“You gotta be crazy to get into this business!” proclaimed 66-year-old Dallas Jones, owner of Beech Bend Park in Bowling Green, Kentucky.

That's nothing we don't know.

But if you think you're going to hear Jones' proclamation softened by “But when I see the smile of a child on our carousel, or when I see the happy riders come into the station on our new rollercoaster,” you're wrong. It's not going to happen.

“That part, the sentimental part, belongs to me,” Jones' 46-year-old daughter, Charlotte Gonzalez told me. “You see, my dad used to race cars all through the Midwest, and he did a lot of it right here at the Beech Bend Raceway Park. We always went to his races as a family, so as kids my brother and I would spend a lot of our time here at the amusement park. That's where the sentiment comes in. My dad's not the sentimental type.”

Indeed. Dallas Jones is tough, smart, focused, not-without-humour, and a great businessman, something the amusement industry needs today a lot more than sentiment. This industry can't survive on dreamers like myself. For every Walt Disney there has to be a Roy Disney. And if Charlotte and the rest of the Jones family are the Walts, Dallas Jones is the Roy.

Dallas started off early as a truck driver and in his 20s he began a 25-year stint as the director of transportation for a large grocery chain. But his real passion was for racing, so in 1972 he quit his job and bought a drag strip in Nashville, which flourished under his ownership.

At that same time, Beech Bend Park wasn't having such luck. A Southern Kentucky recreation tradition since 1880, and following a history like most American amusement parks, Beech Bend Park (named for the large stands of beech trees in the area) evolved from a riverside picnic ground into a bathing area and overnight campground. By the 1940s, under the new ownership of Charles Garvin, Beech Bend offered a swimming pool, skating rink, dance hall, bowling alley and racetrack. Automobile races have always been wildly popular, and were the backbone of Beech Bend Park throughout the 1950s and into the 60s, when the drag strip was added.

Broken Beech

By 1971, though, Beech Bend suffered the plight of most traditional American amusement parks with the proliferation of the brand spanking new theme parks, Nashville's Opryland in this case. Not only did Beech Bend decline in popularity, but Charles Garvin's health also began to suffer. He died in 1979, and the amusement park was closed.

The track and drag strip continued, however, under new ownership involving country singer Ronnie Milsap, and they managed to reopen the amusement park, but it failed after two seasons and the company went bankrupt. The track/drag strip closed along with the amusement park and campground.

Enter Dallas and Alfreda Jones, flush with their successful Nashville drag strip. They purchased Beech Bend Raceway Park in 1984.

“So,” Charlotte recalls, “there we were, back at Beech Bend Park, at least at the raceway part of it. I wandered over to the amusement park and campground. It was overgrown with weeds, and all that was left of the amusement park was the cupola roofs from the carousel, another flat ride and a Pretzel dark ride with the cars scattered inside the building. There were about five kiddie rides rusting out. The swimming pool was filthy. It was sad to see. What we'd grown up in and loved as kids was desolate and depressing.”

Still, it wasn't out of sentiment that Dallas Jones ended up buying the attached amusement park and campground three years later, in 1987. They had become available by default from the previous bankruptcy. The Jones family was now the owner of the entire package.

It's not certain if it was from the imploring of his daughter or from his own innate high energy (probably both), but Dallas Jones began to clean up the campground and amusement park in 1990. The campground was reopened with new electric boxes, sewer and water hook-ups, paving and lighting. The swimming pool and waterslides were refurbished and reopened. To daughter Charlotte's delight, the five kiddie rides were cleaned up and put back into business.

“And that was just the beginning!” she told me. We were standing together on the park's midway with her sister-in-law, Stephanie Jones. These two women are the heart and soul of Beech Bend Amusement Park. Charlotte's father Dallas Jones sat next to us in a golf cart, answering my questions, listening to the women, and barely suppressing a smile at their enthusiasm and pride in the family park.

“And from there,” Charlotte went on, “we began to add one or two kiddie rides each year, slowing graduating to our (Sellner) Scramblers and Tilt-a-Whirls.”

“I suppose it didn't hurt,” I ventured, “that Opryland closed in 1997.”

“Are you kidding? This area was suddenly without an amusement park! We were back to where Beech Bend had been 30 years ago. So we kept on adding rides, eventually building up to our Pinfari Zyklon in 2000 and Zamperla spinning Wild Mouse in 2004.”

“Were you buying rides used?” I asked Dallas. “I would think it’s a buyer's market out there, the way things are now.”

“Well yeah, it is,” he answered. “But there's a lot of work involved in used rides, and I don't have a shop here. So it's easier to buy new.”

New rides return

“Buy new?” I was surprised.

“Can you believe that?” Stephanie smiled mischievously, and she went on to explain the constant, humorous-if-occasionally-maddening tug-of-war between the two women and Dallas. “We want to do so much, and he's got us on a strict budget!”

“You got that right!” Dallas retorted.

But the women's work is obvious. I pointed out an attractive brick planter overflowing with flowers that encircled part of the Scrambler. A series of games booths had flowerpots hanging from them.

“Oh, we even had to fight for them!” Charlotte told me.

“It looks great,” I told Dallas, supporting the women's efforts. “You've got to keep softening a park up.”

“I know, I know,” he conceded. “Without them this place would look like an asphalt carnival. But these girls would break me if I gave them free rein.”

“I suppose we would,” Charlotte nodded, “so Stephanie and I have learned to pick and choose our battles.”

“And,” I went on with the next obvious question, “what kind of a battle was it to add a major wooden coaster?”

The Kentucky Rumbler, my main reason for visiting Beech Bend Park, is considered by many to be one of the best creations by Great Coasters International.

The Six-Million Dollar queston

“Oh that,” Stephanie shook her head. “Actually, we all sweated about that one. We're talking six million dollars put in for this year alone.” Besides the coaster, that six million included the Moby Dick ride from Wisdom, Granny Jones' Petting Farm, the Rumbler Cafe and gift shop, and a new indoor, air-conditioned picnic pavilion that seats 600 people. That’s quite an expenditure for a man who claims no great sentiment for the amusement park.

“I felt okay with adding a major coaster,” Dallas nodded. “Just look at what wood coasters do for all the other small parks. I felt it shouldn't be any different with us.”

It wasn't. By the Fourth of July weekend, the park was 40 per cent over its 2005 attendance. It ended up the 2006 season 31 per cent over 2005, “but only because of some bad weather in August,” Charlotte explained. “I'm convinced we could have maintained the 40 per cent increase but for some rainy weekends.”

It was time for a tour.

“You kids go on ahead,” Dallas said. “I've got work to do. Call me if you need anything.” And he sped off in his golf cart, ever the drag racer.

Charlotte, Stephanie and I hopped into our own golf cart and proceeded at a more leisurely speed to our first stop, Beech Bend Raceway Park.

“We still run the Figure-8 races on our oval track,” Charlotte told me, “and for the past four years we've hosted the National Hot Rod Association Reunion. Bobby Hamilton Jnr, “Big Daddy” Don Garlits, and John Force have all raced here.”

Charlotte's brother and Stephanie's husband, Clay Jones, 34, runs Beech Bend Raceway Park, and was in the middle of running a drag race.

“I love my job!” he grinned at me, as he offered us the best view of the race from the observation tower. (Charlotte's husband, Rick Gonzalez, runs the family-owned drag strip in Nashville.)

We went back to the park and Charlotte and Stephanie pointed out their improvements along with what they'd like to do, and which of those battles they'll probably pick.

“Sometimes it's easier,” I suggested, “asking for forgiveness later than to ask for permission.”

“I wouldn't dare, not with my dad,” Charlotte chuckled. “He checks every dollar that goes out.”

Smart businessman.

“One big thing with me,” Charlotte went on, “when it comes to rides, I'd really like to get away from the portable models and get into the park models.” She pointed out their Round-Up with its barely-concealed trailer mountings. “But that’s a battle I won't pick for now. We just have to keep on improving our facilities and get a new ride when we can. But again, our main focus is to continue softening out the park.”

And they're doing a fine job of it. The lake in the centre of the park, complete with fountain and surrounded by lush grassy banks and quacking, well-fed ducks, is the main feature contributing to a park effect. The swimming pool/waterslide complex is sparkling clean.

We headed over to the 96ft-high, 2,827ft-long Kentucky Rumbler rollercoaster.

First drop fun

“See that first drop?” Stephanie pointed out the short drop off the lift hill that goes into a highly banked U-turn, and then down the first drop. “It's an obvious reference to the famous Airplane Coaster of Playland in Rye, New York, considered one of the greatest in history during its run from 1928 to 1957. The signature feature of that ride was its unique first drop, and it's never been duplicated until now.” (The Kentucky Rumbler duplicates it in mirror image.)

And it works beautifully, as I found during my three rides on the wonderful Kentucky Rumbler. Even uninitiated rollercoaster riders will know there's something special about the first drop, and they'll never forget it. I know I never will. The whole ride is outstanding, as the screaming riders exclaimed, racing breathless into the station. Even hard-bitten Dallas Jones is smiling about his coaster.

For that matter, the entire community of Bowling Green, Kentucky, is smiling. The Kentucky Department of Tourism recently stated that the Bowling Green area had, in 2006 alone, received an economic impact of $31 million from out-of-town visitors to Beech Bend's campground, amusement park and raceway.

Not bad for a park that savvy businessman Dallas Jones revived from the ashes, urged by his sentimental daughter Charlotte.

Even Charlotte and her father would have to agree: it's nothing personal; it's strictly business.

Gary Kyriazi is the author of The Great American Amusement Parks, A Pictorial History, and is a regular contributor to Park World.

Printer friendly version

Email this article to a friend

• Related links
  • • Beech Bend Park official website

Related articles:

• Chimelong Water Park
• Märchenpark
• Quassy Amusement Park
• Expo Zaragoza
• Atlantis The Palm