Enchanted Forest (Maryland)
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- For other uses, see Enchanted Forest (disambiguation).
The Enchanted Forest is a now-closed theme park in Ellicott City, Maryland, on U.S. Highway 40 (Baltimore National Pike) near the intersection with Bethany Lane. Other theme parks with the same name have since opened elsewhere.
The Enchanted Forest officially opened on August 15, 1955, following a preview party the afternoon before — one month after Disneyland Park's opening. Appealing mostly to families with small children, the park had a nursery rhyme theme. The park featured fairy tale buildings and characters, but no mechanical rides originally. Some of the attractions including Cinderella's castle, a pumpkin ride, and a slide based on "The Old Woman in the Shoe." Children's birthday parties were often held in the picnic areas among the attractions. Many local teenagers worked as ticket-takers at the park.
Admission was one dollar for adults and fifty cents for children. At opening, the park was 20 acres, but it later expanded to 52 acres. At the height of its popularity, the Enchanted Forest welcomed 300,000 children per summer season. Part of the John Waters movie Cry Baby, released in 1990 and starring Johnny Depp and Ricki Lake, took place in the Enchanted Forest. The park closed for the first time in 1989 and reopened partially between 1994 and 1997. An episode of the TV series Homicide: Life on the Street from season 4, entitled "The Hat," was filmed at the Enchanted Forest.
Some of the land of Enchanted Forest is now a Safeway-anchored shopping center, called the Enchanted Forest Shopping Center, which opened approximately 1992. Much of the theme park sits undisturbed yet neglected behind a chain-link fence. Several efforts have been made by locals to reopen the park, and a preservation society has been formed. While the long-term goal is to revive the Enchanted Forest, current work focuses on preventing the artifacts from being lost forever. The current owner of the land has agreed to allow the fairy tale buildings to be moved to nearby Clark's Elioak Farm for display and preservation. Funding is still needed to complete the effort. Elioak Farm hosted a 50th Anniversary birthday party and benefit for the Enchanted Forest, on August 13 and 14, 2005. Martha Clark is committed to learning about and preserving the history of Howard County, and preserving elements of the Enchanted Forest is one example of these efforts.
