OAKLAND — It is typical to see kids running around at Children’s Fairyland, the longstanding attraction at the city’s Lake Merritt, on a weekday afternoon. But instead, on Friday, a dedicated staff of adults were the ones scurrying around the amusement park.
Kymberly Miller, the park’s executive director since 2019, had a bowl of steel-cut oats with blueberries waiting for her — fuel to put the finishing touches on a milestone event just days away.
A parade to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Children’s Fairyland is planned for Labor Day on Monday, with the festivities starting at 19th Street BART Station and ending at the iconic destination at Grand and Bellevue avenues.
A number of new displays will await the kids attending with accompanying adults, including circus acts, a live performance by DJ Lance Rock from Nickelodeon’s Nick Jr. network and the park’s first-ever bilingual puppet show, Tío Conejo’s Big Wish.
The whimsical park’s anniversary, a testament to Oakland’s cultural flavor and community investment, is also simply a “flex,” as Miller puts it.
“The reason I think Fairyland endures is that it’s got this through line that appeals to everyone,” she explained. “The minute you walk through the gates, you feel the simplicity of entering a different universe, leaving behind whatever world you had on your shoulders.”
“Everything is built in a child-sized point of view,” Miller continued. “As an adult, you’re following your little person around as their imagination grows and changes with these storybook themes.”
The sensory experience of being a child, those first interactions with the physical world, is often what Fairyland’s ardent fans bring up when they reflect on their relationship to the park.
It stands out in a world that increasingly has become digitized, where even a McDonald’s in Tennessee went viral because its play place had no slides or ball pits, but rather two chairs facing tablet screens mounted on a wall.
The estimated 220,000 visitors at the Oakland park each year has counted City Councilmember Carroll Fife, who would bring her home-schooled kids there on Fridays. Fife recalled how they moved through “open spaces where their imaginations would go wild.”
As the councilmember who represents the 10-acre park, Fife knows first-hand Fairyland’s challenges — years of deferred maintenance on the nonprofit’s weathered facilities. It could use an improved front gate, seating for people with disabilities and new piping.
Surviving another 75 years will require completion of a long-term sustainability plan currently in the works, said Karen Boyd, a member of the park’s board of directors.
“What Fairyland needs most is a community who believes in its magic,” Boyd said of the outdoor park whose lawns require regular maintenance.
Longtime park enthusiasts are quick to run off classic tidbits of the park’s legacy, recalling how its rides and retellings of Northern European fairytales helped inspire Walt Disney as he explored creating his own amusement park.
June 14, 1951 - Child-sized flags presented to Children's Fairyland by the Daughters of the American Revolution and Native Sons of the Golden West are raised by members of Brownie Troop No. 191. (Leo Cohen / Oakland Tribune)Teagan Davis, 3, of Fresno, rides the Merry-Go-Round while attending the Fairy Winterland event at Children’s Fairyland in Oakland, Calif., on Thursday, Dec. 30, 2021. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)Hence then, the article about oakland s cherished amusement park children s fairyland turns 75 can it go 75 years more was published today ( ) and is available on mercury news ( Middle East ) The editorial team at PressBee has edited and verified it, and it may have been modified, fully republished, or quoted. You can read and follow the updates of this news or article from its original source.
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