By the time things enter the realm of legend, it can be difficult to divine what was true. To tell what actually happened.

"Action Park."

If you grew up near Northern New Jersey, the chances are pretty strong that the mere sight of those words is flooding your brain with feelings of dread, doom and possibly the memories of at least a few scars.

WATCH PART 2: The Demise of the World's Most Dangerous Amusement Park

For the rest of you, here's the gist: In the years since it closed down in 1996, Action Park has earned a reputation as the most insane — and possibly the most dangerous — amusement park that ever existed. A lawless land that was ruled by drunk teenage employees, frequented by even drunker teenage guests, and filled with rides that seemed to defy even the most basic notions of physics and common sense.

Let's put it this way: The park had a waterslide that went in a complete loop.

One more time: A waterslide. That. Went. In. A. Complete. Loop.

Like many adults who visited Action Park decades ago, I find it impossible not to look back and think that at least some of what I remember and have heard in the subsequent years is a product of the snowballing effect of time and legend. Sure, things weren't as rubber-coated and insurance-obsessed as they are today. But still...

And so, I got together with a documentary crew from the video site Dailymotion, and we set out to answer a simple question: It couldn't all be true... could it? No amusement park could have really been this insane. This incredible. This bizarre. And yes, this fun.

Turns out, it was.

"Every story that you hear, any legend that you hear about it — it's all true. This is a place that it actually happened," Andrew Mulvihill, son of Action Park founder Eugene Mulvihill, and a guy who spent much of his teenage years working at the park, told me.

In part one of our two-part video series on Action Park, we look at the rides and the riders that made it the most insane amusement park the planet has ever seen. Check back Thursday for part two, when we go even deeper into the legend and legacy of Action Park.

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Images: Dailymotion, WeirdNJ.com