By Maureen Callahan
Locals with very long memories remember that sometimes, rides were actually six for a dollar, depending on the weekly Tribune ads. Chicagoland area kids sang along with the catchy ads for Kiddie Kingdom on the radio while riding around town in their parents’ station wagons. The clean, reasonably priced amusement park was the toast of the town for kids from 1975-1984.
There are always a few standout memories from childhood. For kids who grew up in the western suburbs, Kiddie Kingdom is one of them.
The small amusement park spawned from Dispensa’s Castle of Toys, a huge, 80,000 square-foot toy store located on Route 83 at Butterfield, at the north end of Oakbrook Center. It was a Bavarian-looking palace with turrets and a drawbridge, flanked by life-sized toy soldiers. The business – the world’s largest independently owned toy store at the time – was also Mattel toy company’s biggest account for the years it was operational and one of the top retailers of Lionel Trains.
In 1975, rides were added to the vacant lot next to the castle, a few at a time. The carousel, Tilt-o-Whirl, Octopus, Scrambler, a train that followed a one-mile track, and, of course, a Ferris wheel were among the original attractions.
The Ferris wheel was Kiddie Kingdom’s signature ride and the beginning of the story. Kiddie Kingdom owners Joe, John and Paul Dispensa made a business of having fun. But it didn’t start with them. The brothers had grown up in Dispensa’s Amusements, a traveling carnival business started by their father, Nick Dispensa, an Italian immigrant.
As a young man in 1918, Nick joined a traveling circus as a musician. He noticed that the Ferris wheel man made all the money.
The next year, Nick and his uncle purchased their first Ferris wheel for $3,000. They moved it from town to town on a horse-drawn wagon with the circus. When the Great Depression came, ride manufacturers such as Eli Bridge in Jacksonville, IL, were unable to sell their rides. The Dispensas made deals to buy rides at no money down and pay the company back as they went. Years into the endeavor, Joe, along with brothers John and Paul, all worked the business together.
They patented a labor-saving device to easily disassemble and move carnival rides and game booths via trailer. Later, they gave the patent to Eli Bridge in gratitude for helping them get established in their early years.
In the beginning, the brothers joined together with other local owners of single rides to form a unit for hire. By the 40s, Dispensa’s Amusements had evolved into a full carnival company, sometimes hosting carnivals at three different locations a week. Community groups, schools, and churches hired Dispensa’s to entertain and raise funds for service organizations such as the Jaycees.
The leftover toys used as carnival game prizes during the season were sold at a small store in Hinsdale, above which the family lived. That business led to the beginning of the Oakbrook Terrace (then Elmhurst) toy castle in 1967. Eight years later, as Joe and his brothers approached retirement age, they decided to give their carnivals a permanent home. Kiddie Kingdom was born as their rides found a new home on the empty lot adjacent to the castle.
For the next nine years, Kiddie Kingdom was the last word in fun for west suburban kids. The amusement park averaged 5,000 birthday parties a season in the early 80s.
The Dispensa Family loved their customers and were known to do extraordinary things for them. One Christmas Eve, a father assembling his son’s train set panicked when he realized he was short a few pieces of track. “We lived next door to the castle, so my Dad ran over and opened the store in the middle of the night so the guy could get the parts he needed,” relayed Phil Dispensa, one of Joe’s sons. “Luckily, the phone number for the toy store also rang in my parents’ home. That’s how my parents were – anything to get a smile from the customer.”
Phil’s mother, Florence, was like everybody’s other grandmother. When she walked around the park, she was known to slip another ride ticket into a crying child’s hand who had already exhausted their supply. To her, seeing the little ones happy was its own reward.
The mid-80s saw land become more valuable and patriarchs age out of the business. With each of the sons following their own career path, the Dispensa brothers sold the land to developers in 1984. The rides and other carnival novelties sold at auction. “Watching my family’s business be auctioned off was like being at a funeral,” Phil recalled. “For months after, people called my parents’ phone number looking for any souvenir of Kiddie Kingdom. My dad tried to accommodate all of them.”
Today, the modern looking Oakbrook Terrace Tower stands where Kiddie Kingdom once stood. The developers named the road leading up to the tower Castle Drive in honor of this memorable place.
The magic of childhood is only as far away as the rearview mirror. For those of us kids at heart, the music of the carousel and smell of popcorn will always remain somewhere in our memories.
