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    Holiday World
    Holiday World
    Holiday World
    Ebook196 pages55 minutes

    Holiday World

    By Pat Koch and Jane Ammeson

    4/5

    ()

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    About this ebook

    Louis J. Koch had a dream one of family, fun, and Christmastime year-round. And so he created Santa Claus Land, the nation s first theme park, in Santa Claus, located in the gentle rolling hills of southern Indiana. Now, six decades later, Koch s legacy lives on at Holiday World and Splashin Safari. Still owned and operated by the Koch family, Holiday World and Splashin Safari are consistently voted the friendliest and cleanest parks in the country, and their wooden roller coasters are rated in the top ten list among coaster enthusiasts. The Koch family members treat visitors to the park as family and welcome everyone into what has become a true extension of their home.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArcadia Publishing
    Release dateMay 17, 2006
    ISBN9781439616895
    Holiday World
    Author

    Pat Koch

    Pat Koch, founder of the Santa Claus Museum & Village, and Emily Weisner Thompson, director of the Santa Claus Museum & Village, have carefully chosen a variety of photographs from the archives of Holiday World and Splashin� Safari, the Santa Claus Museum, the O.V. Brown Collection, and a stocking full of images contributed by members of the local community. These sources have also provided the extraordinary stories and memories captured throughout the book.

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    Reviews for Holiday World

    4/5

    6 ratings2 reviews

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    • 5/5
      I remember visiting "Santa Claus Land" when I was a young girl and it must have been at the tail end of its time being known by that name. Now Holiday World has been a part of my children's lives since they were born. Now they are all teenagers. We continue to visit this magical park at least once a season. The park is now home to three of the most highly rated roller coasters in the nation and it has, hands down, the most amazing and innovative water park anywhere. My family is a fan of waterparks in particular and we have traveled quite a bit to visit waterparks, indoor and outdoor and nothing beats a weekend spent at Splahin' Safari waterpark. This park is also the BEST bang for its buck when you get free Pepsi products, free sunscreen, free inner tubes, and free parking all day long. We'd rather visit Holiday World than Kings Island or Cedar Point. The water park is better even than those in Wisconsin Dells.This book was such a treat to read. You know why Holiday World is so fantastic? Because it is family owned and operated by the fantastic Koch family. This book shares little known facts about Santa Claus land and Holiday World and behind the scene moments with the Koch family. The book is extra poignant since a lot of it is told by Will Koch, Holiday World's president who passed away not very long ago. We just returned from the trip and one of the most amazing things we took in on this visit was a Halloween scene with scarecrows and the faces on them were those of the Koch family. We see Pat Koch on almost every visit. The book makes us feel even closer to her family. I think other park owners should read this book and study Holiday World so they can learn how running a phenomenal park is truly done.
    • 3/5
      This couldn't have been an easy task. To try to put together a history of an amusement park, even when you're as closely related to the owners as Pat Koch is, must be an exercise in digging through musty newspapers and trying to find old advertisements. The series is called "Images of America", so there's a heavy emphasis on photographs, but there doesn't seem to have been a huge range of photos available. The book looks and reads a lot like going through someone's personal photo album.

    Book preview

    Holiday World - Pat Koch

    Ammeson

    INTRODUCTION

    The first theme park in the world is not Disneyland, which opened in 1955, or Six Flags over Texas, which started up six years later. Nor is it in a big city or even a highly populated state. Instead, it is tucked away amidst the rolling hills of southern Indiana in a town called Santa Claus. Premiering in 1946, and originally called Santa Claus Land, Holiday World theme park and Splashin’ Safari water park began as the retirement project of Evansville industrialist Louis J. Koch. His son Bill soon became involved and was running the park by the late 1940s, turning it into a family destination that now hosts more than one million visitors a year. Today the next generation of Kochs owns and operates the park.

    Well known for family fun, cleanliness, and friendliness, Holiday World and Splashin’ Safari are also famed for their wooden roller coasters. Both the Raven and The Legend have repeatedly been ranked among the top wooden coasters on the planet. The park’s newest wooden coaster, the Voyage, is predicted to quickly take its place among the world’s very best coasters. So how does a small-town theme park become such a hit?

    Well, for this third-generation family-owned business, it is all about service, because the Koch family does not see the park as a job or a business but instead as part of their home and their lives.

    And how could a park named for a jolly elf not be a magical place? Especially when Santa himself was on hand to spread joy and laughter. And memories. Jim Santa Jim Yellig posed for countless photographs over the decades, always with a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye.

    In 1960, Bill Koch married Santa’s daughter, Pat Yellig. Over the next six years, they had five children: Will, Kristi, Dan, Philip, and Natalie. As their family grew, so did the park.

    The story of Holiday World and Splashin’ Safari is more than that of a successful family business. It is the story of a community, because many of the people who live in and around Santa Claus work (or once worked) at the park, and that sense of family and commitment to common good is reflected in how the park is run.

    Repeatedly named the cleanest and friendliest park in the world—beating out Disney World, Kings Island, Busch Gardens, and Cedar Point—Holiday World is the only theme park to offer such a wide range of amenities as free soft drinks, free parking, plus free sunscreen stations throughout Splashin’ Safari, which also offers free use of inner tubes. The parks are also smoke-free and promote a family-friendly atmosphere.

    It is not unusual to meet people who have worked at the park for decades and whose parents worked there before. Friendships and even marriages have resulted between employees who never ceased to show the true meaning of hospitality to millions of park guests over the years.

    Bill Koch passed away several years ago, leaving an enduring legacy, and not just for Holiday World and Splashin’ Safari. He built Christmas Lake Village, a family-oriented gated community in Santa Claus; Lake Rudolph Campground and RV Resort; Kringle Place Shopping Center; and much more.

    The next generation now owns the park. Will Koch, along with his mother, Pat, continues to take great pride in the high standards his family set long ago, which his employees continue to emulate each day.

    We never want to lose that small-park feel, Will Koch explains. No matter how many guests we serve and how big we grow. The key is our steadfast adherence to the values established long ago as our park’s cornerstones: safety, service, cleanliness, and friendliness.

    One

    IN THE BEGINNING

    SANTA CLAUS, INDIANA

    With no stoplights, no paved roads, and no electricity until 1940, Santa Claus may have looked like a sleepy rural southern Indiana town, but Louis J. Koch saw potential in this small town with the world-famous name. Through the years he, his son Bill, and other Koch children and grandchildren would put the tiny town on the map. The Koch family was among a number of entrepreneurs who were determined to make Santa Claus a place where Christmas was celebrated year-round.

    Originally the town, which was laid out in 1846, was named Santa Fe. After it was determined there already was a Santa Fe, Indiana, the town’s leaders had to agree on another name. On Christmas Eve 1992, radio news commentator Paul Harvey recalled on his show The Rest of the Story how this small town became Santa Claus. The story begins with the townsfolk sitting around a potbellied stove on Christmas Eve night in 1852, discussing what to name the town. The circuit-riding minister, Rev. Christian Wyttenbach, was there, having just conducted the Christmas Eve service. Someone suggested that Wyttenbach sounded like a good name. Reverend Wyttenbach reportedly declined the honor, and while the discussion went on, a burst of cold winter air blew the church door open and, according to

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