SAN ANTONIO — The path to 3015 Broadway St. is familiar to John David Griffin. He started coming to it in 1959 with his adoptive family.
“People have generationally come here because they know what a good clean family environment it is,” Griffin said.
The 64-year-old took pictures of Kiddie Park in operation at its original location for the last time Thursday. America’s oldest children’s amusement park is relocating to a new home, near the San Antonio Zoo, the Fourth of July ending its nearly-100-year run on Broadway Street.
Michael Fuentes, the park’s general manager, said new development on Broadway snatched up their parking space. He said the partnership deal with the zoo give Kiddie Park a new space, as well as more parking.
“It’s just we’re getting pinched in here," he said. "So it’s definitely a good move that we’re partnering with the zoo."
He said the park will move nearly all the rides, and even their memorial brick walk to keep the nostalgia intact. But Dan Detmar wonders if that was true.
So, the 85-year-old brought family members to the park to experience it before the big move.
“We wanted to get here to bring our great-grandchildren,” he said. “Because it won’t be the same over in the zoo.”
Location did not seem to matter to the park’s most loyal patrons. As Emily Garza Sanchez sat and ate hot dogs with her mother, she said the park’s move was no big deal.
“If you wanted to leave (Kiddie Park) and if you wanted to go to the zoo,” she said. “You could just go over there.”
The park’s current location means everything to Griffin. He said when was pelted with personal issues as a child, Kiddie Park represented a happy space for him. Even as an adult he somehow found solace at the amusement park.
“This was my therapy,” he said. “They’ll never make another one like this. This is a diamond, a huge diamond.”
After opening in 1925 on Broadway, Kiddie Park ceased operation at 7 p.m. The park’s manager said Kiddie Park will reopen this fall.