The Difficult Creation of Thorpe Park: The Educational Era
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- čas přidán 20. 01. 2024
- As Thorpe Park enters a new era in 2024, it it time to take an Expedition back to look at the troubled creation of Thorpe Park. For a decade after opening Thorpe Park changed from an educational based leisure attraction into something more.
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Thank you to the original video uploaders. Please check them out below.
www.thorpepark.com
www.memoriesofthorpepark.co.uk (more history information on Thorpe)
John Sherrington - • Thorpe 1979
Graham White - • DREAMLAND MARGATE 1960s.
Odds And Ends - • Longleat during the196...
Loops & Lapbars International - • Our Drive to Thorpe Park
GreatLondonBuses - • DE30 (PN07KPY) On Thor...
Michael A Reardon - • Downtown Family Centre...
Throthelens - • Thorpe Park Theme Park...
Paderline_de - • Cinema 180 Film - 70m...
Nick Pollard - • Thorpe Park V1 - Zábava
Are you hyped for Hyperia?
Hell yes
100%
YEAH
I am, just a little disappointed with the length.
If Merlin spent an extra few million, they could have put a launched section building up to the epic finale.
I absolutely love your video's and look forward to every episode. Your content is well edited, informative and I always get new information. Very well researched
Well done and keep up the good work. You're one of the best theme park content channels out there 👍
Definitely 👍
RMC wasn't making "useless" strip mines, they were providing a vital public service. Where else would the BBC have filmed Doctor Who?? 😂
It’s true!
And Red Dwarf
Imo they should have been filming the superior Hitchhikers Guide instead. But that probably won't ever happen.
Great minds..
..I was thinking the very same.
@@octogonSmuggler didn't they do that too?
As someone stateside, I always appreciate these in depth looks at the UK parks. There's hundreds of videos covering Disney and Universal, and so little about Europe at all. It's all basically new info to me, even despite my familiarity with theme parks in general. Can't wait for the continuing episodes...
I will say it's so odd to me that UK parks, especially in recent years, lean into the horror themes so hard. Coasters like Smiler, Thirteen, Saw, that alien one I can't pull up the name of right now... Ghost Train, Black Mirror, Hex, the list just goes on and on. I admit, I'm a hair jealous.
Yeah we have some unique stuff aha
Thinking Nemesis?
For me, Alton Towers is the undisputed king of dark / Gothic theming. Even before Scarefest, I always liked to go in autumn and experience the wooded grounds, forbidding ruins and creepy rides under gloomy skies. With its powerful conservative-Christian lobby, here's no way that anything like it would ever fly in the US, but I love that it can thrive here.
I think Hyperia will be interesting, as it breaks the trend and is obviously going to be one of the best rides in the UK
@@rich_edwards79 *Some* parts of the US.
The reveal at the end that all of those clips were your home movies was really, really lovely! It's such a sweet, heartfelt detail for you to share your own history intertwined with the history of the park. I'm excited to see the next part, excellent work as always!
This is pretty funny to me - I live near Thorpe Park and it’s got such a bad rep now amongst the locals for unruly teens and bad hygiene. The idea that it was originally intended as a relaxing educational attraction with ‘beautiful grounds’ is so different from what it is now.
Yeahhhhh
Yeah that explains their new identity and brand change, and the millions they are spending this year to do it up! hopefully should get a better rep
The original locals or the locals living far too close cus merlin sold land for housing ?
Merlin really did drag that park down, which is weird because they didn't do that with Alton Towers
@@timecircuits88 Alton towers was advertised as 360 acres with over 80 rides and attractions. They sold land and the last time they bragged about rides and attractions it was 40 and that includes all the rides for 3 year olds in c b bees so I would argue that merlin have ruined Alton towers as well.
I got in my feels at the end, really glad you got to share these videos with us. There are so many stories of kids going to parks just like this and those visits turning into so much more
Thank you !
I've missed these UK expeditions, they are always so good and hit home for me
I will do some more this year!
Good to hear! Looking forward to that!
Give gullivers world some love please
Loved this video and that you added your own personal footage. Loved Thorpe Park in the 90’s
Thank you!
Great Video, brought back memories. Alton Towers when it had the cork screw roller coaster and Thunder Looper was my favourite moment in theme park visits.
Loved this episode Sam! So neat to learn not only about Thorpe Park but also about the start of your theme park fandom. Now we all get to enjoy your passion, enthusiasm and talent! Thank you for sharing!💜
This was so awesome, thanks for sharing your origin story Sam! Very well done😄🙌
Thank you so much
This is great so far and really looking forward to the second part of this. I went to Thorpe Park in the 80's when it was still mainly educational (school trip) and then not again until the 2000's when it was a full theme park, so always wondered how the transition happened
Thank you
Something went badly wrong - loved how it was in the 80s.
This video is truely amazing. It came to me recommended. I am so glad I clicked through. I've never ever given any thought in to how theme parks came in to being. This video is an amazing insight in to a subject I knew absoultely nothing about. Thank you.
I really enjoyed this thanks :)
I grew up and still live in Staines right next door, and visited Thorpe Park regularly right from the beginning in the early 80's and later used to work there every summer during my college years too in the late 80's/early 90's, so it was lovely to have this nostalgic look back.
For me the best years were the early years before it started to transform into a Coaster park as it has now become. The central pavilion was always under used I remember, almost felt barren inside at times and was a walk through as you entered the park. Later they added a pub and a few food places and a photo op place but it still felt like an after thought. The 180 Cinema Screen was always a highlight, the area behind which started as a wonky bike circuit thing and then every few years they tried something else there, never successfully though as often that was barren too. They had a chinese restaurant on a huge Disney type boat by the 180 Cinema but sadly that closed too soon as well. So that whole space never felt thought through but somehow always retained an affection by me for it's missteps in what it actually was supposed to be.
I loved the model village and used to spend hours relaxing in that space. My favourite ride of the park was always that dark Phantom ride just before. I remember alongside it they had that small arcade space too. That slow water ride was lovely too and the large barn it went through at the end was surprisingly packed with tonnes of animatronic animals in such abundance that it proudly met disney standards :) Just to the left of that the North West mini expansion area they later added in the late 80's or early 90's with that new Log Flume ride was great too.
I loved the area to the right of the pavilion where all the history exhibits were and could happily spend half a day there making your way through the various tents, seeing armour and other fascinating almost museum static displays building up to the large fort at the end. Unlike the map shown in the video I don't remember a path at the south to get to the farm. Instead you had to go north of the model village where they would later add the lovely Thunder Rapid ride on that long loop at the top past the crazy Treasure Island which always seemed isolated up there on it's own and for it's size was a quick loop around that quite barren looking island aside form that lovely broken ship where they had a cast member dressed as a pirate who would rush out too surprise you xd
But that led to the 'odd' in my view farm as it felt so isolated and I remember getting quite bored their within five minutes of arriving. But the only reason to go would be the amazing fresh dairy ice creams they served there in fresh cones :)) which were always the food highlight of the day for me. They also had a boat taking you back and forth from the pavilion to the farm which I remember was on a long half an hour schedule so we always got impatient and just walked around past Treasure Island instead. I think they had a train ride thing doing that route too.
The park grew beautifully in the later 80's with Thunder River, Log Flume and the area al around that too, up to Tea Cup period too, but for me when they added the large slide and beach area behind the pavilion and started to close some of the earlier parks charming rides and quirks or left them barred like the bike circuit and slowly the historical area too it was the start of the initially slow demise of the park from it's best early charming era. The modern Coaster era it is in now is totally alien to what it once was I feel.
I loved reading these memories!
That was a good one...Anxiously awaiting part II.
Never been much of a theme park fan, but I am a HUGE Anglophile, and Alton Towers has been on my bucket list for a number of years (based in part because of this channel..thank you very much). Might have to expand my horizons and make a tour of a few different parks one of the next times I hop the pond...finger crossed. 🤞
Sam. Thank god we have you. This is EXCELLENT.
Oh Man This Made Me Emotional Seeing All The Footage Of You As A Child! EVERYTHING HAPPENS FOR A REASON! THANK YOU AND FOR ALLOWING US INTO YOUR JOURNEY AND THANK YOUR DAD FOR BEING WHO HE WAS AND IS TO YOU 🙏🏽🎢
Wow so excited for part 2. I got to enjoy the park as a young kid in the
Mid 80s. Seeing those attractions brings back so many memories!
Good times!
Hey Sam .. its always a good day when a new Expedition Theme Park video comes out! So kewl to see videos of a little Sam and Jackie's quick cameo. Hope you and Jackie are well and uh hum "enthused". Oh and thanks for the recent Expedition Enthused podcast. Please keep them coming.
thank you so much! We will :)
This video helped me understand so many of the attraction choices in Roller Coaster Tycoon. Thank you for another great episode.
Nice video! Growing up in the 90s/early 2000s Thorpe Farm and Loggers Leap are peak nostalgia for me. Gone but never forgotten
Absolutely brilliant Sam. As someone born in the 80s who lives in Hampshire this always was, and still is, my go to theme park and I’ve been waiting for a proper history series and you have not disappointed. My first visit must’ve been in the early 90s (first attraction I ever stepped in was the 180cinema showing car racing footage) the getting the train down to Thorpe farm. I’ve known for a long time about it being a former quarry but had never seen those opening day map layouts so seeing what it was then to what it became 10years later, let alone what it is now, is astonishing.
I look forward to further vids in the series 😊
Just that theme tune at the beginning made me feel as if it was summer again...
I haven't been to the park since 2021, used to go at least once a year but then my dad had a stroke and could no longer drive... I'm hoping to go this year (via some mangled form of public transport...) since I heard about Hyperia... I mean the last new coaster the park got (and I mean a proper new rollercoaster, not just a re-theme like TWD (I still miss X...), or an experience like Black Mirror or that ghost train thing) was swarm in 2012, it's been sooooo long
Wow. If you were there in the summer of 88 or 89 and that’s what started your theme park adventure, you would certainly have ridden a ride I was operating. I was part of the seasonal staff in both those years.
Such an awesome video! Super interesting
I’ve been really ill over the last few days and I have been binge watching tour Alton Towers and Thorpe Park playlists. These videos are so well put together and informative. Definitely cheered me up and made me feel better 😊
When I saw the log flume ride I was like hmmm this looks familiar. This was the park that Princess Diana took Will and Harry to when they were boys, awesome!
I love how much you’ve connected this to your own personal history. I’d probably do the same if I ever made a video about Canobie Lake in NH. Seeing baby Sam enjoying himself was adorable!
Nice to hear your back story in this one. We probably had a similar childhood, I’m just across the border in Oxfordshire. Every summer we would go to a couple of theme parks, sometimes with the whole extended family. Those are some of my cherished childhood memories. Now I am heading back to the same theme parks 25 years later with my kids. I am probably still the most excited one in the family.
Thank you for this video, I loved every second of the history and that final sequence resonated so much with me. I visited Chessington Zoo in 1986 with my Mum and Dad and vividly remember seeing the Runaway Mine Train and Dragon River under construction, we returned the next year and that was the start of my love of theme parks. Can’t wait for the next instalment.
Awesome insight to a theme park I know little about in the early years, I first visited Thorpe Park in my mid 20’s when I was working in london (now in my 40’s) and I have lived it ever since !! Amazing video Sam, can’t wait to see more
Great work as usual Sam. Hope you & Jackie can get out here this year to experience it. 👍
We will be there!
Ahh! I can see how Thorpe Park is near and dear to your heart! Your origin story! Can’t wait for part 2! I knew nothing about this park’s origins until this video. Thanks!
Loved this video Sam! So neat to learn not only about the history of Thorpe Park but also about the start of your theme park fandom. Now we all get to enjoy your passion, enthusiasm and talent through your videos. Thank you for sharing! 💜 Hope to run into you and Jackie at a park one day.
Amazing brings back so many great memories, This park has such deep meaning to me especially after my Mums passing a couple years back, Seeing your home videos brings back lots of emotional feeling as I have the same sort of videos and pictures with my Mum, you and I must have gone around the same time as it looks just how I remember it, we’ve probably even been queueing up for the same ride lol, then later going as a teen with my friends to try out the new thrill rides, fast forward to summer 23 when I finally got to take my Daughter coming full circle making our own memories, can’t wait for pt2, thanks for doing this video as really made me appreciate this park even more ❤😊
I honestly rewatch every theme park expedition over and over, its just a classic!! Keep making such informative and entertaining videos!!
What a lovely idea to add video clips of your childhood visits to Thorpe Park.❤ We are coming over to Thorpe from Ireland for our first ever visit this year. It's exciting to visit, especially this year!!
Outstanding!
This brought back so many happy memories, and just like you, we visited as a kid.
After leaving school I worked here for a season and loved every second ❤
Thanks for taking the time to piece this all together, roll on part two 🎉🎉🎉
Sam, I worked with Sue Hunt in 1985/86 at New York's Empire State Games. She was very nice and cool to hang out with. What a small world moment.
That’s awesome!
I very rarely comment on CZcams videos but just need to say that this was an excellent watch, brilliantly produced and edited together. The reveal at the end that it was home family videos was incredible. Love it and subscribed!
Thank you so much
What a great video, having grown up nearby and visiting here often it’s great to see the background of the park and the warm feeling at the end ❤❤ this is why you guys nail what you do as it’s just so clearly part of you guys and you nail bringing over the excitement and joy going to these parks brings 🎉🎉
Was not expecting the Lochness Monster to make it into this video!
A classic
fun fact:
loggers leap is still *kind of* there- its been put at the back of the park and can be seen from the walking dead experience and the small footpath that runs round the back of the entire park.
As always, thank you for your work on these videos, but also thank you for sharing personal videos of your time at Thorpe Park. Best Always!
Absolutely loved this video. Many many memories of thorpe park.over the years foryself and my daughter. Thank you for doing this and can't wait for the next part
Thank you so much for this video. I’ve never seen such a detailed look at the beginnings of the park. I didn’t visit in the 80s (though has some photos of my parents first visit around 1983) so it was really educational. I would have liked to have seen the park then. But oh you made me cry at the end talking about the 90s at Thorpe Park; a special place and time in my life. 😭❤️ can’t wait for the next video. (Which I will cry more at I am sure!)
I enjoy theme parks but haven't been to any outside the US. Your videos are so interesting and well done, I watch them all. History is fascinating.
Thanks so much
Always appreciate your videos! I enjoyed the peek into your past. That was heartwarming. 👏🏻
That was great. I love the personal touch. Can't wait for Part 2....
Goodness. So much from one place, and your candidness to share. Thanks a bunch for all of this.
Thank you!
Another excellent video 👍🏼👍🏼 especially learning where your love for theme parks came from, Thank you 🤩
Great job Sam. I love your expedition videos. Keep them coming my friend.
This video was awesome (as they always are) and the details in this were more than expected. This is the park I have the most interest in and there were things in here that I didn't know about. I really loved the personal touch added about with your own home videos and some details about the start of your Theme Park journey- well done for such a decent video
Touching ending. Reminds me a lot of what Busch Gardens Tampa did for me.
Thanks for watching
I have a photo of me as a young kid on loggers from 1989! My dad used to water ski there, and back then, pay to ski, park was free!
I grew up not far from both CWOA and TP and feel like i have grown and got old with them lol!
I remember visiting Thorpe Park on a school trip in maybe 1982/83. The skating rink was a big thing for us, as it was the first time we'd ever seen inline skates (or "tri-skates" as we called them, as they only had 3 wheels). I also remember the small boating lake that was a cordoned off area of the big lake next to the Dome. As we were pottering around in pedalos, there were tugs pushing gravel barges not far away on the same lake.
AWWW THAT WAS PRECIOUS AT THE END.
Another superb vid. Great work. Very personal ep indeed. Thanks. From another Wiltshire lad !!
Love your home video footage!
Loved this video! Can’t imagine how long it took to make. Excited for the next part!
I'm full of work today and all I needed was a mini doc about Theme Parks to watch during my breaks. I'm glad ETP heard me xD
Greetings from Brazil 🇧🇷🙌
I hope you have a good day!
Lovely to see your childhood memories here.. great video👍🏼
Thanks Sam.....great story and video! Can't wait for part two.
Thank you!
Thank you Sam, one of the best. Look forward to the next part
Thank you
Absolutely loved that! We're around the same age so seeing all that footage of your first visit brought back memories of my early visits 😁 can't wait for part 2!!
Thank you!
your own family videos?! Stop the cuteness is killing me!
Awesome work on this video, it really took me back
New subscriber here! Thanks for your hard work putting this all together, so interesting to see the history of all our favourite parks ❤cant wait to watch more! Sadly Thorpe Park wasnt local to me so the first time i went was in 2010 but still great to see how it was back in the day nonetheless
I love your content so much, thanks!
That USB disconnect noise gave me a heart attack, Was like "not this s**t again". Awesome videos by the way.
0:01 I've Been To Thorpe Park In Chertsey In Surrey Just Outside The Capital City Of London In England In The United Kingdom Many Times Such As The Early 1990's In The 20th Century When I Was A Kid And Then In The Early 2000's In The 21st Century As A Adult Too. Thanks Mate. PS This Is Were Learn With Sooty Down On The Farm Was Filmed Here At The Theme Park Because ITV Studios And Thames Television And VCI And The Video Collection And Thames Video Did A Marvellous Job And Released On Home Video As Well Too. Old School Times Man. X
Yep!
Great to see the park that started this whole Expedition!
Yeah!
Always love your UK videos, keep them coming!
Thank you! Will do!
I remember how scary that Stone Age cave looked to enter. The Cine180 cinema was always fun as there was always a group seeing who could stand up during the film the longest without falling over
We always enjoy your videos and as a kid in the 90s I loved Thorpe park too. Great video cant wait for the next instalment!
Thanks so much
I’d love to see plans for an immersive new area of the park behind swarm. There could be so much there on that land if developed right, something to phantasialand where Taron is built. There could be two flat rides, a small family coaster, a new wow coaster and a hotel over the water.
That would be awesome
Yayyyyyyyyyyyyyy a full 20 min video on thorpe!
You always do just a stand out job, great video ETP!
Thank you so much!
The farm at Thorpe Park was amazing, my first time visiting there was on a trip there with my nursery school (which was also based round that Chertsey). It's such a massive shame that it had to close during the year it did
I used to be a local, my parents even took me to the first water ski competition you mentioned, as well as an airshow, I still remember a DH super chipmunk fly low and inverted down the lake, below the bank sides where the crowd were sat, and the pilot slid back the canopy and waved, sadly he died a few months later in another airshow. Blue with stars on it.
Anyway, my parents would often take us when it opened properly, and as it was being built we would cycle over and sneak in.
Locals got a season ticket for a heavy discount, and the roller rink was the place to be for all the kids.
Once it got more theme parky I never went back.
Anyway, thanks for all the home movie clips, that was a real journey down memory lane.
Nice vid. I liked the end bit. Really felt the love.
Thank you
Hi There, an informative and very well explained Video of Thorpe Park's past history, keep up the good work! Cheers Peter :)
Thank you for this brought back so many memories, treasure island used to scare me as a kid .. and we all know the song when you went into the barn with those frogs
I have such fond memories of the water park where I grew up. We always have our first park! ❤
Very good video Sam. That brought back a few memories.
Thanks so much
Reclaiming spoiled land as theme parks is a fascinating concept. I was introduced to the concept by The Wilds, a safari park in eastern Ohio, USA, that reclaimed a strip mine.
liking the new editing style, it's going in a nice direction - great work!
Thank you
I'm not a theme park nut, but I've been watching your videos for years the passion you put into then really comes through. So nice to see a glimpse at the origin story 😅
Interesting! Are you going to talk about the Halloween Horror Nights X (2000) event that occurred in Universal Studios Florida?
This video made me smile; I love seeing how it was - can't wait for part two!!
Thorpe Park was my childhood park! I went every school holiday (90s child!) and loved everything about it; Flying Fish was my first rollercoaster although it was prettier when it had all the bushes around it. It was also my summer job while home from University when I was older.
A great time!
It's one of the 3 Amusement Parks in England I visited when I was last there in 2019. I didn't like it as much as Black PoolPleasure Beach or Alton Towers, but now family has moved from Nottingham to Southern England, and with Thorpe Park's new coaster it's more likely I'll visit it over Blackpool Pleasure Beach and Alton Towers. Can't wait to see tour next instalment of Thorpe Park History.
This was my park growing up, the same era as yourself and likely many watching this video. Watching the old footage, it might as well have been me XD Can't wait for the next part!
I love how you tied this into your childhood! Disneyland is that park for me. Definitely got me into theme parks and roller coasters as a little kid. Great video as always! Cheers from LA
The idea of this park being family-friendly before later holding a urine-odor contest and having an orgasm advert is honestly hysterical. Great vid as usual!
Aha crazy right? Thanks!
😮 WTF? I had a giraffe ranger hat - I think you just broke my childhood
Your love for Thorpe Park has been evident for a while and it's lovely to see how much your 'home' park has influenced you!
I'm feeling a heck of a lot of nostalgia for a place I've never been 😁
It probably helps that I rode a ton of similar rides in Kennywood growing up and learned to love them similarly.
I can't wait for the next episode, that's my favourite era. I remember going to Thorpe park as a young child with my Dad then it suddenly all changed when I visited on a school trip back in 2001 🌀
Although Thorpe Park may not be the most interesting park you've done a documentary about, this is probably your best and most interesting video. One can really feel the love you have for this place. And it makes me want to go visit it again (of course after they open Hyperia).
Always amazed by the strong and righ history of Thorpe park. It was also one of the places that got me interested in theme parks. I remember the Rangers fondly.
As someone who worked at Thorpe Park for 3 years as a teenager this was so fun to watch!