Thanks to David Bernstein for reminding me of this place. Read the whole thing, it’s quite funny. Here’s an excerpt:
Super Speed Water Slides: These were two water slides, set slightly apart from the rest of the park, that took advantage of nearly vertical slopes to allow riders to attain higher speeds than usually possible. One started with riders going almost vertically downwards and was covered with screening for the first several feet.
As barriers on the side of the slides were very low, lifeguards reminded every user to remain flat on their back with their arms at the side as they descended since there was no way to ride it otherwise and stay on. The fall from both slides had the potential for very serious injury.
Those who made it to the bottom found their progress arrested by water, which made a large splash, and then a small pool. The speed at which riders met the end resulted in many getting wedgies and enemas from the experience.[13] Employees kept fishnets for scooping out the occasional nugget of excrement or tampon.
This statement I think pretty much sums up what we’ve lost as a society by treating children as fragile eggs who have to be protected from everything:
Action Park made adults of a generation of Tri-State Area kids who strolled through its blood-stained gates, by teaching us the truth about life: it is not safe, you will get hurt a lot, and you’ll ride all the way home burnt beyond belief.
Another patron notes:
Action Park was a true rite of passage for any New Jerseyan of my generation. When I get to talking about it with other Jerseyans, we share stories as if we are veterans who served in combat together. I suspect that many of us may have come closest to death on some of those rides up in Vernon Valley. I consider it a true shame that future generations will never know the terror of proving their grit at New Jersey’s most dangerous amusement park.
But not today. No. We can’t let kids do anything dangerous.
