Charley Hustle
When he was just 13, Charley Wood bought a house for him and his parents. His memory of the place was pristine - “The house had a black walnut trim. My folks were so happy when we moved in - we loved that house. I was a little ball-buster”, he remembered. That turned out to be the least of Charley Wood’s accomplishments. An article in Reader’s Digest led him to Knott’s Berry Farm in California where he fell in love with theme parks. He came back to Lake George, NY, and, in 1954, Charley and his wife, Margaret, invested $75,000 on five acres on the east side of US 9 between Lake George and Glens Falls. They launched Storytown, USA, an amusement park themed on the Mother Goose rhymes. Just before its opening, Charley got cold feet. “I sat on the Mother Goose hill and cried. I thought, ‘What have I done? I’m not gonna have anybody pay and see what I’ve done.” Mother Goose Village, which has morphed into the gigantic Six Flags Great Escape, was a huge financial success and became a regional attraction. It remains so to this day. His imagination and drive made Charley wealthy, but he didn’t stop there.