Playland at the Beach was a popular amusement park in San Francisco from 1890 to 1972. It had 14 rides, 25 concession stands, and a famous indoor funhouse. The park also created the popular ice cream sandwich, It’s-It®. It closed due to declining success and drug activity and was replaced by condominiums. A permanent art exhibit now honors the park’s history.
Playland at the Beach was an amusement park in San Francisco, California in the 19th and 20th centuries. The park, which first featured rides in 1990, spanned 20 acres along Ocean Beach in San Francisco. Although Playland at the beach has been closed since 1880, the park holds a fond place in the memories of many local residents and has spawned many online fan communities.
In 1884, the former squatter village on Ocean Beach built a gravity railway roller coaster, one of the first in the nation. In the following decades, trolley rides were created to bring large numbers of visitors to the amusement park, which came to include the famous Cliff House restaurant and the saltwater pools of the Sutro Baths. In 1911, another local amusement park was badly damaged by fire and many of the rides were relocated to the seaside park. Concessionaire stands began to spring up around the attractions, and the partnership of concessionaires John Friedel and Arthur Looff first envisioned the area as a large park.
Looff and Friedel added ten new rides to the park and operated it with increasing success. In 1926, George Whitney became the general manager and changed the areas by various names to Playland at the Beach. By 1934, Playland at the Beach had 14 rides, 25 concession stands and several restaurants.
One of the most loved attractions was the huge indoor funhouse. The Playland amusement house featured a gigantic and occasionally scary clown at the entrance, commonly referred to as “Laughing Sal”. The interior of the amusement house featured intricate carvings and woodwork, considered prime examples of the carnival style. The attraction featured catwalks, spinning barrels, fairground mirrors, and a three-story-high indoor slide carved from highly polished wood.
Another popular attraction was the Laff in the Dark, an eerie haunted house ride. Terrifying features included a female cannibal, skeletons, and lots of screaming and scaring. In the Diving Bell, pilots were dropped into a shallow pool in a replica of the first submarine. The pool contained fake fish and was considered a bit silly, even at the time. Over the years, Playland at the Beach has had several roller coasters and rides, including the Big Dipper and the wild mice roller coaster, the Alpine Racer.
One innovation that came from Playland at the Beach is the popular ice cream sandwich called It’s-It®. Invented by park manager George Whitney in 1928, the dessert featured vanilla ice cream wrapped around two oatmeal cookies and covered in dark chocolate. It’s-Its® was originally sold only at the park, but after Playland closed in the 1970s, the treat became commercially available.
After George Whitney’s death in 1958, the park went from manager to manager, seeming to lose its sense of success. The area became increasingly known for drug activity, which scared off the family clientele. On Labor Day weekend 1972, Playland at the Beach closed. The park was torn down and condominiums were built in its place. In 1996, San Francisco commissioned a permanent art exhibit honoring the park and its long history with the city. Much to the chagrin of fans, Playland at the Beach can only be visited through memorial websites with photographs and memoirs.
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