Popeye, Bozo + a Sunken Whale: Failed 'Disneyland of the Northeast' Theme Park Nightmare

Some would call "buckies" the Disneyland of the South. - Who would say that, Demi? - I'm not even joking, there are people that say that. - I would like to meet and interview those people's parents, because. - They're parents! - Sub-Parkpeeps, I'm Demi from Magical High Jinks. - And I'm Entertainment Journalist, Joey Nulfi, strapping in for the Parkpeeps podcast. The Ultimate Theme Park show where unhinged passion travel expertise and Coaster Nerd Chaos collide. And this week we're diving into the very strange and scary history of the defunct whale animatronic at Pleasure Island in Massachusetts. - So buckle up and pull up on that yellow strap as we dispatch for season two of the Parkpeeps podcast. - I'm welcome to Medford, Massachusetts Duncan. - See, Nick Medfigs, we'll watch travel when you're already there, that's us Logan. You can have whatever you want from free. - Welcome back, Parkpeeps. We just turned off our blinga-impact.ca and we're live from Duncan. - So grab your cup of chowda and we'll help you ready for a wicked smart episode. - Demi, Demi, why do you sound like you're in a bee movie remake of Goodwill Haunting? - Joey, we're talking about a mass park at a Duncan and mass. It's the only acceptable way to speak. - Well, I did just, okay, cutting into my ear right now, I did just get word from the Parkpeeps HR department that the entire state of Massachusetts does say to season to sister they will sue you for emotional damage of having to hear that bad Boston accent. - Well, that's a bummer. I guess I will transition back into my normal New York accent dog coffee. Okay, let me please remind you to please rate and subscribe wherever you get your podcast. Drop a comment on this episode and make sure you're following us at Parkpeeps Pod, at Joey Nulfi and at Magical Hygiene, so that's H-I-J-I-N-X on all socials. - Now, I'm gonna throw this over to Joey. - Well, I do, we got it, listen, listen. Dear listeners. - I'm very excited about this episode. - It is such a good episode. There is good reason for Demi doing that accent. It is appropriate, it is fitting, and actually does tie back into something that you mentioned in that little intro Demi and that heavily accented intro of Duncan Donuts. But more on that later, this episode is something that I've been wanting to do for a very long time. You know, we love our deep dives on very weird things about theme park history and weird odd things that have happened in the past, such as the great Donald Duck birthday party. - Yeah, birthday party, the great Donald Duck, Bill. - I have to stop. - You, sorry H-R, it's hard to stop. - It's hard to stop. - One just dot, Kada. - You know what, this is a payback for all of my time to go saying that Demi talks like this. That's, this is payback. And you know what, H-R has never come after me for that Demi, so I, you know. - It's very true H-R, the hypocrisy here, come on. - You know what, maybe H-R can now stand for the Parkpeeps Hugs and Rejoicing Department. Hugs and Rejoicing, that's what it is. So we're actually, it's not a season to cease. It's a celebrate and dream. - Dream, celebrate and dream, that's what it is. Boston has sent a celebrate and dream to us, so we can continue with this episode. And it does have a lot to do with something in that geographical location because there's a very weird bit of theme park history that we're getting into today. There is a park that has long plagued both of our memories. It is called Pleasure Island that used to operate in Wakefield, Massachusetts, and on this episode we are going to dive into the very strange history of the park, some of its attractions, some weird intellectual properties that we have discovered that really nobody ever talks about, but made their way into this park, such as Little Spoiler Alert, Popeye, the sailor, did have a brief tenure and also boze of the clowns of Downtown Clown Town, Popeye's Bill Drep Barges, we've got some universal connections. This park also had-- - And it's also not Pleasure Island in Downtown Disney. - It is not, but this park does have actual ties to the origins of Disneyland as well, which we will get into. This park has, like I said, I first discovered this. You might also have seen this on YouTube, but there were some urban explorers who looked into a little lake. It was a man-made lake where when this park first opened in 1959, now it does sit by a Duncan Donuts in an office park and apartment buildings, but so that's where the Duncan comes back in. - It actually does, it literally ties back in, but there was a popular YouTube video a few years ago where I think it was three years ago, these urban explorers went in and found the whale animatronic that we are going to be talking about that was in a giant lake today. But more on this later, we want to start with the history of Pleasure Island that, as I said, first opened in 1959 in Wakefield, Massachusetts, and all of the information that I've researched from today comes from a few different places and I want to cite them here for accuracy. The Friends of Pleasure Island.org website. Everybody should check it out. It is amazing. It is a, well, if you are a theme park nerd like us and you like history and with pictures and it's so well researched and documented, go to this website. They also host like annual walkarounds of this, like these are full nerds, these are our people, Demi. - We will do this one day. - We really should, oh my God, and they said that they happen rain a shine. So then there's a picture of literally all of these boomers with their umbrellas around this lake. It's hilarious. From there, but Sparky Games YouTube, which is where the whale video is from. The Pleasure Island book by Robert McLaughlin. There's also Boston.com and The New York Times. Actually, we're citing some information from. So let's start at the beginning because this park does truly have a wild history. As I mentioned, this park actually does have huge ties to Disneyland as it was designed by C.V. Wood, the late creative who was initially in charge of designing Disneyland. - Oh my God. - Yeah, Walt directly brought him on to help with Disneyland. He later left Disney in 1956 after he completed work on Disneyland, but he also helped create the first ever six flags. So yeah, this guy was very, very, very, he's someone who I think in, at least in my personal scope of Disney history, I don't necessarily think of him first when you think of Disneyland. I mean, 'cause it's usually Walt, it's very Walt-Walt-Walt-Walt-Centric. And Roy, obviously, when you think of Disneyland, but and also, yeah, you think of those kind of people, Bob Gerr, in the early years as well, our cute little icon, Bob Gerr. I just love him so much. I'm shout out to Amos Shanta. - And you're not Bob Gerr on Instagram? - What the hell are you doing with your life? - He's so old and adorable, and they just run his Instagram for him, I'm sure, and it's just a joy. - Well, that's why I ran into him at Amos Shanta, and I have that video, which is the restaurant Walt Disney used to go to in the early studio day. So, and I actually met him and he just is, he's such a sweetheart and he has such great stories. But those are the kind of people that usually think of, I think, you know, the bigger sort of personalities. But so, this park, even though CV would design the park, it was initiated by a man named William Hawks, who was then the president of Child Life Magazine, and there were also executives at Cabot. They collaborated with Marco Engineering of Los Angeles to build what was dubbed, and what they hoped would be, quote, the Disneyland of the East. So, this park is very, very much made, and you can see through some of the design elements and some of the attractions that we're gonna be talking about that this park was very much modeled with Disneyland in mind. - Some would call buckees the Disneyland of the South. - I would like to meet and interview those people's parents because, yes, because that is absolutely wild, and we might need to get MacIla back on here to initiate some testing, but anyway. Pleasure Island, as Demi said, not to be confused with Pleasure Island in Orlando, Florida, RIP, it was an 80-acre park that featured attractions and rides in various locations, and they were hoping to attract 1.2 million visitors in the first year. And as Robert McLaughlin, the author that I, or the writer that I spoke about before, who wrote a book on this, he told Boston.com, it was pretty cool as a projection in terms of the visitors that they hoped to get for that year, except for one little minor problem. Quote, we had more rain in that season than we ever had since I think around 1927. So, think of it like, for all you little jenziers, think of it such as what you would do if your Instagram reel only got like three likes and one comment in the first two hours, the algorithm would deprioritize it. If you have rain and bad weather in the first season of a major amusement park designed by a Disneyland creative, your season is not off to a great start. So, in that ultimately would become a recurring theme [BLANK_AUDIO] as great of a park as this looked at the time, it succumbed mainly to one thing, which was nature. Massachusetts obviously gets very cold in the winter, and that relegated the park to very strict spring and summer only operating schedules, which severely limited its income, and it did eventually close in 1969 after 11 seasons of operation due to poor attendance. But also according to Mr. McLaughlin, the biggest reason the the reason that Pleasure Island closed was the land became more valuable than the business itself. If there is a bottom line, that's the bottom line is what he said. So, apartment buildings and Duncan Donuts are things that can operate you around and bring in your around income, whereas half the year, a park like this, which was mainly built outdoor, which makes me think of something as a why the idea didn't shift more towards something like what we've discussed before in St. Louis when Disney was pondering the river front square park. I imagine that obviously would have cost a way more money to do something in there, but the return on investment. That's always the answer to everything. It's like, oh, well, why doesn't Main Street in Magic Kingdom have that little covering like they do in Tokyo to help with the rain or whatever? Money, I mean, aesthetic too, probably. But just in general, there's like, why aren't there things that, and it's always money. I mean, this was not the level, even though they're wanted to be the Disneyland of the East. Do they have the budget? Yeah, exactly. The budget, honey. They don't have the budget, honey, the land. They have the land, but not the budget, honey. So as I said, this place does sort of to this day remain a key part of like Boomer, Massachusetts, lore. As I said, there are groups that do the walking tour, sites that collect memories and photographs and anecdotes. It's a strong part of the area's history. And the site currently, you can visit it, it sits off of Route 128 and Wakefield on the road is actually called Pleasure Island Road still. There are office buildings, apartment buildings, and like I said, because this is Massachusetts, there is a Dunkin Donuts, very near by. Oh, it has to be. There has to be at least like with like a mile radius of where you are. How do you think they fuel them? Walking tours in the rain. You got to get your coffee, your coffee. Coffee. And now I know that's not a Boston accent, everybody. That's my New York accent. Sort of. Yeah, in my head it is. So to do a little attraction deep dive, the park featured two main areas. Clipper Cove, which is a recreation of a New England fishing village, and an old west area themed to a place called Goldpan Gulch. General attractions and things to do here included. Oh, and this is various over the years. Some didn't open right away, some opened a little bit later and only operated for short periods of time. But it's kind of hard to track down exactly when to when certain things opened. But generally there was something called Monkey Island, which was a ropes and obstacle course over a pond of foul, such as ducks and geese, and there are pictures online where you can see people climbing over this thing. And I guess if you just fell into the water, you were just at the mercy of the ducks and the geese. Yeah. I tell you just like, yeah, yes, you sure, where are you sure, where? I'd like doing the the zipline over a gatorland. I had something tells me you're just here for the monkey island. I am actually there was also the continental carousel mini golf and the show bowl, which was a venue where lots of performers over the years, such as the Three Stooges, Elefits Gerald, Duke Ellington, and many, many more performed. So this was like a happen in spot when it when it first opened. It really was. There was a big push for this. So there's also I want to read some funny names of attractions and things to do at this place over the years. Hood's Gay 90s ice cream parlor. Stop it. Stop it right now, Joey. Are you serious? Yes. You're saying the word hood's space gay. Gay. And then 90s ice cream parlor onto the end of that. Yes. I'm going to need my first born that. Love that. Love that for them. What does that mean, though? Absolutely no clue. No clue because this was the 50s and 60s. This was not the 90s. But Hood's Gay 90s ice cream parlor. Maybe it meant like the 1890s, like the gay old 1890s. Oh my goodness. Oh, you're probably right. Clang, clang, clang. What the gay ice cream? Yeah, I don't know what was going on down at Hood's Gay 90s ice cream parlor. But any time I referenced it, I will be using the full name. There were lots of actually pepperage farm was a big. Yes, there was a very big thing there. They were had a very big presence at this park. Swift and companies great meat market. Which unclear if it was located next to Hood's Gay 90s ice cream parlor. Are you sure we're not talking about P town? You know what? Actually, we cracked the code. Pleasure Island just moved to P town. Yeah, Pleasure. Tell me we're on the case. We've cracked the code. Breaking news. Pleasure Island. P Pleasure, P town. Oh my god. Oh god, we did it. We did it. Well, the meat market was also near Merchants National Bank. Not sure how that's an attraction. Imagine Disney touting an ATM on the map. It's like an attraction. Then there was also Friends Baked Bienery. Okay. A water buffalo land and sea ride, which featured amphibious vehicles. So there's like pictures of people riding these things that looked like little mini tanks like crawling out of the water. It's so funny. This place really truly was crazy, but the craziest thing was obviously the Moby Dick giant animatronic in the water that I don't have sub-mechanophobia, but this triggers it for me for real. Which please explain that nobody else knows that term, but you sub-mechanophobia is essentially the fear of anything that is animatronic like or statue like or figure like underwater. Yeah. So it is a very real thing, but you know, we'll get a little bit more into Moby Dick later, but other attractions first, we just want to briefly overview some of the actual attractions that we have more information on versus just their name because the whale is like the main attraction. Right. So as I said, two main areas, Clipper Cove and Goldpin Gulch, and the IP, there was incorporation of IP and characters over the years. As I said before, Popeye was a very prominent figure in this park. At least in 1961, there is an ad from 1961 that actually advertises that fans could meet Popeye in person. So this was official. This was not just a knockoff. The ad says, quote, "What's new at Pleasure Island? Popeye the Sailor live in person. Meet the one and only TV favorite Popeye exclusively at Pleasure Island all season beginning June 24th." So in a lot of ways, I mean, you are seeing this place. I mean, obviously Disney was already, you know, doing meet and greet characters at Disneyland in the 50s and 60s, but you know, advertising something like Popeye, somebody from a different IP and a park like this seems like laying the, hey, obviously, like I said, this was happening before in other places, but that seems like a pretty cool integration of licensing somebody like Popeye to exist in a different park that wasn't from a major company such as Disney. Yeah, and Popeye was huge. I only think people realize how big of a star Popeye was at the time. Yeah, and the ad is super colorful. I'm assuming it ran in newspapers, and it's a very colorful ad. It's really cool. It's got that retro sort of 60s vibe to it. It's very interesting, and I wasn't able to find any pictures of Popeye actually at the park, but I imagine it was either a face character or somebody who was wearing like big muscle arms or maybe it was a costume character, you never know. You could still be Popeye in two in Lagoon. Exactly. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's pretty cool. So another slightly horrifying ad though teased Bozo the Clown from television head history. He had his own attraction. That's crazy. So the ad reads new Larry Harman's TV, Bozo the Clown sky scraper slide, climbed to the stars, then slide down from the clouds into a magical land of Make Believe, and that sounds a little too close to killer clowns or matter space. No, well, first of all, I love killer clowns, matter space. They're so adorable and oh my gosh, the house, like they're even more adorable in their house. They're just like, got you. Like I just, yeah, but Bozo was huge. Like you don't, again, like people don't realize and that, and this honestly predates scary clowns. Yeah. This was when this is the era of clowns that, you know, what it's supposed to be like just brings joy and fun and you know, why my mom went out of business because laugh and sell, laugh and sell was a real clown. My mom went out of business because everyone's pretty clowns. Yeah, because they just kept and they kept pushing more and more scary clowns and that's saying though it's so funny that's why my mom went out of business love that. I beg you to look at this ad, though, Debbie, and tell me you would not be terrified of looking at this because it is quite creepy. But I think I'm also just so used to all of the clown stuff. I don't get scared of clowns. Clowns don't scare me, but this ad is just unsettling a little bit. But we also had the, there's an interesting story behind the old Smoky Railroad, which was similar to Disney, as we're getting into these what we're talking before with C.V. Wood of the Disneyland Inspiration. You can clearly see it in several attractions. There was the old Smoky Railroad, which was located in Goldpan Gulch. It was, this locomotive was originally originated in 1904. It initially used to work on a sugar plantation in 1904, and then worked at different plantation locations until 1959, when it was bought for Pleasure Island. So similar to the attraction scene at Disney Parks, the ride traveled around the park and took guests through various scenes and locales on site. Other Goldpan and Gulch attractions included Diamond Lil Saloon, Quantum Powet Publishers Print Shop, because nothing screams family fun like manual labor at a print shop. I mean, I don't know what you guys are doing on the weekends. I'm going to the print shop mama and not the club. I'm going to the print shop, but and then going to the print shop at the club. I'm going to the print shop and then I'm going to the old gay 90s ice cream parlor. And then we're going to swing by the meat market for after hours. But there is also the old Chisholm Trail dark ride that followed the frontier excursions of Wyatt Earp and Baton Masterson. There was also the bro trail ride where guests could ride donkeys through various locales, just like they could at Disneyland and what would become the eventually the site of Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. You could do that at Disneyland as well. And then there was also an 1800s contemporary hotel exhibit sponsored by the hotel corporation of America. And there's also Sheriff's Office and a jail. So you also see that sort of integration of brands sponsoring things, just like they've done ever since the foundation of Disney. And you can still see in the parks to this day, no big brands sponsoring these things. So this park really had a good structure and a good foundation to it. But there was another, there was a tilt house attraction called the Slanty Shanty. That's a very cute name. And the only other attraction that seems to me to be just as exciting as the lead up to our big marquee attraction, the Bobi Dick Hunt ride, is called the Rec of Hesperus, which was in the Clipper Cove section. It was a dark ride. It was based on Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's 1842 Ballot of the same name, which I will not recite. This was a dark ride where guests with board carts made to look like boats. And if you look at pictures, they almost look like the Peter Pan's flight boats, just they're on the ground and not suspended from above. They really look very similar to it. And guests with them, whether a thunder and lightning storm and the boat would then, quote unquote, sink beneath the ocean. And you would see fish, a turtle, a shark. And then at the end, there was a giant meeting with King Neptune, which I'm kind of like, this is the exact plot of the little mermaid dark ride at both Disney, Disney California adventure and Magic Kingdom. So there are so many Disney parallels here. And that actually is the plot for the ride that the first iteration of the Disney little mermaid dark ride that was originally intended for Disneyland Paris, which you can find concept videos of online. So yeah, they were originally intended to get a little mermaid dark ride too. And this is very similar to the whole thing. So yeah, according though, fun fact, according to the Friends of Pleasure Island, or excite that I've been citing, they are really, I can't stress that you go to the site enough. If you are a team partner like us, you need to check this out. They believe that they have tracked down the original shark figure from the ride. They believe that they have tracked it down to a local store. There are photos submitted by someone named Ray DePiro. So shout out to you, Mr. DePiro. It is hanging above a bunch of merchandise in this random store. It looks like it almost looks like fishing supplies or something. But it sure, indeed looks like a shark that would have been in a theme park attraction, simulating being under the ocean. And it's high quality stuff too. You know, it's not just something that, you know, love to miss Kennywood, my home park. But like if you kind of look at the old mill and Kennywood, you know, that kind of old style animatronic that like doesn't look really good, but it's kind of camping and fun. This looks like a very good shark. So there was also a pirate cove attraction in this area. And then a restaurant called the Chowder House. So there you go. The Chowder House. So the main event, the Moby Dick Hunt ride, which I want everyone right now to stop what you're doing. And while you're listening to this, yeah, don't navigate away from us. While you're listening to this, please pull up the video of the Moby Dick Hunt. So you can see just be careful where you're going, be careful you don't leave any words out of that search. So you can see what we are talking about this incredible animatronic. Yes. So this was a boat ride. It was outdoor that went out over a manmade lake that is still there today. More than a second. And there is something also a little unsettling before you get to the Moby Dick animatronic. There is video footage of this online in the Sparky Games video mostly. They mostly have everything on this Moby Dick Hunt ride in that video, which you should all go watch. There was a scene where you were traveling by the water and these porpoises would jump out. And I mean, it's just like I said, I don't have sub-mechanophobia. But there is something about the porpoises and the Moby Dick that do deeply unsettle me and I don't understand why. I think you do have sub-mechanophobia. I really, I don't. I think you just do because I don't feel that way at all. Well, no, you actually know what you're right because when I would ride the Disneyland Submarine before it was the damp, dank, Nemo experience, I was deeply afraid of those that creatures in the water. So you do have sub-mechanophobia? Maybe I do have sub-mechanophobia because it does deeply creep me out. It doesn't creep me out at all. It's just it's cool. I just I I don't even know if like creep me out is the right word. Like it's just unsettling. It's it's it's it's open. Let me ask you a question. Yeah. You ride a Jurassic Park. And you know that they're kind of like on little little plots of land within the water. Yeah. Does that freak you out? No. No. Because they're sitting on top. Yeah. What about the ones that come out of the water? No. No. That doesn't bother me either. Although I will say like the jaws. Yeah. You know what? I do have sub-mechanophobia because the jaws ride 100,000% that freaked me out as a kid. Okay. Yeah. Because like thinking it's it's just I think just like the ocean itself terrifies me. I don't like the ocean because I'm afraid of deep bodies of water. I think it's the just something that looks so menacing in life. Like is under the surface. Yeah. Even though you know it's not alive. Oh, actually now that I'm thinking about it, you know, I do have sub-mechanophobia because I know. I know. Yeah. Yeah. Two episodes in a row. Well, because I look at production photos from something that I believe you would like to discuss, Demi. But when I look at production photos from the movie jaws. Yes. And you see those that picture of Steven Spielberg in the shark's mouth. Yeah. Deeply disturbs me. And footage of the shark in the water. It really cruises me out. I don't like it. So, okay. Now, yeah, I am realizing that maybe I do have the sub-mechanophobia. But the porpoises freak me out. And then there was a portion of the ride where you encounter a giant 70-foot long animatronic whale that would rise out of the man-made lake. So, it's 70 feet long. It's very tall. It literally, as you're going past it in the boat, rises from the depths. You can't see it from the surface. It fully rises out of the water. Water shoots out of its blowhole. And then it goes back down into the water. Yeah. I mean, the water shooting out of a blowhole on an animatronic in 1959. Horrific. Yeah. Horrific, but impressive. Yeah. But horrific. Like, imagine not having seen anything like this in your life, not seeing the video, not knowing that this is possible. In the 50s, you're still climbing and banging on the trolley. No, you're not. But imagine, it's just like that. It would feel like it was real. Like, it's so incredible to have that. And I just want everyone to think about this. This was 1959. Jaws opened at Universal Hollywood in 1976. There was 17 years later. Can you imagine? Like, that's a huge amount of time. Really, if you think about it, that this giant whale animatronic existed before Jaws did. And remember how impressive Jaws was? I don't know why this isn't being talked about as much as Jaws gets talked about because I think it's just like one of the most impressive and way ahead of its times things that I have ever seen in my life. And I didn't know about it until you told me about it. That's a brilliant connection that, you know, they, because I don't, I bet if we looked, we could find some similar things like maybe, I mean, actually now that I'm thinking about it, the submarine ride at Disneyland, not quite sure the exact opening date of that before it turned into finding Nemo's submarine actually. Let me look at that because they don't, so because I'm wondering, even though I know for sure, oh, that opened in 1959, 1959, oh, but they didn't have a scale of the size. Right. That's what I'm saying. The point that I'm making is that, you know, they had little things under the water, but they didn't have something that was a giant whale or shark that would rise out of the water and interact with the guests in that way. You know, on the submarine, you are sort of just watching out a little window and there's figures that do little tiny movements already submerged in the water, but this was quite a feat. And I mean, it was on a track. I mean, the whale was on a track under the water. It moved. It came out the blowhole that this was a pretty impressive figure for us as terrifying as it was. It was also extremely impressive. And yes, Demi, like you said, proceeding something that is still iconic to this day, something like JAWS at Universal, which we saw seeing Hollywood on the tram tour and then later in Orlando, the now closed JAWS at Universal. You can still see in Japan, which I got to do, so that, honestly, I felt like I finally was able to call myself a full-fledged Universal. Yeah. Yeah. That's amazing. So I didn't start going until post-JAWS. Yeah. Wow. It's so cool. Yeah. Japanese didn't know what they were saying. I need to get out there and do it. I really do. Anyway, I'm trying to go to Japan within the next year, so I'm going to try to do that when I go out there. Yeah. But there is a mystery now surrounding Mizmobi Dick and many have theorized that he is still in this lake even after the park closed in 1969. And those people who theorize that are correct because he was spotted hanging out under the water with many recorded images and videos dating back to 2005, which was the last time someone was able to see him from the surface in a widely seen video. So the water, after 2005, the water level rose. You could no longer see him from the surface. And then three years ago, the Sparky Games YouTube channel went on an excursion. They bought an underwater drone and located him. Now the footage is horrifying. It was the whale's first appearance on camera in over 20 years. They first knew it was him, even though he was covered in moss and underwater rot. They discovered holes in his side on a blank surface. They looked up pictures. They actually drilled holes into the side of this whale animatronic so that his body would fill with water and he wouldn't float off of his tracks while he operated. So they still couldn't see him that well. They bought another drone, went back down, discovered way more with a higher quality camera and more depth that this new drone was able to go deeper. There is this creepy shot of when they first realized that they are seeing what used to be his eye. It's so terrifying. They just like, it's the murky depths. And then it just is his little whale eye and his big long nose. You can see where his mouth used to be and where all his teeth used to be and it's just horrifying. And then they found the necklace from Titanic and I died in my sleep aboard thinking about meeting my husband on the Titanic in 1912 because I'm the old lady from Titanic. It's been 84 years. But this is really the reason why this I think fascinates both of us so much is because it combines so many different things. It's not just roadside attraction, kind of kitschy theme park history. It is something that I think not a lot of people talk about and they should be given the amount of money and hype and creative brain force that was behind this. I mean, the same people that worked on Disneyland worked on this. And it's I'm surprised that they didn't move the whale somewhere else. That also has always sort of boggle to my mind too. I am just kind of like, why would you not do something else with this whale? I mean, I'm thinking Disney would have wanted it at the time and let the very least, you know? I mean, I feel like Disney would have loved that whale. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, especially like, I mean, they could have painted it black. And made it the whale from Pinocchio. Yeah. Or, you know, well, I guess, Fantasma definitely wasn't running around that time. But I mean, you know, it's, it's there's something that I feel like Disney could have done with this. And because where else are you going to find a home for this? Yeah. This is nowhere. I don't know. Or at least now it just belongs in the museum. Demi, the park keeps the museum. Yeah. Our museum. Now, you know what? Demi, hold on, the HR department has sent us another celebratin' dream. Demi, I have just heard that our park peeps' little minions have actually acquired the whale and it will open at the park peeps' museum in the coming months. Wow. We are doing such a great job here. And we really are. How funny that news just broke while we're fresh in the episode. Especially after the entire state of Massachusetts almost sued me. Yeah. You know, we do it. We unfortunately there are no remnants of the meat market or the gay 90s ice cream parts. I'll open up my own gay 90s ice cream. But this time it's themed to the 1990s. Yes. Oh, well, we just, it's, you know, like we were saying, this doesn't, it's not like a kitschy part of theme park lore. It's very deeply complex, interesting theme park lore that also still very clearly has an emotional connection to the people who are living there and they care very much about it. And it made clearly, even though it only operated for 11 seasons, made very much of an impact on the people living there if they're still doing walking tours, you know, around this lake, which I would love to do. I would love that. I would love that. Yeah. We really should do that. Um, there's plenty of parts up there. At a tour, rowing list of things to do. Yes. Well, there's just six flags up there. Six flags New England. Yeah. I would love to go too. Story land. There's a lot of parks in the, in, you know, New England that I would, I would love to go too. So, oh, my God. Salem in general, just Salem, Massachusetts. I did that for my batch, Bachelorette party. Oh, well, I'm Mary. Can I do it? I was pre-knowing you. I know. Otherwise, it would have been there. Yeah. I know. Well, it was fun. We can always dream, celebrate and dream. Celebrate and dream. Yes. TM. Well, dear listeners, what a whale of an episode. What a whale of an episode. Yes. Make sure you are following us on all socials at ParkpeepsPod, at Joey Northley and Magic, at Magical Hygings. You know that's H-I-J-I-N-X on social and YouTube. Yeah. Make sure you're keeping up with all of our travels on our perspective pages, especially over on the Magical Hygings YouTube channel, where there is lots of incredible stuff going on over there. And I make sure you're giving us here on Parkpeeps the highest, highest rating possible. And on your podcast, App of Choice, and stay tuned for another all-new episode next week. Hubba-bye, Kata. You want to go get some Duncan? Oh, I would love to get Duncan, Kata, and park my car, and eat some chata, and. Oh. Go to the gay 90. Oh, sorry. Oh. Oh, okay. Sorry. Sorry. I have to see some distance again. Oh, they're suing us. Okay, yeah. It has been. We tried. screen parlour. Yes, bye.