The story of the most stupid and dangerous amusement park in the world: “death was tolerated as a game”

During its heyday in the 80s and 90s, the New Jersey action park earned a reputation as the dumbest and most dangerous amusement park that ever existed.

The park, which opened in 1978, was known as lawless territory, run by drunk teenage employees and frequented by even more boozy teenage patrons.

With slides that challenged physics and rides that encouraged risky behavior, injuries in the park were commonplace, according to former employees.

“Class Action Park” is an HBO documentary created, in large part, by interviewing former employees and visitors who remember, with great nostalgia, the wild fun and extreme danger of the park.

Action Park: The amusement park where dying was an option

Most of the youngsters who came to this amusement park left with cuts, burns and concussions that caused them temporary pain.

However, many died.

The park was designed and managed in accordance with two of founder Gene Mulvihill’s core beliefs: people should have the right to unlimited fun and adventure and take responsibility for their own safety.

Mulvihill, a former Wall Street stockbroker, didn’t believe in insurance and dragged out lawsuits against the park, of which there were more than a hundred, by refusing to settle. Additionally, Mulvihill engaged in many illegal financial activities.)

The danger, according to Mulvihill, was part of the fun, and when employees suggested safety measures to reduce the risk, the owner flatly rejected them.

Action Park: the games of death

“Action Park was a place where death was tolerated as a game”says Esther Larsson, whose 19-year-old son George died in 1980 after riding the park’s alpine slide.

With a sled, the riders traversed the steep concrete track with a stick that often broke. The attraction was so dangerous that, according to the documentary, photos of bloodied users greeted the people at the top.

Other victims drowned in an attraction called Tidal wave pooldubbed the “grave pool,” which featured a “death zone” manned by a lifeguard in the “death chair,” according to the documentary.

During the kayak experience, a man died when he fell from his canoe and was electrocuted by a malfunctioning “underground electrical system”.

A company called Great American Recreation he owned the park, and its creator, Eugene Mulvihill, was an unusual businessman who brought to life his “anything goes” ethos and modified the rides while they were under construction to make them “more dangerous”.

Mulvihill, known as “Uncle Gene” to his young employees, designed one of the deadliest rides in the park: the Cannonball Loop, which broke teeth and caused cutsdrawing “a circle on a cocktail napkin” and “hiring local welders to assemble it,” according to Class Action Park.

After various lawsuits and complications, the park finally closed in 1996.