And before the decade was out the Haunted Shack was added to the park. Hurlbut designed and built amusement rides and was invited to become a concessionaire at the Farm with his historic, Dentzel carousel and, later, a little car ride.
Hurlbut and an incredible team created the Calico Mine Ride with wondrous caverns of beauty along with rough and tumble miners of days gone by, which opened in November of The ride was also the first-ever to feature a hidden switchback queue, which has gone on to become standard in theme park design. As Ghost Town continued to expand, Walter never faltered from his passion for history- and education-based attractions.
Hurlbut along with others from the Farm went to Philadelphia photographing, measuring, and taking copious notes on every detail. Independence Hall opened July 4, to great fanfare and is still a source of inspiration and education today. Since , guests could roam in and out of Ghost Town, walking around the area for free, paying only if they wished to ride or buy something.
Yet by it was decided to enclose the park and charge a one-dollar entrance fee. With the success of Fiesta Village and the Calico Log Ride, Marion looked to add another themed area to expand the park and settled upon a gypsy theme, calling the new area Gypsy Camp.
Gypsy Camp opened on May 28, , and guests explored caves to find a magic shop, arcade, get their fortune told and enjoy music from colorfully attired musicians from an outdoor stage built above the caves. Over the years, countless entertainers took to the stage and ice shows utilized its built-in, ice-skating rink. With larger stars filling the new John Wayne Theatre, the Wagon Camp became home to a stunt show, which continues to thrill guests to this day.
Employees in monster make-up and costumes were told to run around Ghost Town and scare guests. An instant success, the event returned the next year and sold out each night.
Amid the success of Scary Farm, the Farm lost its matriarch, the woman responsible for turning a little berry farm into an icon of Southern California. On April 23, , Cordelia passed away at 84 years old. After all, the Roaring Twenties was their era. The Roaring 20s area opened June 6, In , after 61 years of total family control, the Knott family hired Terry Van Gorder, the first non-family member to be president and CEO, however Marion and other members of the Knott family remained involved.
By the end of the year, the Farm ditched their coupon-book ride tickets for an all-inclusive ride and entrance ticket. The year had yet another milestone moment on December 3 when, just one week before his 92nd birthday, Walter passed away. The 80s would see another big addition to the Farm, Snoopy and the Peanuts Gang. Awkwardly proportioned, Whittles was simply better suited to the page and not as a real-life character. Ron Mizaker was tasked with finding and securing the new icon and, as the characters from Charles M.
Schulz invited Mizaker to join him. As the 80s continued, two new attractions arrived. The following year, tales of a hairy creature brought people to explore and get soaked on Bigfoot Rapids. The thrills, mystery, and fun continued into the 90s. The Boomerang rollercoaster replaced the Corkscrew; the unique, the intriguing Mystery Lodge arrived; and Jaguar roared into Fiesta Village.
Guests raced against each other in another new roller coaster, Windjammer, which replaced Wacky Soap Box Racers in Schulz Theatre and continues to showcase incredibly fun shows, often including members of the Peanuts gang. Roller coasters continued to make their way into the Farm with Windjammer being replaced by Xcelerator and the additions of Silver Bullet and Sierra Sidewinder.
But old favorites were not forgotten. When the state allowed theme parks to reopen at a limited capacity, Knott's reopened for a short time to season passholders. Coupled with their experience with the Taste of events already had a head start in keeping visitors safe. Orange County currently sits in the yellow tier under the state's Blueprint for a Safer Economy plan. So when we were finally allowed to reopen to the public, all we needed to do was add the element of rides.
To mark the th-anniversary occasion, Knott's will feature a whole new lineup of entertainment and attractions. Voyage closed in January The new Bear-y ride is a special homage to the original Bear-y Tales dark ride at Knott's from to Knott's Summer Nights is also back, featuring live music, disc jockeys and plenty of new menu items. Long-lost characters have now resurfaced — Boysen, Moxie, Brawny bears, and Whittle the prospector are available for socially distanced meet and greets.
At night, the theme park will light up areas inside the park and culminate in a special moment with the redesigned illuminated K-tower on top of the Sky Tower attraction.
Gahagan said that while the pandemic has been tough on business, it renewed interest in the park from the general public. Louise Murray is the chairperson of the Triotech board of directors. Murray said the th-anniversary celebration and all of the new attractions would be good pure family fun. After experiencing the year-long closures due to the pandemic, Knott's Berry Farm's reopening is needed for many families out there, she said.
The Knotts bought the land they were farming when the opportunity came up in With the land secured, they started to build a more permanent structure than their modest berry stand. The Knotts started to hit on something when they discovered an experimental berry that had been developed by Rudolph Boysen and later abandoned.
Knott produced a bumper crop of the large berries with a unique taste and, rather than taking all the credit for himself, christened them "boysenberries. Those boysenberries put the Knotts farm on the map. But it's what they did next that turned the farm into a hit in the midst of the Great Depression. Cordelia had a tea room that served snacks, and it became one of the biggest early draws thanks to a legendary fried chicken Sunday dinner.
Those chicken dinners were so popular that people were lining up by the hundreds and even thousands. Early attractions included items like an ore car, logging wheels from Northern California, a petrified tree stump, and phosphorescent rocks. Knott also started mixing real items with fantasy -- like claiming that he'd found California's last active volcano and moved it to his farm. In , the Knotts decided to expand. The next year, the first thing we'd think of as being representative of an actual theme park opened, with Ghost Town making its debut.
The thing that makes it special, Lynxwiler said, is that it's meant to be as vintage and authentic as possible. Lynxwiler credits the book he co-authored with Christopher Merritt in with helping to rejuvenate Knott's Berry Farm. The park, no longer owned by the Knott family, had been sold to an Ohio amusement park company. The focus had turned to new roller coasters, but Lynxwiler argues that's not the point of Knott's -- as a theme park, it's about the theme.
The thing Lynxwiler loves most about collecting those photos is seeing the "anonymous, nameless guests who are captured in time" attending the park, along with being able to track how the park has changed over the years. You go to Knott's. Support for LAist comes from. Become a sponsor. LAist logo. We Explain L. The Brief. How To New LA.
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