SILVER DOLLAR CITY: FROM A HOLE IN THE
GROUND TO MAJOR THEME PARK
When a
nature-loving Chicago family leased a
cave in the Ozarks, what they had in
mind was a summer cave tour business.
What they developed was a theme park
attracting over two million people each
year and winning the theme park
industry's top award of excellence
worldwide.
Silver
Dollar City, an 1880s theme park located
near Branson, Missouri, presents six
world-class festivals from April through
December. The 55-acre park has 12 stage
venues, 22 rides, 12 restaurants, 60
shops and 1500 employees, including 100
resident craftsmen. But it began as an
accessory to a hole in the ground.
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The hole, first called Marble
Cave because the limestone walls
were thought to be marble, was
one of the first attractions in
what would become Branson. Eons
old and hidden beneath the
hills, it was first discovered
by the Osage Indians in 1500,
described by geologists in the
1860s and explored in the 1880s
by adventurers who lowered
themselves on ropes 200 feet
into the main chamber. One of
those adventurers was a
newspaper publisher who began to
write about the cave's beauty
and mystery.
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A group
of Union Civil War veterans formed a
mining company to mine resources from
the cave, mining tons of nitrogen-rich
bat guano from the cave in the 1880s,
but finding no marble. Scientific
American magazine described the
cave in 1885, and word of the natural
wonder spread throughout the continent.
Canadian mining expert William Henry
Lynch read of the cave, purchased it
sight unseen, traveled to the Ozarks
and, with his two daughters, opened the
cave to public tours in 1894.
Cave
tours continued into the early 1900s,
and minister/writer Harold Bell Wright
was one of its visitors. In 1907, after
his famous novel "The Shepherd of the
Hills" was published, nationwide
interest in the Ozarks began, drawing
visitors who wanted to see the
self-reliant and stoic hill people, the
wooded valleys, the mountain "balds,"
and the incredible cave Wright had
described.
As
automobile travel took over from
horse-and-buggy transportation, the
creation of roads became important to
attractions seeking visitors. Cave owner
William Henry Lynch was dedicated to
bringing the road from Branson to his
cave, cutting brush and clearing what is
now Missouri Highway 76. By the 1920s,
the cave was a well-established
attraction and tourists could get there
by road or by hiking from a nearby train
stop.
In
1946, Chicagoans Hugo and Mary Herschend
vacationed in the Ozarks and discovered
the cave now called Marvel Cave because
of its awesome proportions. They loved
the cave, which was run by Lynch's
daughters. When the Lynch sisters
decided to retire, they offered the
Herschends a 99-year lease on Marvel
Cave. Hugo, a Danish immigrant whose
world traveling had separated him from
his family in Denmark and whose sales
work at times kept him away from home in
Chicago, was looking for a family
business where he could work together
with his wife and sons. In April 1950,
Hugo and Mary and their teenage sons,
Jack and Pete, took over the management
and tours of the cave. That summer,
Marvel Cave drew 8,000 visitors.
After
making improvements to make cave access
easier, the Herschends brainstormed
above-ground improvements, such as
creating a pleasant area for people
waiting to go into the cave. Hugo's
vision was to have some of the native
craftsmen demonstrating traditional
Ozarks crafts. Then in 1954, an 80-plus
year-old traveling salesman named
Charlie Sullivan came to the cave,
telling the Herschends he had been born
in the general store of a mining town
named "Marmaros" -- which was the Greek
word for "marble" -- that had been at
the entrance to the cave. There had been
28 residents, a hotel, a school, a
pottery shop and a furniture factory, he
told them, and after searching through
leaves and brush, Sullivan showed them
the old building foundations. The idea
of recreating the 1880s mining town was
born.
Following Hugo's death in 1955, Mary,
Jack and Pete began building the 1880s
Ozark village. Mary was committed to
authenticity and preservation -- there
would be no cheap storefronts. She also
insisted on preserving the natural
beauty of the area, particularly the
trees.
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In
1960, the Herschends opened the
village they called Silver
Dollar City, named for the
promotional idea of giving
visitors silver dollars as
change. While little was spent
on advertising, publicist Don
Richardson's idea of giving
silver dollars as change to park
visitors led to tremendous
word-of-mouth exposure. When
vacationers returning home would
pay for their gas and other
purchases with silver dollars,
people would ask where they got
the coins, and the vacationers
would describe the park and
their Silver Dollar City
adventure. |
Silver Dollar
City Employees in 1960 |
The
town square had a blacksmith shop, a
general store, an ice cream parlor, a
doll shop, and two 1800s authentic log
structures which had been relocated and
restored, the McHaffie homestead and the
Wilderness Church. For entertainment, a
small troupe of Silver Dollar City
"citizens" dressed in 1880s costumes
performed street theater, presenting
humorous feuds between the Hatfields and
the McCoys. The staff, including
Herschends, was about 17 people.
The
first year, Silver Dollar City drew more
than 125,000 people, four times more
visitors than the number that toured
Marvel Cave. "We discovered we were in
the theme park business," Pete Herschend
said.
In
1969, Silver Dollar City drew national
attention when producer Paul Henning
brought the cast and crew of the popular
Beverly Hillbillies television
show to the park to film five episodes.
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Jack, Mary and
Pete Herschend |
Silver Dollar City continued to
grow, adding stagecoach rides
and a steam train. Ingenuity in
handling challenges led to some
of the park's long-standing
traditions. When the steam train
needed a stop to build up enough
steam to make the final run up a
hill to get back to the station,
the rest period was turned into
interactive theater. Comedic
train robbers would come out of
the woods to hold up the
passengers while the boilers
churned up the necessary steam
to complete the ride. |
The
first craft festival held at the park in
1963 had native craftsmen demonstrating
19 crafts including woodcarving, tie
hacking, shingle splitting,
blacksmithing, weaving, lye soap making
and candlemaking. Visitors were so
interested in the demonstations that
more resident craftsmen were added,
including a glass blower, a weaver, a
potter and a silversmith. That year
500,000 people visited the park and
Silver Dollar City became Missouri's
number one tourist attraction.
Silver
Dollar City now encompasses more than 55
acres, showcasing America's heritage
crafts with a demonstrating colony of
100 resident craftsmen - woodcarvers,
glassblowers, potters, basket makers,
leather crafters, candle makers, knife
makers and more. Rides include the new
explosive launch coaster PowderKeg, the
multi-looping roller coaster WildFire,
additional themed coster rides such as
"Fire in the Hole" and Thunderation; an
authentic steam train; and water
rides. Attractions such as The World's
Largest Treehouse at Geyser Gulch
provide interactive play areas for kids
and families, and entertainment is
showcased in on-park theaters ranging in
size from 150 seats to 4,000 seats. By
1998, visitors were topping two million.
More
rides have been added in the past
decade, including the explosive launch
roller coaster PowderKeg and the
multi-looping roller coaster WildFire,
and the Grand Exposition with 10 family
rides. New in 2007, the Giant Swing
opens—launching riders more than seven
stories in the air—and nearly upside
down—at roller-coaster speeds.
Attractions such as The World's Largest
Treehouse at Geyser Gulch provide
interactive play areas for kids and
families, and entertainment is showcased
in on-park theaters ranging in size from
150 seats to 4,000 seats.
Six festivals offer a variety of
entertainment and activities throughout
the year. The season opens with
international performers from countries
around the globe for World-Fest
in April and May. Bluegrass & BBQ
brings together some of the top
performers in American blugrass music
and the aromas and flavors of a huge
all-American barbecue, running mid-May
through early June. America's largest
kids' festival, Kids' Fest,
brings in shows and activities, June
through August. In the fall,
Southern Gospel Picnic is the
largest gathering of Southern Gospel
artists, late August through early
September. The Festival of American
Music & Crafts, September through
October, presents visiting craftsmen
and visiting musicians, food from around
the country, and special exhibitions and
entertainment. An Old Time Christmas
in November and December features a
spectacular Holiday Light Parade, a NEW
Christmas Light Spectacular on the
square, holiday shows and more than four
million lights.
Along
with Silver Dollar City's growth and the
addition of high-quality production
shows and high-tech rides -- themed to
keep an old-fashioned look --
"high-touch" elements remain. Visitors
join the activities of an 1800s
homestead at the McHaffie Cabin. Kids
are deputized by the town
marshal. Gospel singing beckons from the
door of the 155-year-old Wilderness
Church. One can smell the aromas of
succotash cooking on an outdoor skillet
and feel the waxy bars of freshly made
cakes of lye soap. The ringing of the
blacksmith's hammer on the anvil invites
visitors to watch his work at an
open-air forge. The craftsmen show their
techniques, share the history and answer
questions, such as why hewing the logs
for a cabin make it strong enough to
stand for centuries.
The
vision of the Herschends more than four
decades ago to showcase the natural
beauty of the Ozarks and to bring to
life the colorful history and heritage
of the area led to the development of a
theme park which is today an industry
leader. Silver Dollar City won worldwide
recongnition with the 1999-2000
Applause Award,
the theme park industry's top award of
excellence based on management,
operations, creativity and
ingenuity. The park was also the 2001
recipient of the prestigious
Thea Classic Award,
recognizing worldwide excellence and
outstanding achievement in themed
entertainment from the
Themed Entertainment Association.
From
natural wonder to international
attraction, it all started with a hole
in the ground.
