From Foam Mountains to Outer Space: Part III

Entrance to Bear Country. Mamba is in the background, Mama and Papa Bear greet guests. 

Pandamonium would reign as Worlds of Fun’s kid's area for a full decade from 1987 until 1997. Its undoing would come from a major shift that would affect the entire park. In June 1995 the announcement was made that Hunt Midwest, who had built and operated the park since its inception in 1973 was selling the park to Ohio-based park operator, Cedar Fair. Cedar Fair would almost immediately start making changes to the park, and one of those included a change to Pandamonium in 1996. Detonator an S&S space shot was added in place of Head over Wheels which was moved down by Wacky Worm. 1997 would continue the changes to Pandamonium, with its retirement and the introduction of a new set of characters and themed land taken from the pages of The Berenstain Bears, Mama, Papa, Sister, and Brother Bear.

In 1995, just prior to Detonator's addition, this area of Americana was still part of Pandamonium.

In 1996 Head over Wheels moved down by Wacky Worm.

At an expansion of one acre, Bear County would completely change the appearance of Pandamonium for the most full-immersive atmosphere the park had ever attempted for a kid's area. Panda Pavilion theater (originally Flying Circus Theater) would be massively modified, taken down to basic steel structure, and expanded in size massively to become the Bear County Museum, complete with interactive activities, computer lab, and reading room. Today, the same structure is used as part of Peanut’s Showplace and Snoopy Boutique.

The entrance to the Bear Country Museum.  Today the entrance to Snoopy Boutique is nearly identical.

Computer Cave. (remember this was added in 1997 when computers were still rather clunky and large)

The idea of the Bear Museum was a learning experience.  

Right next door to the Museum was the Spooky Old Tree slide, which was a basic spiral slide, enclosed in a creepy grey fiberglass tree with appropriately ominous glowing eyes. Like so many details, Spooky Old Tree was lifted from a specific Berenstain Bear’s book, in this case. Spooky Old Tree. From many recollections, Spooky Old Tree terrified its target audience quite well! Once Snoopy came to town, Spooky Old Tree would last on for another decade as the Kite Eating Tree.

The Spooky Old Tree slide.

Sister Bear telephone booth.

Various book stumps were spread throughout the area , and featured the books various attractions were based off of.

A lot of many guests' favorite memories are the small details, and there were a lot of them in Bear Country. The Bear Family characters could often be found roaming the land, large tree stump all-weather “books” were scattered through the area, and small “brother bear” and “sister bear” telephone booths were fun to play in. The Boys Club, which was a small hideout surrounded by a pond area, was themed after the book No Girls Allowed and not far from that was the Dinosaur Pit which was a large gravel play area with a balance beam, digging equipment, and a large dinosaur skeleton to play on (based off The Day of the Dinosaur). To a kid this was awesome, heck it was fun as an adult! The gravel play area would survive, sans skeleton until 2005 when it was replaced by Peanut’s Playhouse. Probably one of my favorite details was tiny and often overlooked, and that was Teeter Totter, a large human-sized teeter toter, instead of sitting you would stand though! One feature that was introduced with Bear Country that does still exist is the musical play pad, today in front of the Peanut’s 500, this tinkling treasure is one of the last holdovers from this short-lived area.

The Bear Country Tree, Woodstock Gliders is located in the same location today.

The kitchen area inside of the Bear Country Tree

Looking up to the various "floors" to the Bear Tree.

One major attraction that was also added, and of which no detail remains was the Bear Family Treehouse. Bear Country Treehouse did what Pandamonium never could, evicting Octopus from the area. And in fact, Octopus would leave the park entirely for the 1997 season, re-appearing only in 1998 in Scandinavia.  

The Boy's Clubhouse, which would become Woodstock's Nature Center in 2001.

  

Teeter Totter.  Both Teeter Totter and The Boy's Club were located about  where Peanut's Road Rally is today. 

A photo is worth a thousand words and I think a photo can explain this attraction better than any description. 

The Bear Treehouse was massive at nearly 30 feet tall, but it wasn’t a ride, but instead a walkthrough experience. It was incredibly detailed and along with much of the rest of Bear Country, it’s sad to think it only lasted such a short time. The Bear Treehouse would be replaced in 2001 by Snoopy Bounce and today Woodstock’s Gliders is located at its original location.

Dinosaur Pit, today this is about where the old Peanut's Playhouse is, which replaced the play area in 2005. 

So what about the rest of the rides? It’s easy enough to say that in regards to the rides not much changed, but that wouldn’t be entirely accurate. All the rides that were already there as part of Pandamonium remained relatively unchanged, the signage looked the same, the colors stayed the same. The exception is PandAm Airlines which became Kiddy Hawk Airlines (its THIRD name change if you're keeping score).

Beetle Bumps was relocated from the Orient to Kiddy Kingdom in  1998.

But this one didn't move at all once again.  Keeping in mind that it originally started its life in 1974 in Scandinavia and moved to the then Aerodrome in 1978.  In 1997 it was still in the same place, and it's still there today!  

What changed in regards to kid's rides was more so the REST of the park. Up until this point, there were still nearly half a dozen kids rides operating outside of the designated kid's area. Micro Moto Bahn in Scandinavia, Pony Promenade in Americana, Beetle Bumps in Orient, and Bounce a Roos in Europa. That would all change. Three of the four would be moved in 1997 and 1998 to the newly designated Kiddy Kingdom leaving their ride pads empty for the "necessary" popcorn and dippin’ dot carts that would occupy them, in some cases to this day. Beetle Bumps today is the Coca-Cola Refresh stand in The Orient (It’s the same pagoda structure and everything).

Micro Moto Bahn moved in 1997 to Kiddy Kingdom from Scandinavia (it was the last ride to hold out from Half Pint's Peak/Humpty's Haven area)

With history, it's hard to sometimes see the impact a change will have in the long term. With Cedar Fair's first few years of park operation at Worlds of Fun it was pretty obvious what direction they were headed towards.  Cedar Fair was taking Worlds of Fun and trying to mold it into the Cedar Point tradition. Kiddy Kingdom was the name of the kid's area at Cedar Point, which also, not surprisingly had a Bear Country too. Many of the changes instituted by Cedar Fair that occurred or would occur over the intervening years would drastically change the park, some in good ways, some in tragically depressing ways. Berenstain Bear Country, though technically a copy of the one at Cedar Point (though in my opinion it was an improvement) was not of the latter, it was a beautifully executed kids area, well themed, well laid out, and even to this day well-loved. For just the four seasons it had with us, it left an indelible mark.