Sharing a family life in the 1930s near the legendary Palisades Amusement Park, a family of dreamers explores ambitions and cultural boundaries that are challenged by the realities of the Great Depression, multiple wars, and the park's eventual closing in 1971.

With its two hundred pages and a foreword by the legendary Cousin Bruce Morrow, this oversized coffee table book captures every fond memory of the famous New Jersey fun spot: the vinegar-soaked french fries, the Tunnel of Love, the world's largest outdoor salt water pool, and so much more. This newly revised edition includes an all new Photo Scrapbook with over 100 new photographs. In the foreword of the book, Cousin Brucie recalls, "Palisades was an integral part of our lives. Anybody who has played, visited, or been touched by this magical kingdom retains the glow from a very special relationship." For those who ever visited Palisades Amusement Park, this book is sure to bring back those cherished remembrances. And for those never lucky enough to have entered its colorful gates, Palisades Amusement Park: A Century of Fond Memories will recreate the thrills, laughter and joy that was Palisades.

How the famous and not-so-famous like-minded citizens all gave their time, expertise, and money to build a park legacy of incomparable benefit The Palisades park and historic site system in New York and New Jersey is a significant anchor-point for the spread of national and state parks across the nation. The challenge to protect these treasures began with a brutal blast of dynamite in the late nineteenth century and continues to this day. Palisades: The People’s Park presents the story of getting from zero protected acres to the rich tapestry that is today’s Palisades park system, located in the nation’s most densely populated metropolitan region. This is an account of huge determination, moments of crisis, caustic resistance to the very idea of conservation, glorious philanthropy, a steep learning curve, and responsibilities for guardianship passed with care from one generation to the next. Despite the involvement of men of great wealth and fame from its earliest beginnings, the Palisades Interstate Park Commission faced an early and ongoing struggle to arrange financial support from both the New York and New Jersey state governments for a park that would cross state lines. The conflicts between developers and conservationists, industrialists and wilderness enthusiasts, with their opposing views regarding the uses of natural resources required the commissioners of the PIPC to become skilled negotiators, assiduous fundraisers, and savvy participants in the political process. The efforts to create Palisades Interstate Park was prodigious, requiring more than 1,000 real estate transactions to establish Sterling Forest, to save Storm King Mountain, to preserve Lake Minnewaska, to protect Stony Point Battlefield and Washington’s headquarters, to open Bear Mountain and Harriman state parks, and to add the other sixteen parks to the Palisades Interstate Park System. Beginning with the efforts of Elizabeth Vermilye of the New Jersey Federation of Women’s Clubs, who enlisted President Theodore Roosevelt’s support to stop the blasting and quarrying of Palisades rock, author Robert Binnewies traces the story of the famous, including J. P. Morgan, the Rockefellers, and the Harrimans, as well as the not-so-famous men and women whose donations of time and money led to the preservation of New York and New Jersey’s most scenic and historic lands. The park experiment, begun in 1900, still stands as a dynamic model among the nation’s major environmental achievements.

The Palisades neighborhood, in the extreme western corner of Washington, D.C., lies on the Maryland side of the Potomac River at Little Falls. Its history and landscape are inextricably linked to the river. George Washington, as president of the Patowmack Company, determined that a skirting canal was necessary to navigate around the rapids at Little Falls. Later, the skirting canal was replaced by the C&O Canal. Nowadays the river and the canal are used for
recreational sports, and the Capital Crescent Trail, formerly a railroad bed used to bring coal in from West Virginia, is a haven for dog-walkers, bike-riders, and joggers. But despite this constant flow of people and the current pressure for development, the Palisades maintains a stable residential population and enjoys a friendly, small-town atmosphere.

Palisades Parks original settlers were the Ashkineshacky Indians, a tribe of the Lenni-Lenape Nation. The borough was incorporated on March 22, 1899, and a month later its first mayor, John S. Edsall, was sworn into office. Advancements in transportation and its small-town character enticed many New York City families to relocate to the beautiful undeveloped land, sparking massive growth. Today Palisades Park remains a progressive community. Its small-town character has been enjoyed by generations of residents and will continue for generations ahead. Palisades Park chronicles the boroughs development from the 19th through the 20th century, highlighting the people and public servants who have made Palisades Park the prosperous suburb it is today.

New Jersey's Palisades Interstate Park was created in 1900 to preserve the majestic Palisades of the Hudson River from being defaced by massive stone quarries. In the generations since its creation, it has served as an oasis of beauty, recreation, and tranquility in the midst of one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country. The park has an archive of over 3,000 images of the Palisades. Photographs show the area decades before the park's creation and through the 1930s and 1940s, when thousands sought recreation as an escape from hard times during the Great Depression and World War II and hundreds of men worked in the park for New Deal agencies.