This story was originally published May 2018.

For those lucky (or in some cases, unlucky) enough to have experienced Action Park, the stories they tell can feel too good to be true for those who missed the era of the infamous amusement park in Vernon.

It can feel like they are reaching back into their childhood and exaggerating those crazy times at "Traction Park."

But after reading an exceptional oral history released earlier this month, with interviews of the owner's son, the general manager, first aid employees, ride attendants, security guards, park supervisors, visitors and others, I'll believe practically anything now about this one-in-a-kind, completely dangerous but absolutely beloved amusement park.

(Click here to read the complete oral history on Mental Floss)

Concrete sledding at Action Park.

Concrete sledding

The Alpine Slide, which was the park's first ride two years before Action Park opened on July 4, 1978, was bought from a manufacturer in Europe by park owner Eugene Mulvihill.

"The Alpine was on a big hill, not a little baby hill," said park security guard Jim DeSaye. "It’s basically you on a sled on a concrete track. And there is nothing keeping you on."

The healing potion

Apparently, it was rare for visitors to come out of rides unscathed, particularly the Alpine Slide. So what do you do when someone arrives at the bottom with rug burns from head to toe?

"I can’t believe we used it, actually," Thomas Flynn, who worked in first aid at the park, told Mental Floss. "It was like 70 percent alcohol and 10 percent iodine. Imagine spraying 70 percent alcohol on a rug burn. We’d spray these dudes down and take bets on who would do the craziest dance. They would run out of first aid like we had just set them on fire."

Nothing was wrong with a ride that killed a man

After work hours on July 8, 1980, Action Park employee George Larsson Jr. rode down the infamous Alpine Slide ride. As he did, according to Mental Floss, he was flung from the track, hit his head on a rock and went into a coma before dying a few days later.

“The ride didn't injure Larsson. It was a rock 25 feet away that hurt him,” park spokesperson Wesley Smith told reporters, according to the oral history. The state's Department of Transportation also found nothing wrong with the ride.

Five people died after incidents at the park in the nearly 20 years it was in operation. According to the Mental Floss story, 176 total deaths were reported in 125 amusement parks across the country from the 1980s to 1997.

The infamous Cannonball Loop at Action Park.YouTube

‘It was like a Hot Wheels track’

The Cannonball Loop, which debuted in the summer of 1983, was only open sporadically for the next 13 years, and with good reason.

To start, Andy Mulvihill, Eugene's son, said "there wasn't really any engineering" and the testing was "just trial and error."

DeSaye described it elegantly as a "giant metal tube on a tower with a 360-degree loop and people would go shooting out of it."

Alison Becker, who visited the park, said: “It was like a Hot Wheels track with a friggin’ loop in it. No human should do that. I never saw it open. It was like a relic of a more dangerous time.”

The headless dummy

The Cannonball Loop was not even safe for inhuman things. To test the ride, as the story goes, they sent down a dummy and it came out with no head.

Although, one person in the story said he is unsure if that actually happened. It would almost be more surprising if the dummy didn't lose its head.

The results of a “trial and error” ride

DeSaye recalls an urban legend-like story of them testing the cannonball loop with employees.

"What happened was, they sent employees down it," he said. "The first one smacked his face and his teeth got knocked out. The second person came out all cut up. When they went in, the first guy’s teeth had gotten stuck inside and cut the second guy."

"We called it a monument to stupidity," DeSaye said.

Open container policy

For someone not from New Jersey and who was unaware of Action Park until recently, it seems absolutely ludicrous that alcohol was allowed inside its confines. You know what would go perfectly with wildly unpredictable and dangerous rides? Booze!

"There were bars throughout the park, which is something when you’re surrounded by rides requiring dexterity," DeSaye said.

Here, before the Alpine Slide, have another beer!

"The park was not real good about cutting people off," said Chris Ish, a first aid employee.

Fights! Lots of fights

I'm shocked that the booze-filled, adrenaline-riddled guests ended up being violent.

Like the time bodybuilders showed up:

"We once had a group of bodybuilders come in and start throwing lifeguards into the pool," Mulvihill said. "We had to call the police. Guys were just aggressive. They were feeling their oats."

And major fights:

"The Vernon police were awesome," DeSaye said. "They were used to it. We once called them to a fight with 20 people here. It was some gang thing that was so violent, people were hitting each other with bricks from the cobblestone walk. They were hell-bent on hurting each other. The cops had to bring the dogs."

No one messes with Jersey:

"It was the Wild West," DeSaye said, recalling more glorious memories at the park. "Fights every day. Guys would come in from the city, think we’re bumpkins, and want to take over. I saw a chair lift attendant hit a guy in the head with a shovel because he didn’t like something he said."

“Early urgent care center”

When you have 330 reported injuries in one summer, like Action Park did in 1986, it would make sense to have on-demand medical care. So the owners bought an ambulance and formed a partnership with a doctor in town.

“We had a good relationship with a doctor in town and would bring him certain types of injuries without going to the hospital,” Mulvihill said. “It was sort of an early urgent care center.”

Water filled with fish, snakes and snapping turtles

The Motorworld part of the park was a "giant swamp," according to DeSaye. That meant snakes, fish and snapping turtles. The snakes apparently left people alone, though, Ish said.

Bumper speedboats?

At the Roaring Springs section of the park, DeSaye can remember putting people into a little speedboat with 20 other speedboats dashing through the water at the same time.

"You’re going to crash into the docks or into other people. People would bump into one another and gas would go into the water," he said.

This led to a “sheen of oil residue over the water,” said John Keimel, a supervisor at the park.

Eugene Mulvihill was the founder of Action Park.

Eugene Mulvihill had no shortage of interests

Besides creating an outrageous amusement park, Mulvilhil also had investments in cancer research, he assembled the largest wine cellar in North America, helped build a robotic garage and made a variety of real estate deals. But when things went bad, they went really bad.

When the park closed for the season in 1997, he filed for bankruptcy. His company, Great American Recreation, was $47.9 millions in debt, including $3.8 million owed in lawsuits against Action Park.

The Mental Floss story has a great anecdote about how his bankruptcy filing was so large it took up 20 feet on a shelf.

Eugene Mulvihill died in 2012.

More on Action Park

A movie starring Johnny Knoxville, which premiered last year, is loosely based on Action Park.

Knoxville's character, presumably based on Action Park's infamous owner Eugene Mulvihill, is the owner of Action Point and has to step up the craziness of his raggedy amusement park because of local competition.

“No rules. No speed limits. Just pure fun,” is how Knoxville describes the park in the trailer.

Joe Atmonavage may be reached at jatmonavage@njadvancemedia.com. Follow on Twitter @monavage. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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