One of Kennywood’s Greatest Dark Rides, Page 4

Dave Hahner

Addendum

Since this article was written, many more changes have occured at Kennywood, including the removal of the Wonder Wheel ferris wheel. It was replaced in 2000 by the Aero 360, a Zamperla Hawk attraction themed to the famous black & gold Kennywood directional arrow. Also during this time period, sadly, another Kennywood traditional dark ride, Le Cachot, was removed after the park's centennial season in 1998. This was another Bill Tracy classic dark ride that opened during the early 1970's. As sort of a replacement for this old style dark ride, the park built The Exterminator, a combination dark ride and roller coaster, which opened in 1999. The additon of this new breed of dark ride keeps Kennywood's dark ride/funhouse count at a constant four, including the classic style Gold Rusher, The Old Mill water dark ride (which just celebrated it's 101st birthday!), and the recently updated Noah's Ark walk thru attraction. Even with the loss of Le Cachot, Kennywood should be applauded.

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The following is a letter to the editor of NAPHA News, dated November 29, 2000.

Dear Greg,

Dave Hahner’s article, “The Ghost Ship”, in NAPHA News (Vol. 21, No. 2) brought back dozens of memories. I don’t know, unless he somehow had a copy of Bill Tracy’s original design, how he created such a detailed and fascinating description of the ride layout.

It was superbly done. But there are a few items I can add, never before printed.

First of all, the cars used on the ride were the old Laff in the Dark vehicles built by Traver Engineering. That ride had been demolished just two years before to make room for the Turnpike.

Typical of Kennywood, we saved the cars. It was Carl Henninger’s idea to use them on the new ride, and they were ideal for the purpose. As Dave noted, “As the car jerked forward, it moved rather rapidly for a dark ride vehicle and had a strange chain driven motor sound to it.”

No wonder. Those chain driven motors first operated in 1930. Wonder if there are any others left – any where?

A few days after the fire, Carl Henninger asked me to make a list of what was lost. It was for the fire insurance claims, of course.

Not until after the claim was filed did I recall that in addition to the operating rides, we had used an area behind the Cuddle Up for storage. It contained the single-rider Scotty bumper cars that were used for one season on the Gran Prix and …the park’s toilet paper supply.

One final item. The person who ran through the Ghost Ship to check on riders after the alarm was sounded was not an attendant, but Harry Henninger. He had been walking the midway in front when a ride operator ran out and shouted “Fire”.

Sincerely,
Carl O. Hughes
Chairman

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This article ©2000 Dave Hahner and NAPHA. Special thanks to NAPHA News for giving us permission to reprint this article.
All photos ©copyright, and generously provided by, Kennywood Archive; all used with permission.