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If
you'd been strolling through the avenues and byways of Coney
Island on a summer evening in the mid-fifties, you might
at some point have
seen or encountered Fred Garms. If
you had, you'd probably remember. Fred was a real 'Coney
Island character'. Back in 1920, Fred's father, Herman Garms,
wanted to build a ferris wheel that would be bigger and
more distinctive than any of the other wheels that were
a common sight at Coney and all other amusement parks. The
result was the spectacular Wonder Wheel with
its coasting passenger
cages, which
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to
this day is a Coney Island institution.
Upon the death of his father in
1935, Fred Garms took over the operation of the Wonder Wheel,
and in the early fifties became interested in opening a dark
ride on a strip of property adjacent to the wheel. Dark rides
were a common fixture among the amusements of Coney, and Fred,
like his father, wanted to build a ride that would stand above
and beyond all of the competition. Thus was born Spook-A-Rama,
which opened for the season of 1955.
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What's
in a name? The name of Spook-A-Rama was likely a take-off of Cinerama,
the giant-screen motion picture process which was at the height
of its popularity when Spook-A-Rama opened. The Cinerama movie's
opening sequence was a ride on the Atom Smasher roller coaster at
the old Rockaway's Playland in Queens, NY. Coincidentally, some
stunts presently operating in Spook-A-Rama came from Rockaway's
Hell 'N Back dark ride. |
Spook-A-Rama's
layout was originally drawn up to occupy a long strip along Jones
Walk from the Bowery intersection to a point just beyond the Wonder
Wheel where the actual dark ride interior building was to be situated.
Before and after reaching this building, a long expanse of track
was planned to run in an outside area (the courtyard) almost down
to the Bowery corner where onloading and offloading were to be
performed.
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Original
blueprint of initial Spook-A-Rama exterior ride layout.
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But
the plan as drawn on the blueprints would prove to be insufficient
for Garms' grand vision, and another interior building was added.
This building (Building #1), at the Bowery end of the layout, was
the primary point of departure for the ride. Beginning their journey,
riders would pass beneath a curved, clear plastic canopy over which
colored water flowed simulating a waterfall before entering this
first building. |
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Diagram
of Spook-A-Rama ride layout as built in 1955. (Not to scale)
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Inside
was simply darkness with the requisite 'spider web' threads
dangling. The cars would almost immediately make a sharp
U-turn and quickly emerge into the courtyard and begin their
open-air travel, passing the back side of one of the large
brick buildings which had been part of the former Feltman's
Beer Garden complex, and upon which was painted a huge,
garish sign beckoning passers-by to ride Spook-A-Rama. The
cars would proceed along the constantly oscillating track,
past a few sinister figures housed in weather-resistant
plexiglass, before arriving at the main building (Building
#2), where the ride would commence in earnest. |
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For
the rolling stock and trackage, Garms contracted William Cassidy's
Pretzel Amusement Ride Co. of Bridgeton, NJ. No stranger to Coney
Island, having installed in excess of twenty rides there, Cassidy
was taken aback by Garms' intention to lay a quarter-mile length
of track with some three-dozen cars, an amount essentially equalling
at least four standard ride installations. Yet, on Garms' insistence,
this is what came to be, and Spook-A-Rama's elaborate signage
proclaimed with classic Coney Island ballyhoo: "The World's Longest
Spook Ride"; "The World's Longest (Level) Ride" (so qualified
to differentiate it from roller coasters which would commonly
have longer track); and "More than One Quarter-Mile Long!".
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Pretzel
furnished their elegant and innovative rotating cars,
which had been introduced a couple of years earlier.The
cars had luxuriously upholstered high-backed seats and
would rotate in both clockwise and counter-clockwise directions
as they moved along their twisted path. But Garms would
quickly abandon the cars' rotating function, possibly
to reduce the dizziness that it induced, but just as probably
to ensure that riders were facing in the right direction
to see and hear each elaborate stunt as it was activated.
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Shown
above: The current lineup of Spook-A-Rama cars.
Left: Undercarriage of Pretzel rotating car at Spook-A-Rama.
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