Palisades Amusement Park: Memories

Been along time since we communicated. Life went on and some how put aside the Park. My life as a member of the saga of the park is long. I'm going on 84 and my mother was carrying me while working her stand. Two weeks after I was born, she was back and I was part of that world starting in my first visit in a carriage, my grandmother guiding it.

Somehow my daughter brought up the subject this past weekend and Peter and I were on a roll retelling our years connected with PAP. Memory came flooding back of our experiences, the entire park staff that worked there from 1910 to 1960's when Peter and I decided to pack it in.

All the games our family used were built by my Uncle Richards brother Peter and my Dad Ernest A. Cuny. There was the Globe and the airplane and the horse racing track and the regular wheels including the Big Six. Perfectly balanced and beautiful. Maybe you remember Curley Clifford who had a stand next to my mother (Helen Brenner Cuny) Before the 40's fire the stand was facing the swimming pool, Curley was the second stand and then there was a waffle stand. There was mighty competition between the two trying one up-man-ship with attracting tips. It turned out to be with my mother having a slight edge.

I have a picture of my Aunt in a small semi tent stand with a candy wheel. Long dress with the high collar waist and her hair combed as it was in the early 1900's. I will scan them and send them to you. Got a few together this evening.

Will have to take a bit of time since our granddaughter is graduating College next week from OSU. I'm still working as a small business consultant and I have to take care of my clients during part of the week.

Peter and I both have the aches and pains that come with the years, however, they will be there no matter what so we are still very active and living life with the attitude if it hurts take a pill and get on with it.

Hope this finds you in good health and hanging in there. It sure beats the alternative. When I got on the web I was so pleasantly surprised that so much had been done to keep the park memories alive.

There is a great deal missing from your book. It's the people that made it all work. I can remember most of them. Many with nick names. Of course most all of the concessionaires we were very close with. In the winter we partied, and visited one another and had a very close relationship. They were good friends to name a few. Sadie Harris and her husband. Cy and Peggy Mallek, Myra and Paul Koppell, Minett Dobson, Pat and Gary, Anna Cook of course, Since we all belonged to the Showmens Associatioin we met at the Club in New York for affairs and then the biggy Thanksgiving Eve at one of the hotels in NYC. That was a black tie and not only PAP were present all the Park People from other states attended as well.

From the day I was old enough to understand the word Park our family ate and lived PAP. In the summer they worked there and in the winter my family gathered at my parents house on Cumbermead Road planning for the following season and constantly thinking up new games and how to improve the old ones. After the park closed a number of us worked the Danbury State Fair in Connecticut. That was like a work holiday vacation.

PAP is in the blood and it never goes away. We all went through some very tough times especially when they shut us down and every park in the state as well down to Cape May. We survived it came up with a way to get around it called Flashers. I still remember Jimmy Corkoran arguing on an issue about them with Peter Santanello (my husband) when they were trying to get the darn thing to work. It was finally my Uncle Peter Brenner that solved the problem for us and it worked out. There were a lot of fingers in that pie in order to refine it and make it simple. It never took the place of wheels though that's actually what it was technically.

Fifty Years of Working at the Park