Have you ever visited a friend at Lake Place Condos in Danbury? Maybe you live there? If you do, you sleep right where a popular amusement park used to be.

The Lake Place Condos are on the shores of Lake Kenosia. This was the site of one the biggest attractions in CT for 30+ years, called the Lake Kenosia Amusement Park.

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Every Tuesday morning, we do a feature on the Ethan and Lou Show called "The Place You Live" featuring Mike Allen. Mike gives us an in depth look at the rich history in our area and Tuesday's (5/11/21) segment was all about CT's Amusement Parks, specifically Danbury's Lake Kenosia Park.

Mike taught us a lot about the attraction, these are some fun facts about Lake Kenosia Amusement Park:

  • The Danbury & Bethel Street Railway Company owned and operated CT's shortest electrified trolley system.
  • They devised a plan to boost revenue, build an amusement park in Danbury, CT.
  • The company bought 12 acres of land on the Lake Kenosia shores and extended their electrified trolley line to Kenosia.
  • The 12 acres became Lake Kenosia Amusement Park in 1895 and the park sat where the Lake Place Condos are today.
  • The park featured a gas powered carousel, wooden roller coaster and a 1,000 seat open-air performance center.
  • The Danbury & Bethel Street Railway Company also built a crown jewel on the property known as the Kenmere Resort Hotel. The hotel was a magnificent three story Victorian style building.
  • Lastly, the Amusement Park featured the Montgomery a 30 seat steamboat brought in from Norwalk. The Montgomery became problematic because it was far too big for Lake Kenosia. Legend has it that the boat sunk and sits at the bottom of Lake Kenosia today.
  • The beginning of the end for the Amusement Park came in 1926. A hideous raging fire destroyed the Kenmere Hotel. In 1927, Danbury's attention shifted to the brand spanking new Candlewood Lake. The combination of the introduction of Candlewood Lake and the fire at the Kenmere diminished popularity to a point of no return.

Stories like this are not uncommon in the Greater-Danbury area. Our home is filled with rich exciting history and there is only one radio show where you can learn new information just like this, I-95.

Every Tuesday morning, the Ethan and Lou Show welcomes Mike Allen to the studio to present "The Place You Live" in two segments at 8:20 and 8:50 am. Don't miss next week's episode where Mike will give us a time machine look at our local area during the Jurassic Period.

LOOK: 100 years of American military history

 

Danbury Man Shares His UFO Eyewitness Story and Photos

Everyone has a story to tell and some are more interesting than others. Recently, I was contacted by a Danbury man who had read an article I’d written about UFO’s and he wanted to tell me his story and share his photos.
 
From the opening sentence, I knew it was a story I wanted to hear and the pictures were even more intriguing. This is a UFO story from a Danbury man named Bill Salvador, in his own words. 

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