it originally was, Thriller, it was an incredible ride. Probably in my top 5 of all time coasters. I rode it in Stuttgart when it did the travelling fairs. I next rode it at Astroworld before the modifications were made to the restraints, I still liked it. Once it was modified for Marineworld it was pretty much a different ride. Most of the forces the ride produced where mellowed and it was just uncomfortable. I wonder where that ride will show up next. I hope it does not get scrapped because it is still a good ride. Only 4 days left of brochures and then onto something new...or old I should say.

Yeah Tatum, the Mindbender is still one of the better coasters out there. The winning combination of hilly terrain and Anton Schwarzkopf make it still incredibly popular after all these years. I am trying to think of a bad Schwarzkopf coaster and nothing comes to mind. The SooperDooperLooper, although still a great ride, is probably the lightest on thrills. Some might call the Revolution a bad Schwarzkopf but it is only because of the awful headrests. Without those headrest I think the ride still would stand up against some of the great rides of today.

SIX FLAGS over GEORGIA 1979 This brochure totally captures the 70's; butterflies, fantasy, magical heavens, screams & dreams. Six Flags....what a "gas" man! While it is far out, it is one of my favorite brochures of this 1979 series. Of course Six Flags over Georgia always gets "high" (another 70's term) marks with me just for having the Mindbender!

SIX FLAGS GREAT ADVENTURE 1979 The first park outside of the originally built Six Flags parks worthy enough to carry the Six Flags title. (remember AstroWorld was just a member of the six flags family) Anyways New for 1979: Rolling Thunder (a disguised Kings Island Racer) Uh Oh, they should have thought twice about adding the Haunted House...

The Management at that time felt that the theme park business was too seasonal and difficult to staff and operate. Someone came up with the "Brilliant" idea to replace the seasonal park with a year round outlet mall, with the hopes of bringing millions more visitors to their Opryland Hotel and facility. In 1997 the park was closed, leveled and paved over with what is now the OpryMills outlet mall. Since then I have read somewhere that one of the Executives from that time admits it was a big mistake. I think we can all agree with that!!!

OPRYLAND 1979 This video isn't from 1979 but it is still cool to see this park that is no longer around. For a more indepth look at Opryland click here.

Carowind's Afterburn was the first coaster to be called "Flight Deck"

Yes, you are right, that is a much better description of what Drachen Fire's corkscrews did. They crossed rather than interlocked...OK Kumba had the first interlocking corkscrews.

Actually Drachen Fire's corkscrews interlocked before one of them was removed not as tight of an interlock as Kumba's but I would still call this an interlocked corkscrew.

And here it is...

Marriott's GREAT AMERICA, Santa Clara 1979 Great America History 101 This brochure from the Santa Clara park is very similar to the Gurnee park brochure just as the parks were also very similar (Gurnee seemed to get the bigger budget as they had more rides). When Marriott entered the theme park business in the early 70's they had big plans. They opened the two parks in 1976 and had plans for a third park in the Washington DC area that was supposed to open in 1978, but due to zoning issues they were not able to get the park off the ground. They secured a management contract for Rye Playland for a couple of years and also tried unsuccessful to purchase Cedar Point. Marriott then decided to get our of the theme park business and to focus more on their core business of hospitality. They put both parks up for sale. The Gurnee park was quickly sold to Six Flags but the Santa Clara park was going to be sold to developers and leveled due to the value of the land it sat on. The city of Santa Clara wanted to keep a theme park as part of their community and stepped in and bought the park. They operated the park for a couple of years and then signed a management contract with KECO (Paramount Parks). After a couple of years of operating the park KECO exercised their option to buy the assets of the parks and lease the land from the city. Of course the park then became Paramount's Great America and that finally brings us to California's Great America, home to the wonderfully named "Flight Deck" When the Marriott parks first opened I think it was the perfect formula for a successful theme park. They had a consistent theme that ran thru the entire park. Rides tied into the theme area, Food was tied to the specific theme area and the souvenirs also fit the theme area. They had a perfect balance or Rides, Food, Shopping, and Entertainment plus they had the Warner cartoons as mascots for the park. When the park originally opened it was open year round. After the first season it was decided that the weather could not sustain year round operation and the park was closed in during the winter season. The picture of the Sky Trek Tower is obviously from the Gurnee park. The Santa Clara park is in the flight path of the San Jose airport and has a much smaller tower without the flag pole on top of it.

Now this is a great find: the fabled prototype corkscrew for the suspended coaster. It was rumored that once the kinks were worked out of the suspended corkscrew, the two spirals in the Bat would be replaced with corkscrews. Apparently the kinks were never worked out. You can actually see one of the Bat cars hanging from the track. This picture comes from a great publication from the early 80's called "Amusement Park Journal"

I would love it if you or anyone would post some old stuff from Knott's. Especially if you have anything before 1980, I would love to see the brochure that introduced Montezooma's Revenge. I remember for the TV commercial they used White Lightnin from Carowinds. Because I lived in So Cal I didn't really collect any of the brochures from the parks here. I just figured I already knew everything about them....I am kicking myself now that I didn't. I do have a couple of things from Magic Mountain but nothing really from Knott's and although I vistited Busch Gardens in Van Nuys several times, I have nothing from that park except memories and an old pennant.

Marriott's GREAT AMERICA, Gurnee, IL 1979

Here you can see the original profile and the reprofiled speed dip after the Six Flags remodel. 1980 "Colossus Rides Again" Great position for taking this picture but I sure hope whoever took it ducked as soon as the snapped it.

You do know why it was called Willard's Whizzer don't you??? It was named after the founder of the Marriott Corporation, J.Willard Marriott.

Scott- The three original Six Flags parks all installed Parachute towers in the early 70's Six Flags over Georgia - "The Great Gasp" Six Flags over Texas - "The Texas Chute Out" Six Flags over Mid-America - "Sky Chuter" Sometime in the early 80's, to make room for Thunder River, the tower from Mid-America was moved to Great Adventure where it is still in operation. The tower at Georgia was just recently removed to make way for Goliath. The only original tower in its original location is the one at Texas. If you want to see more on the parachute towers in the Six Flags parks click here