San Antonio Express-News (Sunday)
Carnival rides kept going after HemisFair ’68
After the closure of HemisFair in October 1968, at least a portion of the carnival attractions that comprised “Fiesta Island” relocated to the plaza area beneath the then-named HemisFair Tower. This arrangement was christened “City Amusements,” which debuted in March 1969. George Lane, a longtime Alamo City-based carnival entrepreneur, was its manager. In a mid-1970s story in the Express-News newspaper, Mr. Lane complained that food refuse, among other items, were raining upon a Tilt-A-Whirl ride.
Bill Holtzman, assistant manager of the Convention Center, which was responsible for the functioning of the tower, was quoted as saying, “It’s true. George gets it sometimes.” He referenced a faulty plumbing system that was causing the problem. At this point, my knowledge of City Amusements ends. Who booked attractions into City Amusements? Also, which attractions were contracted? Altogether, how many rides, games and food concessions did City Amusements consist of? Finally, when did City Amusements cease to be? Any info you could provide is substantially appreciated regarding what appears to be a forgotten chapter in San Antonio’s carnival annals.
— Dan J. Zapata The World’s Fair theme structure was known generically as the HemisFair Tower from its announcement as such in late 1964 until May 10, 1966, when “Tower of the Americas” was chosen from among 68 submissions, beating out “Astroshaft,” “Stratospire”
and “Tower of Friendship.” The fair opened April 6, 1968, but the revolving restaurant in its top house had its official opening 10 days later. Scheduled to be completed by March 15, 1968, the restaurant opened for an April 16 media and VIP preview with one of the Tower’s three elevators not yet in service, some tile and landscape work still to be done and the observation deck and a service area not ready for use.
Although HemisFair ’68 was intended to put San Antonio on the map for its soaring skyline, well-preserved historic buildings, futuristic monorail and modern pavilions, having carnival rides and games was a World’s Fair tradition. Chicago (1933) and New York (1964) had them, also segregated in their own areas for children and teens with a little pocket money and a short attention span for pavilion exhibits.
Four amusement companies were asked to bid on the HemisFair contract; all but one were unavailable,
according to minutes of City Council meetings. George Lane — a veteran of the Fiesta carnival process who was bidding as Lane Concessions (and after
1971, George Lane Enterprises) — got the contract, which required him to pay 10 percent of his gross revenues to the city as well as some of his own utility costs.
The area where the carnival-style attractions were kept was called Fiesta Island (a nod to the Fiesta San Antonio carnivals and maybe to its moated isolation). As described in the HemisFair ’68 souvenir guide, this was a “beguiling area, landscaped with diversion in mind to hold rides, games, food kiosks and amusements in a picture-book setting of walks and waterways, shaded sitting areas and tree-lined paths.”
Lane’s original contract stipulated that he would furnish it with at least five rides and “five to six games,” to include a live pony ride, merry-go-round and three covered rides, as well as “amusement games
such as throwing darts at balloons and baseballs at milk bottles.” Rides and games were to cost 10 to 15 cents a throw — not including the monorail, an elevated train operated by a Pennsylvania company that charged $1 per round trip.
The international and corporate pavilions packed up and left after the fair closed Oct. 6, 1968, but the Tower restaurant stayed open, and Lane got a sixmonth extension on his contract. This time, he had to post a performance bond to guarantee the expected revenues for the city, which planned to keep the former fairgrounds open as an ongoing tourist attraction — rechristened HemisFair Plaza in a Nov. 9, 1968, ceremony that included hourly showings of the controversial film “US” (covered here July 20, 2019).
The amusements area was known by the name of the outdoor food court, Goliad Food Cluster (or Plaza), where most of the rides would remain, most of the time. The city regulated their hours of operation — at first daily, noon to midnight — and Lane had to get written approval from the city to bring in new rides. The reopening of the amusements center, “on the old Fiesta Island,” was announced for March 29, 1969, in the San Antonio Express, Jan. 24, 1969.
To replace the World’s Fair exhibits, there would be a downtown Witte Museum, a new Institute of Texan Cultures, petting zoo, playground equipment, and shops and restaurants such as a Swiss clock and music box store and Brown’s Enchiladas.
Over the next couple of years, Lane’s offerings became more diverse. A 1971 newspaper advertisement promises free admission to HemisFair Plaza for paddle boats, “kiddie rides, miniature golf, thrill rides, water rides (and) tasty foods and beverages in HemisFair Plaza, with free dancing every Saturday and Sunday, featuring
Juan Equivel’s Orchestra.”
From 1969 through the early 1970s, Lane’s operation expanded during Fiesta to fill the role of the annual carnival in the downtown location required by city ordinance. Rides were leased from other businesses and moved out into the plaza, usually 40 to 50 at a time. While Lane, requesting the first of several six-month extensions, told council members he had spent $250,000 on new rides, he would supplement them for big events by renting equipment from other amusement businesses.
The concessionaire leased rides from Buster Brown, owner of the Bill Hames Shows (now Carnival Americana), a Fort Worth-based company, and almost everyone else in the Texas carnival game: Al Bouchard’s pony rides, Wes Galyon’s “Siamese Twins” (apparently the name of a ride), MillerMcCrary’s “Himalaya,” Ken Penn Amusements’ “Sky Wheel” and “Saturn 6,” Sandefer’s “Toboggan,” Dwayne Steck’s “Hurricane” and “Monster,” and unnamed rides by Joe Cherbeck.
One such arrangement ended badly. Lane brought a lawsuit against Adolph “Booby” Obadal ( discussed here June 23, 2012), manager of Riding Devices, asking him to remove four of his rides from the plaza because they were unsafe and detrimental to the city.
The suit was settled Sept. 17, 1971, and Obadal — a sinister figure in the local entertainment scene since the 1940s — was allowed to keep his rides in place until Dec. 1, 1971.
HemisFair Plaza didn’t have the afterlife planners had envisioned. Without the fair’s glamour to bring people downtown, restaurants and merchants didn’t see as much foot traffic as they needed. Even the monorail stalled after the original owner went bankrupt, and the new owner — one of HCP Enterprises’ main creditors — also found it to be unprofitable and abandoned the ride in 1973.
City money for improvements wasn’t forthcoming, and some tenants gradually moved out. “The plaza itself has just disintegrated, a somber shadow of neglect, a public eyesore,” said the Express, June 16, 1975. “Some staunch souls still hang out at the plaza. One can wonder what keeps them going. George Lane has done his best to continue the carnival. … So far, he’s just managed.”
By 1976, remaining HemisFair tenants had formed an association. Some suggested the amusements area be moved; others asked for it to be eliminated; and a minority were in favor of leaving it where it was.
The kids who patronized its rides weren’t likely to visit art galleries or restaurants with international cuisine. The rides were noisy, and their customers messy.
The outgoing director of HemisFair Plaza, Jim Gaines — whose job was being eliminated — told council members at their June 12, 1976, meeting that Lane had “performed extremely well in full compliance with the terms of his contract” and was planning extensive refurbishments. The council gave the concessionaire an extension to the end of 1976, the year of a nationwide bicentennial celebration that was expected to bring increased tourism to the Alamo City and all its attractions.
On Feb. 3, 1977, Lane asked for and was granted a four-year extension. Whether he made it to 1981 or beyond isn’t covered by council minutes nor the local papers. Nor does the name “City Amusements” appear there, and it wasn’t registered with the Texas secretary of state. (George Lane Enterprises was, and it is no longer a taxable entity.)
The story you saw ran in the May 21, 1977, Express. It is presented as a dialogue between Lane, who is complaining about grease and food trash falling on his rides, and Bill Holtzinger, assistant manager of the Convention Center and manager of the Tower restaurant when it opened. It’s not clear what the occasion was, but the piece was written by Jim Wood, a longtime City Hall reporter, who might have bumped into this contretemps on his daily rounds.
Lane complained that grease, detergent and food trash fell from the fancy revolving restaurant onto the revolving rides, dripping onto “himself, his customers and his kiddy rides,” spattering clothes and corroding the rides’ paint until it had to be replaced, at a cost of $30,000 to $35,000. Holtzinger replied that the restaurant’s plumbing had always been inadequate, overflowing with peak loads. “We’ve tried and we’ve tried to correct it.” At the conclusion of the story, an official from the Department of Public Works is quoted as having said they’d “take a new look at the problem.”
The disused monorail was removed in 1983. The tenants of the Goliad Food Cluster lost their leases during a mid-1980s redevelopment of the HemisFair area. It was renamed HemisFair Park in 1988 and has been known as Hemisfair since 2015.