The Giant Dipper
January 4, 2009 · By Kathee
Belmont Park
Mission Beach, CA
circa 1962
I was eleven years old. Both of my parents worked, which in the early 1960’s, was fairly uncommon. In fact, due to the added family income, I had a fairly sizable allowance and plenty of free time on my hands in the summertime.
On weekends and throughout the summers I spent lots of time and money down at Belmont Park at Mission Beach, in San Diego, CA. The seaside amusement park was not within a reasonable walking distance from my house in Pacific Beach, so I always had to save back a dime to ride the bus home.
Belmont Park’s attraction to me was the public indoor Olympic sized swimming pool called, “The Plunge”, a midway with street vendors peddling their games and prizes, a House of Mirrors, and a massive roller coaster called, the “Giant Dipper.” The Giant Dipper was undeniably the park’s star attraction.
Whenever visiting the park, I was especially in awe of the Giant Dipper but never thought in a million years that I’d ever get the nerve to ride it. It was a “woodie” in terms of construction, not made of steel, and was supposed to be the largest wooden roller coaster in California, maybe even the world at that time.
Rumors would abound about the unfortunate few who would literally fly out of their seats just as their cars crested the highest slope of the roller coaster. I think my friends made up gruesome stories to emphasize the Giant Dipper’s huge scary expanse. Whether or not the rumors and horror stories were true, my eleven year old vivid imagination was open to believe whatever anyone told me about the ride.
My best friend Kay Lynn and I had arrived at the park in the early afternoon and got caught up in the “just-one-thin-dime” traps set by the midway’s street vendors. We’d spend a dime here and a dime there, trying to win the elusive prize, always losing of course. Each time we discovered we were duped yet again, we would get mad, and displayed what we thought were convincingly mean looking faces at the vendors as we stomped away. The vendors would laugh and we’d fume even more, stomping harder and swear we’d never go back.
Kay Lynn always dared me to ride the Giant Dipper. I sure wanted to show her up, but whenever I got up the nerve to walk toward the ticket stand, I’d tremble in fright and chicken out. Kay Lynn would tease me unrelentingly afterwards but it never did her any good. Kay Lynn was just as chicken as I was, if not more so. I would chant back to her in sassy sing-song, “at least I was going to BUY a ticket and YOU-U-U-U never came CLOSE!!” and she’d stop teasing me for the moment.
We were standing near the Giant Dipper, admiring it yet again when a couple of Navy sailors approached. “Sissy, would you like to ride the Giant Dipper with me? My treat!” He was a stranger but looked no older than my 13 and a half year old brother. I still hesitated and moved closer to Kay Lynn for guidance. Kay Lynn whispered in my ear and said “you can’t go wrong, after all, he called you sissy. Surely he looks upon you as a little sister”. In my mind, he called me sissy because he knew I was afraid to ride the Giant Dipper!
The sailor had the two tickets in hand and began waving them seductively in front of my face, tempting me even more. I relented and said okay. Kay Lynn squealed in delight and the sailor’s buddy said he’d pass on this ride and promised to go on the next ride if we came back alive! Back alive? I thought. I banished the thoughts of the car flying off the end of the tracks and got into the car anyway. The sailor stepped in after me, pulling the protective rail down over our laps.
The car began to slowly inch forward. “This will be fun,” I convinced myself.
The first turn was nothing spectacular. We careened around a few bends, went up a little slope and quickly dipped down and back up again, and finally rolled onto a flat track with a few fast turns. I had the sensation of butterflies in my tummy a few times, but nothing more. I knew that I was sure to survive this ride because I was just as sure it was almost over.
Before I knew it, the car appeared to be dragging itself slowly up the tracks. While in this slow and wobbly 45 degree incline, I remembered the children’s story, The Little Engine That Could. “I think I can, I think I can,” the little engine sputtered. I began to wonder if our car could make it all the way up to the top without sliding backwards on the tracks. I thought about my previous perspectives looking up from the ground, and recalled that it didn’t look quite so scary from the safety of the asphalt below.
I swear the roller coaster never looked so huge as it did at the moment we crested the highest peak. In that instant, I could see the tall palm trees below, dwarfed by the height of the roller coaster. People walking through the park looked like toy soldiers. From my car’s perch, I could see clear across the ocean to the horizon. To my right, I could see Mission Bay. I felt exhilarated and on top of the world, but truly scared out of my mind!
I tried to envision how I could convincingly scream for joy on the down side. I reached up and touched my face as my heart raced frantically. I felt my contorted and twisted facial muscles and recognized it as the look of terror. I squinted my eyes and clenched my teeth tightly in anticipation of what was to come. My heart was pounding so hard that I was sure that death was imminent. In fact, I welcomed it… the sooner I was put out of my misery, the better!
Two feeble, shaking arms moved across my shoulders and squeezed me tight. I wondered if that was a protective gesture or the sailor’s fear.
I waited for some action and nothing seemed to be happening. I felt the car momentarily teetering at the very top of the roller coaster. Then in the blink of an eye, our car pointed straight down the tallest and scraiest slope on the Giant Dipper.
I watched in horror as the car was sent wobbling down the tracks with lightening speed. I felt the inertia pull my face back towards my ears. My hair flung wildly into my eyes and beat at the tears I now cried.
We were tumbling down the slope so fast that I couldn’t catch my breath. The sailor next to me was screaming all the way down, burying his head in my shoulder and that didn’t help matters for me at all! By then, the contents of my stomach were up in my throat and I feared that I’d lose it at any moment.
We no sooner got through the mightiest slope of the ride when our car continued onward to turn at amazing angles. As our car entered the next curves, up the next slopes, and careened down the tracts at breakneck speeds I thought this was the longest ride I’d ever been on in my life! I needed to breathe and soon!
In what seemed like an eternity of hairpin turns, the car came to a screeching, whip-lashing halt. Seeing our friends approaching us at the exit gate, my riding companion began the pretense of laughter and told his buddy how much fun the ride had been for us. The two sailors walked off and left me standing there by myself, white as a sheet. I could hear the car behind me take off on its next trip and I stood there with my back to the roller coaster while drying my tears.
I heard a familiar silence and I looked up just as the car finished its ascent. It teetered for a moment as I noticed another sailor with the same look of terror I had previously experienced with my companion. For sure it had been his first ride too.
He didn’t get too far down the slope when I saw the contents of his stomach shoot down through the rafters. Although repulsed, I also felt a tremendous sense of relief that I was not riding the Giant Dipper with that sailor!
Kay Lynn wanted me to unwind from my experience by going back to the midway. I didn’t particularly want to go because I only had one dime left, and that was my bus money home. Kay Lynn coaxed me over to some booths that were easy wins. I gave in and as we approached, the vendor called out to us and told us we’d win, just like Kay Lynn had said. He said he’d even show us how easy it was to win.
He let us play the game 3 times and lo and behold, I won each time! All I needed was a dime, one thin dime, to play the real game and win the coveted prize. I told the vendor that I only had ONE thin dime and I needed it for my bus fare home.
He assured me again that I’d be sure to win. He even offered to buy back the prize I would win, for the cost of the bus fare.
Tempting as it was, I hesitated, knowing full well that it would be a very long walk home if I lost.
I was an easy mark. Giving in, I decided to gamble on the game, and of course, lost my last thin dime.
I was fighting mad and demanded that Kay Lynn walk home with me right then and there as her punishment for luring me to the midway again. She refused to leave because she still had money left, and wouldn’t give up one thin dime for the sake of our friendship.
During the lonely three mile walk home, I tearfully contemplated the value of friendships…AND… wondered how those unscrupulous midway street vendors could stoop so low as to rob an innocent child such as myself, of her last thin dime.
Then I remembered that I was no longer innocent. After all, I had experienced the Giant Dipper at Belmont Park.
(My name was Kathee Gorden. Childhood friends from 1957-1966 in Pacific Beach or Clairmont, please get in touch with me.)
To see my perspective from the top of the Giant Dipper, check out this remarkable photo of the Giant Dipper courtesy of Joe Schwartz at Joyrides.com Copyright © 1997, by Joe Schwartz.
I remember the “Dipper” and Belmont. I used to work there. It really was and awesome park back in it’s day. Disneyland? No way, but it was home and that made it better somehow.