["itemContainer",{"xmlns:xsi":"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance","xsi:schemaLocation":"http://omeka.org/schemas/omeka-xml/v5 http://omeka.org/schemas/omeka-xml/v5/omeka-xml-5-0.xsd","uri":"https://history.santacruzpl.org/omeka/items/browse?advanced%5B0%5D%5Belement_id%5D=49&advanced%5B0%5D%5Btype%5D=is+exactly&advanced%5B0%5D%5Bterms%5D=Seaside+Company&output=omeka-json","accessDate":"2024-03-28T15:26:01-07:00"},["miscellaneousContainer",["pagination",["pageNumber","1"],["perPage","10"],["totalResults","3"]]],["item",{"itemId":"134367","public":"1","featured":"1"},["fileContainer",["file",{"fileId":"20804"},["src","https://history.santacruzpl.org/omeka/files/original/a7b96beab4ec9174ee23cd942a63a879.pdf"],["authentication","e4a85970993093b14da936dec4c725fc"],["elementSetContainer",["elementSet",{"elementSetId":"7"},["name","PDF Text"],["description"],["elementContainer",["element",{"elementId":"94"},["name","Text"],["description"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1899585"},["text","Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk:\nSurvival of the Funnest\nBy Andrew Schiffrin\n\nPacific Ocean Park in Santa Monica, Nu-Pike in Long Beach, Playland in San Francisco, Belmont Park in San Diego—the\nlist of large beachfront amusement parks on the California coast that are now gone is a long one. One might have been\nforgiven for assuming that they would eventually be joined by the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk. For years, the boardwalk\n(owned by the Santa Cruz Seaside Company) seemed a quaint anachronism; and some local officials predicted a slow\ndeterioration, followed finally by closure and increased pressures for conversion to other uses.\nIt appears, however, that the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk is not only healthy but vigorously so. The number of visitors—\njudging by the pressure on parking areas nearby—looks to be increasing every year, and the Seaside Company is buying\nup major properties in the adjacent area for long-term investments. In 1981 the company undertook a $10 million\nrenovation of the Cocoanut Grove ballroom and converted it into a small-scale, high-quality, convention and banquet\nfacility. Gary Kyriazi, in The Great American Amusement Parks (Citadel Press, 1976), calls the boardwalk \"without doubt\n... the best and most beautiful seaside amusement park in the nation.\" How has the Santa Cruz amusement park, which\nis not even located in a large city, continued to prosper while other coastal parks have gone under?\nAlthough many factors contribute to its success, the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk is both a social phenomenon and an\neconomic reality. The nature of the park's market and the value of its land are two important reasons for the park's\nsuccess. Its ability to continue to draw customers and its inability to convert to a \"higher and better\" land use maintain\nits vitality.\nTourists first started coming to Santa Cruz in 1865, when John Leibrandt built a public bathhouse near the mouth of the\nSan Lorenzo River. Other bathhouses soon followed, catering to those seeking the \"natural medicine\" of a dip in salt\nwater and needing a place to change. (Women in those days swam covered ankles to neck in wool suits that weighed\ntwenty pounds when wet.) By the end of the nineteenth century, plans were being laid for a casino and boardwalk\nbased on the Coney Island and Atlantic City models.\nFred Swanton's Neptune Casino opened in 1904. Twenty-two months later, on June 22, 1906, it was destroyed by fire;\nbut by October of the same year Swanton was laying the foundation for another. The new Cocoanut Grove ballroom,\nalong with an indoor swimming pool, a pleasure pier, and a boardwalk, opened in June of 1907. The boardwalk's\ncenterpiece attraction, the Giant Dipper roller coaster, opened in 1924 and continues to thrill riders today.\nDuring the 1930s, tourists from the San Francisco Bay Area, ninety, miles north of Santa Cruz, could take the Southern\nPacific Railroad's \"Suntan Special\" right to the front gate of the boardwalk. They came to hear the greatest names of the\nBig Band era play at the Cocoanut Grove—Artie Shaw, Benny Goodman, and the Dorsey brothers. Across the country,\nmeanwhile, most other amusement parks were falling on hard times. As income shrank during the Depression, and as\n1\n\n�the automobile opened up new recreational possibilities, traditional parks lost some of their appeal. By 1936, the 1,500\nparks that had existed in 1919 had dwindled to about five hundred.\nThe end of World War II gave a boost to those which remained, but the renaissance was short-lived. To some extent it\nseems easy to explain the demise of amusement parks in terms of changing cultural values or, more precisely, the\ngrowing sophistication of the middle class: as people had more money to spend after World War II, they determined to\nspend it on what they considered higher quality entertainments. By this time, though, many of the older parks had a\nseedy, run-down appearance and unsavory reputation—not entirely undeserved. The new amusement parks needed a\nstrong theme, expensive advertising, and a cover price to keep out the riffraff.\nAt just about the same time, a new competitor arrived on the scene to undermine attendance.\n\"New amusement parks were being planned again in the late 1940s, but the television craze of the early 1950s put\npeople back in their homes, and the amusement industry, right along with the motion picture industry, suddenly looked\nbleak again. (Kyriazi)\"\nTelevision offered a cheap alternative and led people to expect more glitz and flash from their amusements—\"show biz\"\nquality.\nDisneyland, which burst on the scene in the mid 1950s, and the array of theme parks which followed not only had these\nqualities but also offered cleanliness, safety, and lavishly landscaped outdoor environments. Many traditional\namusement parks, faced with a carny image, old and deteriorating facilities, and problems with rowdy teenagers, were\nunable to compete and started a downward slide.\nA 1977 article in Theatre Arts by cultural historian Brooks McNamara explained the closing of the Palisades Amusement\nPark across the Hudson River from New York City:\n\"The combination of escalating land values near the ciy, and the increasingly bad press accorded traditional amusement\nparks have made Palisades worth less as an operating business than the land on which it stood—the story repeated all\nover America from World War II onward.\"\nCertainly, skyrocketing land values over the last twenty years along the coast in California's metropolitan areas have\nplayed a major role in the loss of the other coastal amusement parks. The market demand to convert these relatively\nlarge parcels of land to other uses offering a significantly higher return can easily be seen as overwhelming the cash flow\npotential from a difficult- and expensive-to-run amusement park.\nThese same factors also applied to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk, however. Throughout much of the 1960s, the\npolitical vision for Santa Cruz was based on the desire for major growth. The 1964 General Plan anticipated major\nfreeways running through the city and connecting to the beachfront areas, a major new University of California campus,\na population of 100,000 by 1985 (it is now about 44,000), and major hotel development along the ocean front from the\nMunicipal Wharf very near the amusement park to Lighthouse Field about a mile away. A major development for\nLighthouse Field (to consist of a seven-story Hilton Hotel, convention center, shopping center, and housing project was\nactively pursued into the earlv 1970s. The political leadership at that time was closely allied with the business leadership\nand welcomed not only the independent growth of Santa Cruz but its close integration, through a freeway over the\nmountains, with the Santa Clara Valley.\nThere are two aspects of land value that are relevant here—the market demand for the land in an alternate use and the\npolitical possibility of converting it to that use. Looking first at the potential of the boardwalk property in residential\nand/or hotel uses, it seems likely that, given the growth pressures in Santa Cruz, the demand for such uses in that\nlocation would be strong, if the land were available. Charles Canfield, the current president of the Seaside Company,\ncites the shape and size of the boardwalk's land—a narrow strip between the railroad and the sea, in places only seventy\nfeet wide—as a factor in reducing the demand for the property. Other observers, however, dismiss the importance of\n2\n\n�the odd shape, agreeing that any bit of coastal real estate has to be considered desirable. Although the level of demand\nis probably less than it would be in San Francisco and Long Beach, it has still been significant.\nCanfield gives much of the credit for the boardwalk's survival to his father, Laurence, who became president of the\ncompany in 1952. According to Charles, his father had grown up in Santa Cruz and liked the challenge of keeping the\npark alive. Many other parks had been family owned he explained, but as they were passed from one generation to the\nnext interest in the operations was spread out, and infighting among the family members resulted. Finally, with no one\nleft with the will to maintain the parks in the face of adversity, the families sold out.\nUnder Laurence's stewardship, the 1950s and 1960s were a time of reinvestment and expansion rather than\nconsolidation and loss cutting. Management took some chances, but they were taken on the basis of careful long-range\nprojections and studies. The rebuilding effort was aimed at increasing security, keeping the facilities clean, and catering\nto families. The park is actively patrolled by a low-key but effective security force, and aside from a few hassles from\nbikers in the early 1960s, crowd problems never got out of hand. The boardwalk is perceived as—and is, in fact—a safe\nand congenial place for the well-behaved family to visit and, maybe even more important economically, for parents to\nallow their teenagers to visit.\nWhile the company, invests in a major new ride every few years, which is the industry standard, they are not\nextravagant about it. Some amusement parks sought to change with the times and added themes, entertainment,\nanimals, etc. The Seaside Company has not done this to any great extent. They have worked for modest growth by\nproviding a high-quality traditional amusement park rather than by spending a fortune on massive improvements which\nthen require a surge in attendance to pay for them.\nFinally, the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk has served as an amusement area for Bay Area residents since the turn of the\ncentury, and while over the last 30 years the public in general has become less interested in this kind of amusement\npark, the increased population, particularly in the San Jose area, has provided a rapidly growing base of support. The\nsound management policies of the Seaside Company have allowed them to continue to attract these potential\ncustomers, and the attendance now runs 1.5 to 2 million visitors per year.\nWhile the Seaside Company was managing to stave off economic pressures, another factor in the demand for alternate\nuses was changing. The pressure to convert land is, to some extent at least, a function of the political process. The highgrowth vision of the sixties, if carried out, would have increased tremendously the demand for conversion of the\namusement park. While the market for the amusement park itself would have grown, the increased population, better\naccess, and the lack of centrally located coastal locations would have created massive pressures for conversion.\nThe vision of sustained civic growth began to fall apart in the early seventies. First, the Route 17 freeway connection to\nSan Jose was rejected by the County Board of Supervisors. The Lighthouse Point project was voted down at the city polls\nand, finally, by the Coastal Commission. The beach loop linking Highway 1, Route 17, and the boardwalk, and other\nmajor development projects never got off the ground. The advocates for low growth and environmental protection,\ncalling for the preservation of Santa Cruz's small town quality, found support within the traditional community as well as\nfrom the students, which the founding of the university, in 1965 had brought to town.\nIn 1979, a growth management initiative passed, strictly limiting annual growth within the city and establishing a\ngreenbelt of major parcels on its fringes to be protected from urban development until 1990. Finally, in 1981, when a\nmajority was elected to the City Council which supported low growth (it had been a minority since 1973), the\ntransformation in vision was complete.\nThe current political leadership is committed not only to low growth but also to the preservation of the city's existing\nneighborhoods and \"quality of life.\" High-rise residential projects and hotels along the beachfront are antithetical to that\nvision. It is probably clear to all concerned that any proposal to convert the amusement park to such uses would be\nsoundly defeated.\n3\n\n�There are, then, two major reasons why the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk continues to thrive while the other coastal\namusement parks have disappeared. First, it is blessed with competent and dedicated management which operates a\npark still attractive to large numbers of people. And second, the value of the land must respect the political values in the\ncommunity. The predominant political values in the Santa Cruz community of low growth and preservation of a small\ntown feeling have prevented the increase in land value which would stimulate conversion. In the other coastal\ncommunities it was possible to obtain approval for the conversion of their amusement parks: the proponents could\nmake economic arguments to which the cities responded. In Santa Cruz, however, these arguments would now be\nrejected.\nThe Santa Cruz waterfront offers its residents as well as the people of California their only remaining chance to sun\nthemselves on the beach, watch the pelicans glide over the ocean, and scream their hearts out on a roller coaster—all in\nthe same afternoon.\n\nSources\n\n\n\n\nThis article appeared in California Waterfront Age, vol. 2, no. 2, Spring 1986; California Waterfront Age, was\nsuperceded by California Coast and Ocean which is also published by the State Coastal Conservancy.\nSubscription information may be obtained by contacting the State Coastal Conservancy at 1330 Broadway,\nSuite 110, Oakland, CA 94612 or calling (510) 286-0934.\nCopyright 1986 California Waterfront Age. Reproduced with the permission of California Coast and Ocean and\nthe author.\n\nThe content of this article is the responsibility of the individual author. It is the Library's intent to provide accurate local history\ninformation. However, it is not possible for the Library to completely verify the accuracy of individual articles obtained from a\nvariety of sources. If you believe that factual statements in a local history article are incorrect and can provide documentation,\nplease contact the Webmaster.\n\n4\n\n�"]]]]]]]]],["collection",{"collectionId":"8"},["elementSetContainer",["elementSet",{"elementSetId":"1"},["name","Dublin Core"],["description","The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/."],["elementContainer",["element",{"elementId":"50"},["name","Title"],["description","A name given to the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"123576"},["text","Santa Cruz History Articles"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"41"},["name","Description"],["description","An account of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"123577"},["text","Original articles by library staff and by local authors and material from historical books. "]],["elementText",{"elementTextId":"264219"},["text","Articles on Santa Cruz County history, many with illustrations, are available here.\r\n\r\nThe Santa Cruz Public Libraries is grateful to our local historians and their publishers for giving permission to include their articles. The content of the articles is the responsibility of the individual authors.\r\n"]],["elementText",{"elementTextId":"264220"},["text","It is the library's intent to provide accurate information. However, it is not possible to completely verify the accuracy of individual articles obtained from a variety of sources. If you believe that factual statements in an article are incorrect and can provide documentation, please contact the library."]]]],["element",{"elementId":"45"},["name","Publisher"],["description","An entity responsible for making the resource available"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"264216"},["text","Santa Cruz Public Libraries\r\n"]]]]]]]],["itemType",{"itemTypeId":"1"},["name","Document"],["description","A resource containing textual data. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre text."],["elementContainer",["element",{"elementId":"7"},["name","Original Format"],["description","If the image is of an object, state the type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891892"},["text","Paper"]]]]]],["elementSetContainer",["elementSet",{"elementSetId":"1"},["name","Dublin Core"],["description","The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/."],["elementContainer",["element",{"elementId":"43"},["name","Identifier"],["description","An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891883"},["text","AR-066"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"50"},["name","Title"],["description","A name given to the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891884"},["text","Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk: Survival of the Funnest"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"39"},["name","Creator"],["description","An entity primarily responsible for making the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891885"},["text","Schiffrin, Andrew"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"48"},["name","Source"],["description","A related resource from which the described resource is derived"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891886"},["text","California Waterfront Age, vol. 2, no. 2, Spring 1986."]]]],["element",{"elementId":"45"},["name","Publisher"],["description","An entity responsible for making the resource available"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891887"},["text","Santa Cruz Public Libraries"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"40"},["name","Date"],["description","A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891888"},["text","1986-Spring"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"42"},["name","Format"],["description","The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891889"},["text","Text"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"44"},["name","Language"],["description","A language of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891890"},["text","En"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"51"},["name","Type"],["description","The nature or genre of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891891"},["text","ARTICLE"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"47"},["name","Rights"],["description","Information about rights held in and over the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1891893"},["text","Copyright 1986 California Waterfront Age. Reproduced with the permission of California Coast and Ocean and the author."]]]],["element",{"elementId":"49"},["name","Subject"],["description","The topic of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1892901"},["text","Boardwalk"]],["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1892902"},["text","Tourism"]],["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1892903"},["text","Seaside Company"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"38"},["name","Coverage"],["description","The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1892904"},["text","Santa Cruz (City)"]]]]]]],["tagContainer",["tag",{"tagId":"3"},["name","Tourist Attractions"]]]],["item",{"itemId":"53116","public":"1","featured":"1"},["collection",{"collectionId":"3"},["elementSetContainer",["elementSet",{"elementSetId":"1"},["name","Dublin Core"],["description","The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/."],["elementContainer",["element",{"elementId":"50"},["name","Title"],["description","A name given to the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"109713"},["text","Local News Index"]]]],["element",{"elementId":"41"},["name","Description"],["description","An account of the resource"],["elementTextContainer",["elementText",{"elementTextId":"109714"},["text","An index to newspaper and periodical articles from a variety of Santa Cruz publications.\r\n"]],["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1840006"},["text","It is a collection of over 87,000 articles, primarily from the Santa Cruz Sentinel, that have been clipped and filed in subject folders. While these articles of local interest range in date from the early 1900's to the present, most of the collection and clipped articles are after roughly 1960. There is an ongoing project to scan the complete articles and include them in this collection.
Also included are more than 350 full-text local newspaper articles on films and movie-making and on the Japanese-American internment.
In addition, this is an online index for births, deaths, and personal names from The Mountain Echo. The complete print index is available at the library. For more information see The Mountain Echo."]],["elementText",{"elementTextId":"1840007"},["text","Most of the indexed articles are available on microfilm in the Californiana Room or in the clipping files in the Local History Room at the Downtown branch. Copies of individual articles may be available by contacting the Reference Department - Ask Us.
\n