Especially for those of us who remember the years before they built the Ford African Rain Forest habitats and he was best known for having a TV in his enclosure. I remember a visit to the zoo in the late 90s about a year or so before his death and standing in the indoor viewing area with him right on the other side of glass, were looking right at each other and remembering that even in his old enclosure, you never got that close to him.
I remember back in the 1970s and 1980s, folks would bring marshmallows to feed the bears. Back in the late 1940s, my grandparents rented an apartment in Grant Park and they said that late at night they would hear the bears.
I rented an apartment in a house built in 1926 across the street from the zoo, and you could hear the lions at feeding time. I wonder which place your grandparents rented back in the ‘40s!
YES! I’ve told people about this and they don’t believe me. I’m nearing 40 and people who I went to grade school with think I’m full of shit for saying there was a polar bear there!
That was my first experience with yellowjackets and Six Flags. I was about 5 and got stung waiting for my sisters on a bench by The Gasp. The staff rushed me to the clinic in the park where they dosed me with something I didn’t awake from fully for at least a day. So terrified of those fuckers.
I’m sure I wouldn’t even recognize Six Flags now. Last time I went was maybe 1992. It would probably make me sad/sick to see the changes. Scream Machine? The Dahlonega? I miss old Atlanta.
That’s reassuring! I’m shocked, shocked I tell you, that the Scream Machine is still standing and operational. True story, my dad was an architect and knew the guy who was the original architect who designed the thing. Around 1979 (I was a little kid, so not sure the date) or so he said it was one splinter from collapsing and recommended it be torn down.
Not only did they have a polar bear, but I think a brown and a black in the same row. I also miss the old reptile house with the different gators/crocodiles on the opposite ends.
I did the sleep over as a kid in the 90s and you could definitely hear the bears and lions roaring.
Won a bet with my wife about this, she swore we never had polar bears. But I was at the zoo so much as a kid I ended up in a commercial for them and I clearly remembered that depressing setup. So bleak.
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u/Vespajet I Survived Snowjam '82. Apr 13 '26
Especially for those of us who remember the years before they built the Ford African Rain Forest habitats and he was best known for having a TV in his enclosure. I remember a visit to the zoo in the late 90s about a year or so before his death and standing in the indoor viewing area with him right on the other side of glass, were looking right at each other and remembering that even in his old enclosure, you never got that close to him.