Thursday, November 4, 2021

The evolution, death, and resurrection of Hugh Mongous.

An old postcard I have, featuring the earliest Hugh Mongous (the mascot). At the time he was standing guard over Jungle Falls.

In his seminal late '7os, early '8os days. Hugh was pantless, and a pretty realistic recreation of a gorilla.

But at some point, Hugh was partially clothed, and the park name was changed to Wildwater Rapids. During this era, Hugh was inexplicably torched, and then replaced with a full-on anthropomorphic character..

Even after the park went thru a second rebranding (as Ocean Breeze), I was still unawarely referring to the park as Jungle Falls. But I was reminded of it in a surprisingly random Zippy comic (property of Bill Griffith) I saw (I think in the LA Weekly, or LA Times). It was a cool reference to Virginia Beach..


contact- nat.rain@gmail.com (send me old Jungle Falls photos if you got 'em.)