Frontier Town was a Wild West Theme Park in the Adirondack Region of Upstate New York that opened in 1952 and, except for a few years in the 1980s, remained open until 1998. The park has been abandoned since that time and still contains many of its original structures. Project Absurd visited what was left of Frontier Town in the summer of 2009, and have posted two pages worth of pictures and videos documenting our visits. Click on the links below to check them out.
Ham & Kelly
The teepee in one of the photos is not from Frontier Town — it’s been along that same stretch of Route 9 since I was 10, in 1976. However, I think the sign and the pillory are probably from FT. I’m very disappointed it’s gone — I now have kids of my own and would have loved to take them there.
Thanks for the information!
My parents met at Frontier Town while they were working there. If it weren’t for that place, I wouldn’t be here right now. I went there every summer up until it closed. I was five at the time. The area has never been the same since then. Just wanted to let everyone know about this. http://frontiertowncommitted.wikispaces.com/
Check it out. I think you’ll all like it. You can find me on facebook or email me at calebbauer23@yahoo.com.
Really enjoyed your pictures & video’s of Frontier Town. On one one they make me sad & on the other hand make me realize how fortunate to have visited several time from the late 60′ to the early 90′s with my own kids!!!!!
I remember visiting FT some time around 1965-66 with my parents. I was 9 or 10 at the time and I really enjoyed it -especially the train ride, where we were “robbed” by two or three villains. I still have the postcards my mom bought for me. Too bad it’s gone.
I was luckey enough to be there in i think 1967 an then again with my kids in 1993, I think it was. I love that place an then so did my kids. It is to bad its gone, We can only hope that someone starts it up again, For the kids of tomarrow. What a loss it would be to not have a place like that around. I was talking to a friend the other day,An thats what brought me to this site, They thought it would have been a place they would go an had wished they had. Its sad so sad! Was a great place, Thank you grandma for taking me there as a kid RIP
I worked there in 1967. I was a cowboy in the rodeo. I came from Kansas to get experience riding bucking horses. We also rode in the Cavalry, greeted adults & handed out sheriff badges to kids (we called it Howdy duty). Occasionally we robbed Old 44 the train and robbed stages.
It was great fun.
Kent Hewitt? I remember you from Frontier Town. I used to hang out there with Rand Corey.Didn’t you do some bull dogging also?
Well sure! Nice to hear from you. It was fun also to read Matoaka’s post below and see so many familiar names. Yes, I bulldogged and roped calves also, but mostly rode saddle broncs. I saw Rand when we were both at a team roping in Kansas, probably in the mid-80s. Tom Bass (Florida) and I correspond periodically. He is a representative for National Day of the Cowboy and says there’s also going be a reunion of some of the FT cowboys at the Kissimmee rodeo this winter. A couple other Kansas cowboys you may remember, Dr Wes Vogt (below) and Mike Nichols. Great memories of great times in Frontier Town.
Thank you so much for taking me back to FT. I went as a child in the 70′s. I remember the pony rides around the circle. Was looking forward to taking my kids, it would’ve been so much fun to revisit. Its so sad that its gone and has been left to rot…..
I loved Frontier Town when I was little. I was looking forward to bringing my son there and just checked to see if it was still open and am sad to hear it hasn’t been for quite some time. Thanks for the pics! Brings back great memories. I guess with all the high tech stuff today a great place like this wasn’t in demand anymore. So sad!!
I actually have a picture of me in the stockade with my little brother pointing a “pistol” at me. Shame kids of today won’t experience that innocent fun.
We were planning a trip to Lake Placid and I thought it’d be fun to take my boys to Frontier Town. I was very sad to learn that it was closed for some time now. I went with my grandparents in the 70′s. I loved it! It was neat to see your footage from last year – but very sad indeed to see how it has been let go. Too bad someone didn’t take it over and keep it up. As someone said earlier – most people are into the high tech amusement parks and don’t care for the simpler things in life. A shame. Thanks again for the memories…
How sad…as a child we visited many of the area amusement parks: Storytown, Gaslight Village, Frontier Town, and as a teen I worked at a couple of them: Gaslight Village & Time Town. Now they’re all gone.
Yes I remember back in the early seventies fondly visiting Frontier Town. I have many pictures my parents took when I was around 6-7 years old. Back then our vacations were road trips in the car from Quebec and we would drive down to all the theme parks in New England. My best memories…. By the way the Cdn. Flag at the old gas station across from Frontier Town was there because a lot of Canadians visited FT. Back then Canadian money was accepted at par.
Lyndon
How sad! another innocent era from our past has died.
It is shame that the youth of today will not experience the re-enactment of our frontier history.
I am a freelance photographer who visited Frontier Town as a child – shortly before its closing in the early 90s. As a native to the area I would love to go back to photography and explore the property but am (mildly) concerned about getting caught trespassing. Does the area seem to be patrolled at all?
Maggie – We didn’t see any police patrolling the area. However, the other group of people that we ran into told us that we should hide our car behind some bushes so police driving by on the main road wouldn’t see it. Also, on the second time we went to the area, there was a construction crew working on the “newer” entrance area – so we couldn’t explore that area.
I don’t know if you’ve made it up yet or not but, I know a few ways to get in without drawing attention to yourself. I’m on facebook or you can shoot me an email at calebbauer23@yahoo.com. Just don’t quite feel comfortable posting it on here. lol Don’t want anyone who wouldn’t want me sneaking in to know about it.
It really is sad to see such places turn into run-down husks of their former selves. Very sad to see.
i saw the pictures of frontier town today and its heat breaking.because my grandfather worked out therefor 20 plus years.he was a stage coacxh driver out there.i knew almost everyone that worked out there. i wish someone would buy itand open it like it was.
I also worked at FT as a cowboy in the rodeo etc.
Summer of 1972. I was an adventure and a total
hoot!! It is sad that it is gone. New
generations . . new heros for children.
The photo of the stagecoach brings back memories… I remember screaming in fear and crying my eyes out when the stagecoach was robbed by masked bandits firing blanks from their six-shooters while I was riding on top with my sister and parents!
I live upstate and drive by the area on fly fishing trips to Keene/Wilmington. It’s spooky to see it all deserted and overgrown. From “Frontier Town” to “ghost town”!
Yeah, I remember Frontiertown in the late seventies early eithties, very cool place to be as a young kid. The train robbers became heroes of mine.
HI! I found a 1955 wheat penny encased in a Frontier Town casing souvenir. I tought you might be intrested. let me know if you would like to see a photo.
Yes, we would be interested in seeing a photo. Thanks!
As a young child, my parents took me to Frontier Town in the 60′s . We loved the area with Gaslight Village,too ! We were a camping family, so we went back there every year . Enjoyed riding the “Ticonderoga” on the Lake where when the boat turned around this neighborhood dog would greet us, bark at us til we were turned around and back to shore. Gaslight Village was so much fun too !!! The “Keystone” cops would chase mw all around the Village either on foot or on police car !! The melodrama’s in the theater were so awesome!! I even went back there when I got married for my honeymoon !! And again, when I was pregnant with my 1st child !!! Would love to take my grand kids there but can’t believe it’s all gone !! Remember riding the train and we were held up by Jessie James and his gang !! They were looking for gold in my fillings!! And the Indians robbed the stagecoach, so we had to race to the fort to get help from the calvary. Remember my dad going to the newspaper office and getting the Gazette for me, with headline’s that read, Lizette Freitas captures jessie James and his Gang !!! What a thrill for me !! WE have a park in North Dartmouth, Mass, now closed!! It was called Lincoln Park. The only thing that stands there now is part of the old wooden rollercoaster!! A place where I went, mykids and my first grand-daughter got to go too !! I will forever miss that park and Frontier Town too !!!
February 18, 2011
VERY NICE JOB PUTTING THIS TOGETHER, THANK YOU, SPENT EVERY SUMMER IN LAKE GEORGE WITH A VISIT TO FRONTIER TOWN INCLUDED IN THE 60′S GREAT MEMORIES
So sad to see the place in such a state of decay. I worked at Frontier Town from 1979 – 1982 while I was in high school. I worked at the Archery and the Express Shop engraving sherrif’s badges. I have so many fond memories of the place and all the friends made. What a great way to spend my summers!
I frequented Frontier Town as a child in the 90′s. This place had always been the one of most memorable. My fondest memories are of the taste of the most amazing kettle cooked split pea soup prepared by “Grandma” and the bandit shootouts. Frontier town was especially memorable because this was on of the few places I have spent with a united family, all separated now. Thank You frontier town for the wonderful times I will always cherish and keep in my heart. Thank You for creating a microcosm that was incredibly tangible! Peace and Love
I really enjoyed your pictures and videos of Frontier town. We went there many times in the 60’s and 70’s. It was my favorite place for summer vacation. We stayed in the motel, ate in the restaurant, the whole deal. The last time I was there was in like 1989 or 90. I took my wife to show her part of my childhood. It had changed quite a bit in 20 plus some years but my memories came back strong.
It is very sad to see that it has been left to ruins. If I ever won the lottery I would use my winnings to bring it back!
Were you able to just go onto the property with no questions asked? Are there any trespassing signs? We are headed to Lake Placid next week for vacation and if it’s fine to go onto the property I would stop in to travel down memory lane gain.
Thank you for sharing your photos and video’s.
Regards,
Jay Punt
My parents took me here as a young child, and I (hopefully) still have my sherrif’s badge from there, even if the pin is bent. I’m glad I happened upon your website, but am sorry to hear the place is gone. It’s not surprising it’s gone, but it’s sort of shocking that the ‘ruins’ remain. I would have thought the owners could have sold the property or something.
Wonderful pictures. Many thanks. Went there in 50′s as a kid, then in 80′s with our kids and the in early 90′s with my daughters scout troop. The girls fell in love with a cowboy named Shane. Would love to visit now. Is it totally gone or have you not returned since you took these pictures?
So sad to see it’s gone, my grandchildren would LOVE it.
thanks again for the memories.
Sherry
I loved this place growing up. It’s so sad that it never could make a go of it. I remember it was the first place I ever rode a real horse. They used to have a narrow circular path (fenced on both sides) where the horses would travel at a walk until they got back to where they started. The stagecoach was great as well. I went there when they were starting it back up in the very early 90′s I think. They had a vew of the stagecoach horses still there. They hitched them up after many many years of retirement, and they took off as fast as they could and crashed the stagecoach.
As I read these comments, I appreciate the memories that people have. I worked at Frontier Town with my family – The Swift Eagle family, from the time I was 4 years old in 1954, until I was 18, in 1968. I believe that my family, as a whole unit, was there when Frontier Town was at its best. I mean that there was such a community feeling among the workers. Everybody watched out for the employees’ kids, who were free to just be kids and generally were dressed in western clothes or Native clothing,in the case of my older brother and myself. Lots and lots of memories, lots of stories,
Hi, my name is Matoaka Little Eagle. I have an fb site. If you go to my notes, you’ll find some stories written from the perspective of me, as a little girl, growing up at Frontier Town. It was quite the adventure.
I am so glad that my father, Swift Eagle was strong and committed to be himself, as a Native man, with respect and integrity. I felt bad for my oldest brother because when we first started working there, the management convinced him to be an Indian that scared passengers on the stagecoach by messing up their hair. Poor guy would come home with bruises and marks on his body. Besides that, it was demeaning and just perpetrated a one-sided biased history of the west that did not look upon the actual history with enough references to what was happening with Native people at the time. (My opinion. Luckily, Powhatan, my older brother, and I did not have to do any hokey stuff. Actually, we refused. We were kids and didn’t have to worry about losing our jobs. Not that I am casting aspersions on my oldest brother. He did what he had to do to have a job at the time. I was so glad when he decided to be a cowboy instead, so he wouldn’t have to get beat up all of the time.
It is kind of funny to think about an Indian wanting to be a cowboy. There are lots of Native cowboys. But it’s sad, too, that he was driven to be something other than identifiable as a Native person. I used to joke that Indians can be cowboys, but cowboys can’t be Indians…unless they’re really Indian. Being a cowboy is an occupation and being an Indian is to be of a race, a real human being of a different ethnicity and culture.
Understand that in the 1950′s, it was very difficult to be a Native person, in real life, and to have people mock you, disrespect you, and even physically hurt you. It is not so easy to understand that they are playing and living their fantasies, while you are living your life. There is a clash of reality and surrealism. When people do not want to believe that you are really, who you say you are, and continue to disrespect you, it goes to racism, not fun. It took me many years to understand that many people were just ignorant of factual history or they had been educated to believe that manifest destiny was ok and justified the taking of land and the massacre of thousands of Native people – real men, women, and children, my relations. They also learned a lot of stereotypes and misinformation from school, movies, and tv. I’m not trying to lay a guilt trip on anyone. I’m just saying that there was a lot more happening at Frontier Town that what people saw on the surface. It took a lot of work for me to just be a little Indian girl who wanted to play and make friends, when people would hit me with their stereotype comments and refused to see the real me. I didn’t understand it when I was a child. I would hear things like, “If you’re not good, I’m going to leave you with the Indians.” Once I spent all day with a little girl who screamed with terror when she first saw me. It was my first day of being a behavior modification therapist! I was about 6 years old. It hurt me so badly that someone could be so afraid of me. I set out to prove that I was just a little girl like her, with a mom and dad, and liked butterflies and horses, and liked to laugh. By the end of the day, she was my friend. That was the day that the seeds were sown for me to become an educator and one who studies what makes people who they are.
Remember that when FT first opened in 1952 or 53, it had only been about 60 years since the last Indian wars. People had grandfathers who may have been around to hear stories from their mothers and fathers of what the West had been like. So the times were truly different back in the 1950′s. Maybe that is what made the Frontier Town experience so vibrant for people. Native people did not get citizenship until 1924. In my dad’s home state of New Mexico, the Native people there did not get their right to vote until 1948! Times were ripe for a Frontier Town experience. People were still intrigued by how the West was settled and the Lone Ranger was a hero. Zorro thrilled people with his good deeds. Gunsmoke (my favorite!) was a western tv series that featured many movie actors that went on to become famous in their later years. Great acting on that series. No fancy props or effects, just real character development and stories that went to the heart and imagination. (You can catch Gunsmoke on TV land channel. Worth watching, as is Lonesome Dove and currently Hell on Wheels!)
However, getting back to the fun of Frontier Town, there was plenty to be had. At one time, Powhatan (my older brother by 2 years) and I were given shetland ponies to ride and care for. That was great! We could recite, word for word, the entire taped programmed dialogue of all of the events. We knew all of the Western songs that were song. We played “rodeo” and hatched schemes with other employees children to be business typhoons (as Pow would say! LOL!) We were there to witness the development and growth of the town over a period of 14 years, and saw the creation and development of the various acts that would become the regular programming of the Frontier Town experience. There were so many memorable characters in real life! Including Mr. Arthur Benson, the visionary and owner of FT. He was a larger than life man, always busy, always thinking of ways to enrich the experience of FT. He would book engagements for my family to promote FT. It was scary riding in his station wagon to NYC. He would literally drive with one hand on the wheel…at 100 miles an hour. I’m not kidding! We were on television shows, in the Macy’s parade, on the Johnny Carson show – “Who Do You Trust” show, Captain Kangaroo, Magic Tom from Canada (a number of times – he was a nice man.) Lots more events and places.
Ok. I have to stop or I’ll be writing another story before I know it. I am not able to focus on that right now, but I will be writing some in-depth thoughts and adventures and opinions in the near future, so stay tuned. I will more than likely put my stories on my fb site or on the Frontier Town fb site.
By the way, I think the teepees that you see in the photos may have been from the Indian Village tourist attraction that was near Lake George. Also in Lake George was Ghost Town, Story Town, and Gaslight Village, plus the steam boat Minnehaha
I could go on and on with stories, but not right now. Check my fb site from time to time because I put my short stories in my notes. I am compiling my stories and may one day publish a book. I certainly have enough material! Please forgive me if I brought you down with the earlier paragraphs that I wrote, but I included them so that you could get a feel of what it was really like to work there as a Native person. Even with all of that, I have very fond memories of the people and times of Frontier Town, and made some amazing connections with some of the tourists that would return year after year. They liked the fun and adventure. And they especially liked that in the midst of all of the pretend, there were real people with hearts and warmth and compassion. My family was quite popular because we were ourselves. On top of that my parents were larger than life and charismatic. Irresistible personalities. Pow and I were just caught up in the wake of their waves. Lucky us! Well, we made our share of friends among the tourists as well. One just found me on facebook last week! She had a picture of us together at Frontier Town
The people who worked at FT back then were really committed to doing their best and playing their parts to the hilt, so that people would have good memories in their childhoods. We were very dear friends with Clarence Canary, the Hanneford family, the Millais family, Evelyn Clark, the Corys, the Odells, the Besseys, Percy Flemming, Joe Java, Evelyn Clark, and so many others. Lena Stillwell. June Hillman, Sandy McCasland. The Sharpe Family. Joe Evans, Margaret (Ovensen), Dick and Jan Olsen, the Medfords, so many people in our Frontier Town family. Many of them have passed on, including my parents and my sister. To them I send my greetings and my thanks for their caring and their love.
Have good holidays, Everyone! Sincerely, Matoaka Little Eagle
Thank you so much for sharing your story!
Matoka,
I couldn’t find your Facebook page, but I have one. I have a great pic of your father and a cute little anecdote about him. Please contact me.
Enjoyed the post from Makoakta. I was employed the summer of ’72 as a cowboy in the rodeo & cavalry. Great time. Great memories. As Swift
Eagle would say. . . Caaarry On!
MY NAME IS HUBERT HENDRIE, AND I KNEW YOU BACK IN THE MID 50′S AT FRONTIER TOWN…..SWIFTY WAS A GREAT FRIEND OF MINE AND THE LAST TIME I SAW HIM WAS ABOUT THE SUMMER OF 1977. HE TOLD ME THE SAD STORY ABOUT YOUR SISTER “SINGING EAGLE” WHOM I KNEW AND DATED A FEW TIMES…..REMEMBER THE BOAT RIDE IN THAT SMALL BOAT ?????? ALMOST SANK THE BOAT WITH ALL YOU KIDS IN IT AND “SQUAKING HAWk’ AND I……..WOULD YOU HAVE A PICTURE OF YOUR SISTER THAT YOU WOULD SHARE WITH ME….SEND TO …..HHENDRIE@AOL.COM……THANKS A BUNCH
I was browsing through your web site and I came accross Frontier Town. I went there as a kid in 1966 and back in the mid 70′s and bought a stetson. I kept it all those years it’s at least 36 years old. I’ve e-mailed you 2 pics and you can clearly see that it came from Frontier Town I bought it in the 70′s with my minuscule economy at the time at the western outfitters where the gift shop was. It’s a shame that the place is closed and left to abandonment today because I would have brought my husband to visit it because as a kid he never visited places like that.
Frontier Town was built by my great-uncle, Arthur Bensen. How sad to see what has become of it since he sold it and retired, and later passed on.