Special Guest Post - Busch Gardens, Tampa - 1972

Today I am happy to share some family photos, generously shared by GDB reader Mark H. Besotted! You've probably seen his name if you read the comments. He doesn't  personally appear in any of the pictures because he hadn't been born yet. Yep, that old excuse. Mark's young parents visited Busch Gardens in Tampa, Florida, and... well, Mark included an entertaining writeup to accompany the pictures, so I'll let him do the honors. Here's Mark:

Many moons ago, 45 years' worth, in fact, my parents took advantage of their childfree, young-adult lifestyle to visit Florida. In one week during September of 1972, they visited Busch Gardens Tampa and a younger park in the wilds of Orlando. Here are some pictures from the first day. Busch Gardens Tampa was already 13 years old in 1972, and only had three rides (counting the escalator to the brewery tour). It was mostly focused on wild animals and free beer. My mother focused her camera mostly on the animals, though we can see some incidental monorail track near the end.

Here's a good-looking kid, and also my father, only 26. The petting zoo area was in an area called "Boma." (That's Swahili for "small animal enclosure," if the park maps of the time can be believed, which makes me wonder about the naming of that restaurant in The Animal Kingdom Lodge.)

More from Boma. Everybody loves petting ruminants!

I can only assume Mom took this photo from the Serengeti Express Railroad (which had just opened the previous year). The rock wall behind that tall cheetah hides the baboon enclosure, where large apes were entertained by a constant stream of humans being ferried past. 

We're off the train now, and on the far side of the park. This is Flamingo Point, with the brewery peeking up over the trees in the background. Fun fact: like all flamingos, these birds got their vivid pink color by eating their own weight in maraschino cherries every day.

These parrots provided a wisecracking introduction to a show where the flowers sing, and tikis play drums. And just like the ones up the road, they did so in a collection of hilarious dialects. Behind them, you can see the home of beer samples, the Hospitality House. 

Gazelles are so fast, they can outrun a snail on a turtle's back. 

Our elevation above the crocogators suggests that we're finally on the monorail. The architecture of the park didn't show a lot of imagination then, but I enjoy the scaly walls of the enclosure. (That's not fair, really. The park did include a kiddie area with storybook cottages and giant mushrooms. The nocturnal animal house was dressed up as a mountain, complete with waterfall. Sadly, Mom didn't take pictures of those.)

This time, the tall cheetah is ducking down, to make herself look smaller, and therefore further away. It's an old theme-park trick called "forced perspective."

Rhinos don't have very good vision, and they've mistaken us for the family who loaned them ten dollars, They're pretending not to see us. It's embarrassing all around.

In Eagle Canyon, there's an eagle. It's a salute to all geographic formations, but mostly canyons.

In the back left, we can see the park's only restaurant at the time, The Old Swiss House. It's a replica of a famous restaurant in Lucerne. To the right, we can see most of the monorail station. Unfortunately, there's some kinda hippo in the way. 

Ah, that's better! Here's a nice close view of the monorail station and supports. (Since the Busch Gardens Monorail is a hanging type, it needs those side supports.)

My mom knew Thufer would want to see powerlines, so here they are. Funny how actual wide-open spaces can feel less expansive than a properly-engineered berm on the Jungle Cruise. 

Here's a herd of... something. Wildebeest? Ibix? Moose? I can only give a positive ID on those palm trees.

A thing rests in the shade. I *think* it has horns. Maybe a mutant wolf?

This is another picture of a thing. No reason to even post it. 

I couldn't find a decent contemporary map to link to. (I relied on one from '70, and one from '76, neither correct to what the pictures show in '72. But both together helped me get a feeling of where in the park the pictures were, and coincidentally led me to suspect Mom filed them out of order. No matter.)

Here's my bibliography:

https://www.tampapix.com/buschgardens10.htm (General history.)

http://bgthistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Map-1970-001.jpg

http://bgthistory.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Map-1976-001.jpg

I hope this is interesting and fun for everyone, and look forward to writing up the WDW pictures. I'm swapping out photo albums this week, and moving on. I know there are pictures in 1982 from the Knoxville World's Fair, and early early EPCOT Center (with the creepy giant-head characters around World Showcase). If you're interested in any other random things (there's a quick trip to DC in '75  or so, with the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum heavily featured, plus Savannah and other places), let me know. As I said, I'm scanning everything, so I'm happy to share it all. 

Mark

MANY THANKS to Mark for sharing these photos of Busch Gardens, and for all the work in scanning them and providing the accompanying text. I'm interested in the photos from the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum circa 1975, and the Knoxville World's Fair sounds good too, so I'll probably be bugging him for those. (Sorry Mark, no good deed goes unpunished)

Guess what? His parents also visited Walt Disney World, and Mark has shared the photos from there as well. Stay tuned!