Negative-G - Santa's Village Amusement Park

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Santa's Village Amusement Park, East Dundee, IL

Growing up in the Chicago area Santa's Village in East Dundee has always held a special place in my heart.

Back in the 1970's when I grew up there were literally amusement parks everywhere. There was Old Chicago and Marriott's (now Six Flags) Great America for big theme park thrills. Mostly targeting families there was Dispensa's Kiddy Kingdom, Kiddieland, Adventureland, Fairyland, Funtown, and Santa's Village.

Out of all of those small parks that I grew up with Santa's Village was by far the best of the batch. Instead of rides in a parking lot or strewn out in a field like most of those parks when you went to Santa's Village it was special. As special as it was back fifty years ago it still shines because the park never tried to be anything other than a nice little theme park that's geared to kids.

Santa's Village began in 1959 as the third of a chain of Santa's Village Parks opened by a gentleman named Glenn Holland. Years before Six Flags decided to make a chain of parks Glenn decided to built a chain of Santa's Villages across the United States. He began in California with two parks there before expanding east to the distant Chicago suburb of East Dundee to create the flagship park in his chain.

Santa's Village doesn't have the most dramatic entrance as guests walk almost straight into the Polar Dome Ice Skating Rink. In 1963, four years after Santa's Village opened its doors they shoehorned in this indoor skating rink to be able to make money off of the site during the long cold off season.

Instead of walking into the Polar Dome just take a right once you have entered into Santa's Village and you will walk right to the big guy's house.

Guests get to go visit Santa Claus is his own house while outside sits a frozen pole of "actual North Pole ice" that you get to touch. Just a quick warning in this post-covid world touching the North Pole ice might not be the most advisable but if you do and survive whatever lives on there chances are you will be invulnerable to pretty much everything.