{"id":5949,"date":"2015-10-07T00:20:45","date_gmt":"2015-10-07T04:20:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/?p=5949"},"modified":"2015-10-07T00:38:22","modified_gmt":"2015-10-07T04:38:22","slug":"in-the-1950s-kennywood-was-a-blast-sometimes-literally","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/2015\/10\/07\/in-the-1950s-kennywood-was-a-blast-sometimes-literally\/","title":{"rendered":"In the 1950s, Kennywood was a blast (sometimes literally)"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Hurricane <\/a>
Hurricane made its debut at Kennywood Park in 1949. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"Hurricane <\/a>
Hurricane in daylight. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"Rockets <\/a>
Rockets were added in 1940 and removed in 1978. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Rockets <\/a>
Rockets in daylight. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"For <\/a>
For some photographs, Stewart Love left his shutter open for up to 45 seconds. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"The <\/a>
The merry-go-round looks like a giant spinning top. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\""The <\/a>
“The Old Mill becomes modern looking at night,” reads the original caption. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\""Rotor" <\/a>
“Rotor” made its Kennywood debut in 1955. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"The <\/a>
The Rotor operated on the simple principal of centrifugal force. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"More <\/a>
More hijinx on Rotor. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"Smoke <\/a>
Smoke belches from Edgar Thomson Works across the river. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"The <\/a>
The Roll-O-Plane. (Stewart Love\/The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"The <\/a>
The number of school picnics at Kennywood greatly increased in the 1950s. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"Train <\/a>
Train ride past power lines. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"Kennywood <\/a>
Kennywood added several rides to Kiddieland in the 1950s. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Boat <\/a>
Boat ride at Kennywood. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div>
\"Children <\/a>
Children wear bonnets on the merry-go-round. (The Pittsburgh Press) <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"We <\/a>
We found this pictures of “Suicide” Simon by doing a google news search. It’s from a 1950 Milwaukee Journal story. <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>\n

Leopold Simon was a stocky Texan who made his money by curling himself into a coffin-sized box and setting off a stick of dynamite placed six inches from his head. The resulting blast obliterated the box and when the smoke cleared Simon staggered unsteadily to his feet. Crowds loved it.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cSuicide\u201d Simon, as he was known, brought his act to Kennywood Park in 1958. He played second bill to the Lone Ranger, who rode a white horse and complained about having to drive a Cadillac all night from Albany, NY, to make the appearance.<\/span><\/p>\n

Kennywood\u2019s gates reopen this month for the park\u2019s annual Halloween attraction that features stumbling zombies and phantom pirates. But in the 1950s, a decade before George Romero brought hipness to rotting dead people, Kennywood offered death-defying acts that were actually alive.<\/p>\n

We found in our archive several pictures of Kennywood from that era. You\u2019ll recognize the park, but it appears as a simpler and less crowded place, the rides smaller in scale. Braddock\u2019s Edgar Thomson steel mill belches black smoke in the background. Moms in the pictures wear dresses. Girls wear bobby socks. Bonnets are strapped to babies\u2019 heads. Davy Crockett was popular — his image graced t-shirts worn by several young boys.<\/span><\/p>\n

Most stunning are a series time-exposures shot at night by Pittsburgh Press photographer Stewart Love. The pictures transform spindly rides like \u201cRockets\u201d into magical wheels of light.<\/span><\/p>\n

While researching these photographs, we came across stories about Suicide Simon, \u201cThe man who dynamites himself,\u201d and other acts that once performed at the park. Simon\u2019s trick sometimes failed. One time he miscalculated the dynamite blast and awoke 48 hours later in a hospital bed. The mistake cost him four teeth.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Baranak Sisters perch pole team miscalculated during an act in 1950. Waltrand Baranak held the pole; her sister Gesela fell and broke a leg. Luckily, an emergency backup perch pole team named the Adamson Duo remained at the ready, and so a show did go on.<\/span><\/p>\n

Visitors in 1953 got to see Victoria Zacchini, \u201cthe only girl ever used as a human cannonball.\u201d She was launched over the park\u2019s lagoon. That same day Galasso the Great balanced his body on just one finger.<\/span><\/p>\n

By far the strangest story we found concerned a Charleroi father who took his six children to Kennywood in August 1953. After a day of chasing his kids around the park, the father gathered up his brood at dusk, stuffed them into his car and headed home. There, the kids were sent to bed.<\/span><\/p>\n

Next morning, the man awoke and was shocked to discover in his house a seventh child — a stray six-year-old named Billy Voelker. The father had been somewhat careless, or at least absent-minded, while rounding up his kids the night before and young Billy had allowed himself to be carried away with a bunch of strangers.<\/p>\n

The boy, according to a Post-Gazette article, had wandered away from his mother and was \u201cworn out with a day\u2019s load of mischief.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mrs. Voelker was of course in a panic as the hours passed and police and firefighters scoured the Mon Valley for her missing child. The story ends well, though, with the father driving the boy back to Kennywood for a reunion with his mother.<\/span><\/p>\n

Oddly, the absent–minded Charleroi father was unnamed in the Post-Gazette\u2019s story. \u201cAnother case of absent-mindedness,\u201d wrote the reporter. \u201cNobody thought to ask him his name.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

If \u201czombie\u201d can be\u00a0a state of mind, it made its debut at Kennywood more than six decades ago.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stunning images and quirky acts reveal the park’s magical, peculiar quality.<\/p>\n

Look at the picturesIn the 1950s, Kennywood was a blast (sometimes literally)<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":5932,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[945],"tags":[975,961,1332,1331,1025,1019,1038],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/Digs.Kennywood1951001.jpg?fit=864%2C698&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8579,"url":"https:\/\/newsinteractive.post-gazette.com\/thedigs\/2018\/05\/04\/pittsburghs-favorite-time-capsule-you-know-it-as-kennywood-is-set-to-open-once-again\/","url_meta":{"origin":5949,"position":0},"title":"Pittsburgh’s favorite time capsule — you know it as Kennywood — is set to open once again","date":"May 4, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Emerge from the entrance to Kennywood Park. 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