Old Miracle Strip Carousel gets new life at Pier Park

PANAMA CITY BEACH, FL - The eyes of the painted horses still flamed, even after 45 years. Their nostrils still flared, as if ready to romp again, five years after being put out to pasture with the closing of the old Miracle Strip Amusement Park. So when Jenny Meeks looked out at the crowd swarming Pier Park on Tuesday, she decided to crank up the carousel a few days earlier than its official Saturday opening.

The 1964 Allan Herschell carousel, which delighted generations of young people at the old amusement park on Front Beach Road, began twirling once again, its bright lights shining and 30 colorful steeds keeping time to the hidden pipe organ.
   
After discovering the carousel in pieces under the old pavilion at the site of the now-defunct amusement park, Jenny Meeks and her husband, Teddy, have restored the ride and brought it to Pier Park. Miracle Strip Amusement Park closed in September 2004 after 41 years.
   
"Grandparents and parents have come up to us and thanked us," Jenny Meeks said Tuesday. "Some say they had ridden it as youngsters. Some said they actually ran it as teenagers."
      
The Meekses, originally from Griffin, Ga., had a "soft opening" of the carousel two weeks ago across from the Grand 16 Theater and Starbucks at Pier Park They were taking the brightly colored horses out for a test scamper, she said, but had more than 1,000 riders in about 10 days.
   
"I remember two older women, probably in their 50s, who rode it - no children - and they just giggled the whole time," she said. "They had rode the same carousel as teens."
   
In its heyday, Miracle Strip Amusement Park offered more than 60 rides ranging from kiddie bumper cars and the painted carousel to Dante's Inferno and the Musik Express. There was The Old House, a maze of illusions, and the Starliner, a 2,000-foot roller coaster ride which now resides at Cypress Gardens in Wmter Haven.
   
The rest of the old Miracle Strip Amusement Park rides now are gone, either sold off or sent to the junk heap.
   
But the Meekses, who moved to Panama City Beach about five years ago, thought Pier Park needed something more for children and began looking around, eventually hiring an "amusement ride broker."
   
When they finally tracked it down, the colorful carousel had been dismantled but was still in its original condition, the old paint still brightly shining from the ride's wooden horses.
   
The Meekses, who own a wholesale jewelry and gift company, gave the carousel a good steam cleaning, a new motor and a bright red, blue and yellow canopy and the ride was ready for its next generation of youngsters. If maintained with care, the old carousel rides last nearly forever, Jenny Meeks said.