The Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk is an oceanfront amusement park in Santa Cruz, California. Founded in 1907 and operated by the family-owned Santa Cruz Seaside Company since 1915, it is California's oldest surviving amusement park and one of two seaside parks on the West Coast of the United States (the other being the Santa Monica Pier). The West Coast once hosted many more beach parks, including the Pike in Long Beach, California, Neptune Beach in Alameda and Playland at San Francisco's Ocean Beach. All have long since closed, but the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk survives as a reminder of a bygone era in amusement.The Boardwalk extends along the coast of the Monterey Bay, from just east of the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf to the mouth of the San Lorenzo River. At the western edge of the park lies a large building known as the Casino (which does not offer gambling), which contains a video arcade, an indoor miniature golf course, a laser tag arena and the Cocoanut Grove banquet room and conference center. A Laffing Sal automated character, from Playland-at-the-Beach, is viewable near the miniature golf course.
East of the Casino, the boardwalk portion of the park stretches along a wide, sandy beach visitors can access easily from the park. The eastern end of the boardwalk is dominated by the Giant Dipper roller coaster, one of the best-known wooden coasters in the world and one of the most visible landmarks in Santa Cruz. The Dipper and the Looff Carousel, which still contains its original 342-pipe organ built in 1894, are both on the United States National Register of Historic Places[1] and were, together, declared to be a National Historic Landmark.[2] In addition, the park itself is a California State Historic Landmark.[3]
In many ways, the Boardwalk has changed little from its turn-of-the-century origins. Old-fashioned carnival games and snack booths can be found throughout the park. The atmosphere evokes East Coast seaside parks,[citation needed] such as Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York and the many parks on the Jersey Shore.
As of 2007, the park is headed by Charles Canfield, the son of Laurence Canfield who purchased the park from Charles I. D. Looff in the 1950s.
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