Riverview Park was an amusement park in Des Moines, Iowa, from 1915 to 1978. What began in pre-1915 as a zoological garden and trolley destination in an area of Des Moines known as Highland Park would become Riverview Amusement Park, a popular family entertainment oasis in early Iowa history. It was built upon an island, accessed via a wooden bridge, by a group of nine local businessmen that were headed up by a Des Moines movie-theater mogul named Abe Frankle. In the early years various entertaining events and attractions that made Riverview Park a fondly remembered family get-away included free acts featuring death-defying daredevils and musical band concerts. The early amusement rides included a Herschell-Spillman menagerie carousel with intricate hand-carved animals and a John Miller–designed figure-eight roller coaster featuring eight full dips that all went to the ground level.
Riverview Amusement Park continued to prosper and grow over the decades up until the late 1960s. When Disneyland opened in 1955 with such amazing success, corporate sponsored theme parks started springing up all over the country. Small traditional amusement parks found it increasingly difficult to compete against the large corporate theme parks and many started closing around the country. Riverview was feeling the pressure also but was holding on to some profitability with its large returning clientele consisting of corporate and company summer picnic bookings every year. The new theme park in the area, Adventureland, made an offer to buy Riverview after the end of the 1978 summer season. Adventureland reportedly was going to keep Riverview operating for all of the company picnic business that was booking at Riverview, as well as for the general public. When the sale was completed in spring of 1979, Adventureland decided to close Riverview for good rather than keep the aging park open.
A few of the rides and attractions that were found at Riverview still live on. Some rides and attractions were moved to Adventureland. These include but are not limited to, the Haunted House which later closed to be replaced by ‘Dragon’ rollercoaster but a piece of the Haunted House still remains as you exit the rollercoaster you go through a maze of mirrors which was an original piece of the Haunted House. The ‘Kiddie Boats’ is another ride that originated at Riverview and moved to Adventureland and still exists today. The Scrambler was also moved from Riverview to Adventureland but was later replaced by the now in existence ‘Saw Mill Splash’.