The Ride on the BEAST Never Repeated!

It was a cool, misty, April Spring evening at Kings Island in Cincinnati. A group of us had finished a not-so-pleasant “Family Leisure Centers” Board of Directors meeting several hours earlier in the Taft Board Room, a meeting room over the front gate off to the side of Kings Island’s “International Restaurant”.

On the other end of the “International Restaurant” was our in-house management’s “watering hole”, appropriately known as the Caprice, a carryover name of the beautiful Coney Island suite which was located over Moonlite Gardens and used by Coney management to entertain friends, dignitaries, and celebrities.

After retiring to the KI Caprice for a few drinks (the park was not open to the public), we sat and lamented the meeting, which was a tough budget meeting held by both Taft Senior executives and The Kroger Company executives, Taft’s partner in Family Leisure Centers! Present were two Chairmen, two presidents, two CFO’s and two Senior marketing officers. It was a serious meeting. We were in the midst of an early 1979 recession, caused by an energy crisis triggered by the Iranian revolution which led to soaring energy costs. The officers of both companies were clearly concerned about the affect this crisis would have on the impending 1979 operating season at all of the parks - Kings Island, Kings Dominion, and Carowinds. We, the management teams from the parks, had a difficult several hours of volleys with the BOD answering questions and demonstrating how we intended to combat the looming recessionary issues everyone was concerned about.

At the end of the earlier BOD meeting, I remember we were all feeling down, and the cocktails were flowing, not to excess but were flowing. There was Bill Price, Mike Bartlett, Gary Wachs, Tom Kempton, myself, and a couple of other senior park employees all together when someone mentioned they were testing the BEAST this week with sand bags, and we should go down to the BEAST and take a ride! So, we as a small group walked down to the new coaster, talked to the engineers, had them remove the sandbags, and get the train ready for us to take a ride. All systems had been inspected, and we were informed the brakes and all were good to go! Now remember, this was a cool misty evening, and all conditions were perfect for a guaranteed fast ride. Little did we know that the ride we were about to experience would be the first and last fastest people-boarded ride ever taken on the BEAST!

Let me describe….sandbags were removed, then we boarded and spread ourselves throughout the train so as to distribute our weight. There were six or seven of us going for the inaugural ride. A little buzzed as we boarded, I have to say we were excited to ride! The train made its way up the 110-foot-tall first hill, down the 141-foot drop into the underground short tunnel, and we were off! The evening mist made the ride eerie. We did the whoopie doo’s, the S’s, and then we were getting ready to climb the second hill leading downward to the 540-degree tunnel! No one had ever ridden or gone through the tunnel at this point ! We hit the tunnel at an amazing speed. As we went through the tunnel, all of us quickly lost our BUZZ and finished the remainder of the ride astonished at the velocity of this ride. The speed through the Helix 540 tunnel was scary fast, so scary that upon departing the ride we all looked at each other and asked the question? What have we created??!! THE NAME WAS CORRECT! IT WAS A BEAST!

A hurried meeting was held by park management back in the Caprice. It was decided to get the design team and the construction crews together ASAP, to which a decision was made to slow the train going down the hill into the tunnel (which was so scary). That decision, along with a few other recommendations, delayed the ride opening by about two weeks. That evening ride was the fastest, scariest, ride ever taken on THE BEAST! The ride was slowed, and still remains 45 years later among the top 10 best coasters in the world! THE BEAST logo won the New York Advertising Club award for creativity.

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