Parking the Rides Where the Rides Used to Be

 When the Coney Island situated on the Ohio River was a full fledged amusement park, the midway was filled with the traditional rides. Everything from roller coasters to kiddie rides and from a lazy tunnel of love to rides that were there to make you feel ill if you had just eaten, this Coney had it all. Now the midway is a lovely field of grass with a few winding patches of blacktop. But this is the perfect place to park all of the great old classic and collector rides that show up each year for the Cruise-A-Palooza car show. At this year's event there was a third generation Ford Thunderbird, a Pontiac Firebird, a few different generations of Mustangs, a Fairlane, a Firebird convertible, and a nicely chopped street rod.

Cruise-A-Palooza Draws A Large Crowd

The banks of the Ohio River saw well over 100 cars turn up for the annual Cruise-A-Palooza car show. This, in turn, brought in a large crowd of people who were able to wander around and enjoy the many old classic and collector vehicles. Among the ones they saw was a Ford Falcon, a 1968 Pontiac Le Mans convertible, a 1967 Chevy Chevelle SS, a 1962 Ranchero, a 1961 Falcon, a 1964 Dodge, and a 1964 El Camino.

Celebrating Labor Day With Some Great Old Cars

People who are into the old car hobby will find just about any reason to gather and enjoy all sorts of vehicles. Holidays make especially popular times for these get together events and Labor Day in my region means the Cruise-A-Palooza show at Coney Island on the Ohio River. For this season's show there were plenty of good rides including a 1964 Chevy Corvette, a 1959 Studebaker Hawk, a Ford station wagon, a 1967 Chevelle, a GMC pick up truck, another Chevelle, and a Ford Starliner.

A Late Summer Draw

 Cruise-A-Palooza is held every Labor Day weekend and traditionally draws a lot of people who still want to enjoy the still nice weather and check out some great old cars. For this edition there were plenty of those on hand including a late 1980s Mercury Capri, a Chevy Camaro Rally Sport, a 1964 Dodge station wagon, a Ford Falcon Sprint, a 1965 Volkswagen Beetle, a Malibu, a Futura, and a chopped 1939 Ford.

Cruise-A-Palooza On the River

Nestled on the Ohio River, Coney Island was once a thriving amusement park and is now a large water park and also the hose to many area events including the annual Cruise-A-Palooza which regularly draws well over 100 great vehicles. (If you haven't been following the blog you might want to scroll back a few days and read my history of Ohio's Coney Island). Among the many rides on hand for this event was a sweet custom 1936 Studebaker that was packing a Hemi engine, a Chevy Nova, a Ford Mustang Mach 1, a 1970 Chevelle, a 1966 Chrysler 300, a Ford Bronco, a 1967 Impala, and a Dodge Coronet 500 with a very clever license plate.

Ohio's Cony Island History Part Four

From its humble beginnings as a picnic grove up through the 1920s when it became a full fledged amusement park until the late 1960s, Coney Island was a major entertainment destination for people living around Cincinnati. Constant flooding convinced the owners to build a new park on high land and settled a spot 25 miles north of the city in Mason, OH. Since many of the rides from Coney were going to be used in the new Kings Island park, the old place officially closed in September, 1971. But it wasn't closed for good. It still exists today centered around Sunlight Pool, the largest recirculating pool in North America. Coney now sits next to a major outdoor music venue, Riverbend, and a little further up the road is Belterra Park Casino and race track. Coney uses its expansive land to host events such as the Cruise-A-Palooza car show which is one of the area's more popular events. It draws a number of great automobiles each year such as this customized Ford pick up truck, a 1969 Cadillac convertible, a 1966 Thunderbird, a pair of Plymouth Super Bees, a 1970 Chevelle SS, a Ford Starliner, and a Chevy Nova station wagon.

Part Three of the History of Ohio's Coney Island

What started as a picnic grove on the banks of the Ohio River had grown into a full fledged amusement park by the mid 1920s. Coney Island had added a number of rides, including several roller coasters as well as a children's section and had opened a dance pavilion called Moonlight Gardens that featured top name national touring talent. But the thing that made Coney Island so successful was also it's biggest problem. Sitting on the banks of the Ohio meant that the park was prone to floods. By 1969 new owners, Taft Broadcasting, were building a new amusement park built on higher ground. But that didn't mean the ultimate end to Coney Island. It still exists on a smaller scale and has become the home to one of the region's more popular car shows, Cruise-A-Palooza. The show draws great cars such as this Volkswagen Type 1 Beetle, a 1948 Chevy, a Plymouth sedan, another Beetle, an Edsel Corsair, a 1967 Cadillac, an Oldsmobile 442, and a 1956 Caddy.