Oglebay Park
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Oglebay Park is a municipal park located in Wheeling, West Virginia, located on 1,650 acres (6.7 km²). Originally known as Waddington Farms, it was donated to the city of Wheeling in 1926 by Earl W. Oglebay, owner of the Oglebay-Norton Company. Its expansive history includes that of being a farmhouse – before Earl W. Oglebay bought it – and a model farm run by Earl W. Oglebay. It currently incorporates three championship golf courses, eleven tennis courts, a large outdoor pool, extensive walking trails, the Good Zoo, The Mansion Museum (operated by the Oglebay Institute), the Bissonett gardens, a greenhouse, the Anne Kuchinka Amphitheater, the Wilson Lodge (containing over 200 rooms), 49 cottages, The Schrader Center (a nature center operated by the Oglebay Institute), a planetarium (located within the Good Zoo), a ski slope, Camp Russel, and Schenk Lake, which is used for fishing, pedal boating, and several nightly fountain shows in season.
Annual events at the park include, but are not limited to: The Winter Festival of Lights, Oglebayfest, the Ohio County Fair, the West Virginia Open (tennis), and Springfest.
It is studied by developers worldwide as the only self-supporting municipal park in operation.[citation needed]
[edit] The Winter Festival of Lights
This 1985 holiday tradition began at Oglebay Park, but soon spread throughout the city of Wheeling, WV. The first year, displays and landscape lighting covered 125 acres over a three-mile drive throughout the resort. The show now covers more than three hundred acres over a six-mile drive throughout the park. Landscape lighting expert Dick Bosch and the late Robert J. Otten, Wheeling Park Commission’s long-time creative director, were the creative talents behind Oglebay’s show. Bosch’s lighting expertise was needed to produce the lighting for trees and buildings, and Bob Otten designed the first five displays for the 1985 opening and created nearly 50 additional displays until his death in 2005.
Every year, several new displays are added. Notable displays from past years include the Snowflake Tunnel, a display that allows visitors to drive through a lighted tunnel portraying thousands of twinkling snowflakes , the massive Polyhedron Star, which includes over 2,000 lights, and the Poinsettia Wreath and Candle, which is the festival's tallest. Other displays include the Candy Cane Wreath, The Twelve Days of Christmas, and Willard the Snowman, named for the television personality Willard Scott, who switched on the lights for Light-Up Night in 1986. Every year, local students submit new display ideas, and several displays were created at Wheeling Park High School.
[edit] The Good Zoo
The Good Zoo was dedicated in memory of a seven-year old boy, Phillip Mayer Good, who loved nature. Its collection includes red wolves, river otters, spectacled bears, cottontop tamarins, lemurs, an ocelot, an ostrich, llamas, goats, a red-tailed hawk, a barred owl, barn owls, bald eagles, red pandas, gorals, a red-crowned crane, a sandhill crane, and many other animals from all over the globe. It includes a train, which travels through the ostrich exhibit and all throughout the zoo, and a discovery lab, with an indoor South American Rainforest exhibit.
The Good Zoo has many SSP programs.The Species Survival Plan (SSP) is a cooperative breeding and conservation program instituted by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA). The goal of the SSP programs is to help as many species as possible through captive breeding, education, research, and habitat preservation.
Annual events at the Good Zoo include "Boo at the Zoo" (in October) and an Easter Egg Hunt (in April).
