Customer Reviews

Knott's Preserved: From Boysenberry to Theme Park, the History of Knott's Berry Farm

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I often get disappointed with the purchase of books about favorite topics when the design and quality of the book looks less-than professional. This is definitely not the case with this perfectly-presented 160 page illustrated hardback volume. Filled with more than 200 never-before-seen and rare photos/illustrations (both black & white and color), it is a high-quality publication that is written well (huge kudos to Chris Merritt & Eric Lynxwiler) and designed beautifully (by Amy Inouye). After reading this book, I have a much higher appreciation of the more low-key Walt from Orange County (the other being Walt Disney). A hard worker and sharp entrepreneur, he overcame the hardships of farming during the depression to create a thriving restaurant and theme park in Southern California. The majority of the book tells the story of Knott's Berry Farm while it was run by the family, with a brief chapter at the end about Cedar Fair, the company who currently runs the theme park. There are plenty of behind-the-scenes stories about the creations of some of the classic attractions at Knott's (The Calico Mine Train, Halloween Haunt, Calico Log Ride, and Knoot's Bear-y Tales to name a few) as well as the famous Ghost Town, my favorite part of the park that is still there today. Pleasantly, this is an upbeat book that celebrates the family, the restaurant, and the park instead of being a sarcastic rant bemoaning what has changed or disappeared over the years. Tony Baxter (Disney Imagineer) wrote the forward to this book. Highly recommended for Knott's and Theme Park enthusiasts!

This is the best and most lavish telling of the history of Knott's Berry Farm. The place deserves it. So many memories and a great American success story to boot. Lots of great images from the early days. You get more than a chronology, the pictures convey the soul of the farm and the personalities that built it. Lots of original art used to build the Ghost Town is included which has never been published. I used to work there years ago and went often as a boy. Those visits were very special and the book helps bring much of that back. A labor of love to put this together and now that the history is out there, hopefully the farm will continue to embrace it. Recommended.

I am so pleased to see a book - similar to Disney's theme park books - finally published about Knott's Berry Farm and its history. The authors did an excellent job with their publication. Everything from the stories behind the attractions to the people involved with the Knott's Berry Farm history are well told. My only wish is that there were more photos of the rides' designs, park maps from the years, and more photos of Knott's Scary Farm. BUT - outside of that, this is an excellent book - particularly for any theme park fans to have in their collection.

We really enjoyed this book as it covers the development of Knott's Berry Farm in a reasonable time-line that seems to make sense. One always feels vindicated by purchasing a book like this if you can walk away from "the read" with a plethora of new knowledge. Being avid readers of anything about Walt Disney, and theme parks... you can readily see that a few of Disney's ideas may have emulated from the mind of Walter Knott...and there were others that came before Disney too, such as Arto Monaco and his "Land o0f Make Believe" in upstate New York.

Disney may have been the first to refine the theme park into the current benchmark, but it is abundantly clear that others such as Walter Knott had many of the ideas first... long before Walt. No disrespect to Walt who was a creative genius... it is still important to pay homage to these other pioneers as well.

Denny Magic

I've lived in Southern California my entire life, and I've been to Knott's Berry Farm countless times. Now we're enjoying Knott's all over again with our 3-year old son, which brings back so many memories of the past.

Knott's isn't the same place as it was in my childhood, it's become a park filled with thrill rides. Some may like that better, some may like it worse. Personally, I think they've lost a lot of the theming that made Knott's a special place.

Now on to the book. It's a great history of the park from its early days as a farm, to the days of the chicken restaurant and Walter Knott's attempt to divert the attention away from the 3+ hour wait for a table, to the theme park it is today. I love the book. It's jam-packed with great pictures of the park through the years. Walter Knott was a true visionary and he seemed like a very decent and humble man. I just wonder what he'd think of his park today.

When I was growing up in Southern California, my family did not have much money for vacations. However, each summer, my father would take a week off from his work as a self-employed gardener and take our family to local attractions. It always involved a trip to Knott's Berrry farm. Back in the 1950s, Knott's was little more than a ghost town, Indian village and chapel.

I did not have much of a recollection of our annual trips to Knott's until I read Knott's Preserved. As I read the book, many things came back to me about my visits as a child. This book does a wonderful job painting a picture of the evolution of this unique and treasured part of California's history. The pictures are phenomenal and the pictures that the text helped to paint in my memories are priceless.

Knott's Preserved is more than a book. It is a journey through time that chronicles in an unparalleled fashion how Knott's Berry Farm was and is a significant part of the fabric and culture of Southern California.

What a neat book. It's about time to have this book about Knotts Berry Farm and the Knott family. This book is full of wonderful photographs and memories from those who were there. (There is a photo of Walt Disney visiting Knotts circa 1952-53)

The book, along with all the Disney connections, is a wonderful tribute to Walt and Cordelia Knott and their wonderful farm.

The book was a delight to leaf through. It contains some great pictures depicting the "Farm's" history. I am a local who has been going to Knott's Berry Farm for over 50 years. I have enjoyed reading two terrific books about Knott's recently: "Knott's Preserved" and "Cordelia Knott, Pioneering Business Woman." These two books complement each other. The Knott family success story is of great historical importance. My family knows the Knott family and have great respect for them and their many contributions to Buena Park and America.

Having grown up in Buena Park (a whistle-toot from Knott's), I was eagerly awaiting the publication of this book since it was previewed on [...]. It's a good addition to the too-scarce body of work on Knott's Berry Farm, is very well-written and enjoyable, but three problems exist which significantly detract from its overall usefulness and quality.

1. The printing of many of the photographs is quite poor. Granted, some of this can be attributed to the age and quality of the source material (especially the truly vintage photos), but even the more recent photos are fuzzy with bad contrast (i.e., too hot). As examples, look at pages 106/107 (note the hot spots on the woman's shirt), 121 (the passengers in the log are little more than a white splotch), 132 (terrible resolution from a photo taken in bright sunlight), 140 (same), etc., etc., etc. I don't know if this was a scanner or Photoshop problem, but my memories (and the photos I have of Knott's) are a lot sharper than the photos.

2. As mentioned above, there is a great lack of serious documentation on Knott's history, so it would have been quite useful for the authors to annotate and footnote the text. The acknowledgments were adequate, but proper annotations would have made this book very useful for future research on Knott's, Buena Park, Orange County, and farming in the 1930's. This is a small issue, especially since the book doesn't claim to be a "scholarly work," but it would have been better.

3. If the lack of footnotes is a small issue, the lack of an index, even for a entertainment book, is inexcusable. As the book currently stands, to find information on a specific topic, the reader either has to know the book intimately or spend a lot of time flipping through it. An index is not a difficult thing to prepare in modern word-processing software, and the omission of an index makes this book much less "user-friendly" even for a casual reader.

I heartily recommend this book, but it could have been better.

My brother and I grew up (1955-1968) a mile from Knott's and spent much of our youth there. This book vividly captures the development of the park from its earliest days to the present,

through well-researched and well-written text and lots of well-reproduced images. Reading it brought back fond memories. I often buy a jar of boysenberry preserves to remind me of my youth.

This book serves a similar purpose.