Midsummer Issue 2023

Hundreds Take Part in a Salute to
Bertrand Island Park
8
Story by MICHAEL DAIGLE
Photos by Karen Fucito
The land doesn’t seem big enough.
A driver today passes the wall of condos
that line both sides of Bertrand Island on the
way to the spit of land with its quaint lake homes
and the Lake Hopatcong Yacht Club.
Takes less than five minutes.
But for the more than 300 fans of Bertrand
Island Park who gathered July 13 in the parish
center at St. Jude Roman Catholic Church in
Hopatcong, that trip took a lifetime. The old
park was the touchstone of the easy days of their
youth, a first kiss, first boyfriend or girlfriend,
their transition into a working life and a chance
to recall that aroma, that sound, that thing that
has always stuck with them.
Forty years after the park closed.
For David Maresca, it was the smell of fresh
popcorn.
“Every year. That’s what told me I was there,”
he said.
So, for a few hours at the Salute to Bertrand
Island Park event, fans filled the church hall with
the ding of the Criss Cross pinball game and the
clatter of the Hi-Ball, while taking in the aroma
of fresh popcorn, hot dogs and hamburgers.
There was also cotton candy and ice cream and
attendees reveling in the plain old-fashionedness
of it all.
It was beside the point that the event—which
was sponsored by the Lake Hopatcong Historical
Museum—recalled the 40th anniversary of the
park’s closing in 1983. This July night was about
celebrating the founders, the vendors, the
LAKE HOPATCONG NEWS Midsummer 2023
families, the guests and the spirit of the park that
drew thousands of visitors each year.
It is nearly impossible to measure the
importance of Bertrand Island Park because
it is impossible to measure the importance of
memories and dreams.
Three separate Facebook pages dedicated to
the old park have more than 20,000 members.
Maresca, who administers the page “I went to
Bertrand Island Amusement Park,” with 16,000
members, said memories vary from person to
person.
It could be a favorite ride, food or their first
job, he said.
For Donna Lohmeyer, daughter and
granddaughter of park concessionaires, it was
trying to sleep as a 3-year-old in the family’s
bungalow that was built under the roller coaster
or walking the grounds collecting glass Kelly soda
bottles.
“All the vendors sold Kelly,” she said. “The
bottles had a deposit, so we had to collect them.
It was territorial, so we had to be careful not to
cross over the line.”
She recalled her 4-year-old self returning to
the family stall with small armloads of bottles.
“They didn’t give me a basket,” she said.
Arno Paessler leaned into the Mutoscope
machine with one hand extended over the
opening to block the glare of the sunlight.
The film showed the 1937 crash of the airship
Hindenburg.
“Oh, the humanity,” Paessler, called out,
echoing the famous radio broadcast of the
disaster.
For Paessler, the park was one of the attractions
of living on Lake Hopatcong.
Clockwise from left: Evelyn (Craney)
Constantine and Al Cuda enjoy a taste of cotton
candy, just like when they were kids. Visitors
stop to look at a banner showing the original
park entrance. Nancy (Donofrio) Webster
watches a video presentation. Rick Scherr
wrote about his first kiss for the memory box.
Vicki D’Agostino enjoys a moment during
the video presentation. EJ Wood and Wendy
Walter enjoy a turn at the Hi-Ball game as
Tommy Donofrio looks on. Bruce Feakins is
at the front of a long line with two ice cream
sundaes. Ken Rybka and Mary Voelker take a
turn at the Criss Cross pinball machine.
As a young teen, he had a long-nosed boat.
He said he and his friend would camp out in the
boat near Raccoon Island. “It was long enough
for us to slip right under the bow to sleep,” he
said.
In the morning, they would motor over to
Bertrand Island, he said.
Nearby, Margaret Hipwell accepted a nickel
from Tom Donofrio, whose family shared
ownership of the park until 1978.
Hipwell slipped the coin into the Criss Cross
pinball machine, popped out a silver ball and
sent it rolling across the game, bouncing off
bumpers that lit up, off rubber-banded borders
and flipping the ball back out to score more
points.
“Ah,” she muttered, smiling when the ball
slipped down a side chute. “I was better at Skee-
Ball,” she said.
Donofrio said he made sure the owner of the
arcade didn’t sell the pinball machine to anyone
else.
“The arcade held a pinball tournament every
summer,” he said. “The championship game was
played on the Criss Cross.”
Bob Drexler, wearing a baseball cap festooned
with pins celebrating veterans, surveyed the
room. His memory of Bertrand Island Park was