"They were kind of the Disney World-Six Flags of its era," said Jim
Futrell, historian with the National Amusement Park Historical
Association. "It was just amazing the variety of rides and attractions they had."

Just as amazing are the memories left behind -- some fuzzy, like
wisps of cotton candy, others as sharp as the screams coming from the
park's seven roller-coasters.

"I remember the Bobs, the Fireball, the Shoot the Chutes, the
Pair-O-Chute ride, the Wild Mouse," said Hargrave, stepson of Chicago
Blackhawks owner William Wirtz. "But the best roller-coasters were the Bobs and the Fireball. They were the fastest. And on the Fireball, you'd go down the first drop, would go right into a tunnel, and it would look like your head was going to hit the tunnel. It was quite cool.

"It was a place where my father grew up going, it's a place where I
grew up going," Hargrave said. "My mother went there as a little girl. And my stepfather, Bill Wirtz, used to go there as a kid.

"It was just a wonderful, wonderful place, a carnival atmosphere in
the heart of the city." Like all carnivals, some of the memories are seamier. The seedy penny arcade, the "Freak Show," the dunk tanks that served up racism at the price of three balls for a quarter.
But most are as warm and sunny as a July afternoon. Two-Cent Day and
Five-Cent Night. Park spokesman Dick "Two Ton" Baker's urging Chicagoans to "laugh your troubles away." The stolen kisses in the picnic grove and Tunnel of Love. And that wonderful carousel.

The park featured more than 100 rides and other attractions on 74
acres in its final season. The Bobs, the stomach-churning wooden
roller-coaster built in 1926, was always the king. It attracted 700,000 riders every year.

"I was 10 or 11 before I worked up the courage to ride the Bobs,"
said Chuck Wlodarczyk, 67, author of Riverview: Gone But Not Forgotten, 1904-1967. "The greatest roller-coaster I have ever ridden. ... It was a non-stop, Katie-bar-the-door ride. I mean, you held on for dear life."

The park's other real nail-biter was the Pair-O-Chutes. Riders rode
nearly to the top of a 212-foot tower and then parachuted down.
Countless Chicagoans tell stories about getting stuck in mid-air on the way up. But Wlodarczyk says that was part of the schtick.
"If the operator saw your girlfriend or wife was a little
apprehensive about getting on it, they would get you near the top, and they would kill the power and let you sit for 10 or 15 seconds," he said. "Of course, if you were up there, you felt like it was 10 or 15 minutes. "And the operator would yell, 'Don't worry. We'll get a ladder and get you down.'"

Newspapers touted the park's safety record, considered one of the
best at the time. "Riverview Park So Safe, It's Almost Frightening!"
read a newspaper headline in 1961. But at least 18 were killed in
accidents or mishaps at the park over the years -- two in the park's
final season.

Professional magician Marshall Brodien, 69, can still recite the
pitches he uttered half a century ago to draw people into the sideshow when he worked as its barker.

"Terra Sue, the Mystery Girl from India; the Hindu fakir; the
Anatomical Wonder; the Man With the Disappearing Stomach! The
Rubber-Skinned Man! Watch him stretch his skin 14 inches away from his body, let it snap back like an elastic rubber band, twist, turn his body into more shapes than a pretzel! "We had the fat man, we had the armless wonder -- did everything with his feet. Operate a typewriter, paint with oil color, thread a needle and sew, shuffle and deal a deck of playing cards, play musical instruments."

Such shows have virtually disappeared, considered politically
incorrect and an exploitation of the disabled, but Brodien, who later
played Wizzo the Wizard on "Bozo's Circus," makes no apologies.

"The four-legged girl was born in Georgia from a real poor family,"
Brodien said. "She bought her mother a new home. She put her brothers
and sisters through college with the money she made. Now, a person in
her condition, they won't let 'em do it any more, and it's sad.

"The Armless Wonder. What would be the best thing for him to do? Sit
in a corner and beg for money or something? He was out there doing stuff with his feet, and the people were amused and mystified by how he could do these things."

When the park suddenly closed about a month after the close of the
1967 season, Chicago took it like the death of a favorite relative. "I remember being in tears when they announced they were shutting the park down," Hargrave said. "No more family outings to Riverview. And no more sneaking off with my older brother to Riverview. "It was a great tragedy. It was a huge disappointment."

The investment banker who bought the park for commercial development
received death threats. Riverview was sold Oct. 3, 1967, after one of
the investors died, and his heirs and some of the other shareholders
accepted an offer of about $6.5 million. William Schmidt, grandson of
the founder, objected, but he held less than 15 percent of the stock.

Today, Riverview's former site is home to the Area 3 Police
Headquarters, the DeVry Institute of Technology, a couple of
supermarkets, a Blockbuster video outlet and a handful of other shops.

The carousel, whose riders included President Warren G. Harding and
Al Capone, wound up in Six Flags Over Georgia -- although three of the hand-carved wooden horses disappeared along the way. Most of the other rides were sold for scrap. Behind DeVry in a woody stretch near the river, a huge ring of concrete and a long narrow trough -- remnants of long-demolished rides -- remain nearly buried in the dirt and fallen leaves. Patches of pavement said to have been part of the park's original midway peek through the weeds.

The only thrill seekers are kids riding their bicycles and
skateboards up and down a series of small hills in the woods.

RIVERVIEW BY THE NUMBERS

85: Height in feet of the Bobs' first hill

65: The Bobs' top speed in m.p.h.

127: Duration in seconds of the average ride on Bobs.

70: Number of hand-painted horses on the Riverview Carousel.

1.5 million: Gallons of water used each year to fill the Shoot the
Chutes pond and other water rides and attractions.

187: Height in feet of actual drop from the Pair-O-Chutes' 212-foot
tower.

3.5 million: Rounds of ammunition used each year in park's shooting
galleries.

60,000: Number of ice cream cones sold each year.

80,000: Pounds of popcorn sold each year.

500,000: Hot dogs sold each year.

250,000: Candy bars sold each year.

6,000: Gallons of paint used to spiff up park each year

900: Number of employees and concessionaires who worked at the park.

200,000: Number of pennies and nickels needed to open each morning.