Thursday, November 20, 2014

Pennyland - The Haunted Amusement Park that Never Was

I recently recorded three episodes of Hauntings and Horrors (apparently formerly known as Creepy Canada), and the last story of the last episode I recorded (which happen to really be the last story of the last episode) featured a haunted amusement park called Pennyland. I normally didn't pay much attention to the investigation sequences on these shows, because they used psychics, rather than looking for hard evidence. (I have nothing against psychics in general, but don't consider using psychics on TV to be credible evidence, as there are hoaxers out there who love to be on TV, even for a cheesy dramamentary.) However, in this instance the one of the team's psychics found a box of evidence.

Inside a collection of polaroid photos, a rope, a knife, and a bloody handkerchief. . . however both the box and the evidence looked too fresh. There was no dust, the rope looked unused, and blood was still red. Not to mention the police already supposedly scoured the place. But the show claimed this evidence was still being reviewed by local police. However, since this show was filmed in 2006, I figured any review was probably done now and started to scour the internet for what happen to the box, and if it indeed turned out to be a hoax.

Nothing. Hardly even a single relevant webpage. Well, I did learn the show had another name, Creepy Canada, which made sense as almost all the locations were in Canada. So armed with the new name, I searched again, and found Wikipedia's episode list. At the very end was the episode in question, bearing a note none of the other episodes had, a disclaimer:
'The buildings that are featured in the Pennyland Amusement Park episode look identical to the buildings located at the defunct Rocky Springs Amusement Park in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA. There is no information on the internet to back up the story featured in the Pennyland Amusement Park episode.'

This is a generous statement, suggesting they didn't shoot their investigation at Pennyland. Because further research finds there's actually no evidence that Pennyland ever existed at all!

Check this out: http://cec.chebucto.org/ClosPark/Penny.html

9 comments:

  1. I am watching that episode and it looks so fake! The so-called paranormal team is a joke. I love watching shows like this but this one is awful.

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  2. The show does indicate that the investigation is a dramatization albeit a cheesy one.

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    1. Now, I could be mistaken, but I think what was actually implied was that the recreation/background history scenes were dramatized (as opposed to the investigation), however I'm fairly certain the investigations on all episodes of Creepy Canada contained a good dose of added/fictional drama.

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  3. All these episodes do post that they are a "dramatization" throughout the entire episode. Therefore you are seeing actors portray these events, and not the actual footage. This will pertain to the "evidence box" and mostly likely the place or area it was filmed. Hope this helps.

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    1. Hey there, thank you for your comment. Sorry it took so long to get your post approved, I didn't realize I hadn't approved it. I think you'll find I already replied to this issues, the way the disclaimers were done did not appear to be intended to leave viewers with that impression.

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  4. There was no serial killer then?

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    1. I think that's a pretty safe assumption. If the park the killer was supposed to be hiding in didn't exist, he probably didn't exist either.

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  5. The Rocky Springs Amusement Park in Lancaster, PA has been shut down for many years, but yes it was known as Pennyland. It even has a building there with the name Pennyland across the front of it. There is now a bed and breakfast on site but there are still many old rides and attractions still up that have been taken over by nature. The owner of the bed & breakfast gave my brother and myself a quick tour of the property and brief history maybe 10 years back.

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    1. Thanks for sharing that bit of information.

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