Codona's Amusement Park
Codona's Amusement Park is an amusement park located in Aberdeen, Scotland. Established by the Codona family in 1970, it continues to operate under family management.
The park is located on Beach Boulevard at Aberdeen Beach, adjacent to the Queens Links, on the coast of the North Sea.
History
Codona family
Francesco Codoni, a Swiss-Italian national from the Ticino region next to the Northern Italian border, immigrated to Scotland in the 1790s. Codoni's descendants worked in circuses throughout Europe, but the majority remained in Scotland.Throughout the 19th century, the family toured Scotland with various circus acts. Francesco Codoni's grandson, Henry Codona, founded the trapeze act "The Flying Codonas". The act was featured in various films, including Varieté. The circus film The [Greatest Show on Earth (film)|The Greatest Show on Earth] mentions both the Codonas and Costellos as prominent circus families.
Alfredo Codona, a trapeze artist from the family who lived in the United States, died in 1937 after shooting his former wife, Vera Bruce, and then taking his own life, following the earlier death of his second wife.
Once the Industrial Revolution hit the 1860s, the Scotland-based Codonas purchased steam-powered fairground rides and toured as John Codona's Pleasure Fairs, running it until 1960.
Amusement park
Alfred Codona took charge of the Aberdeen beachfront amusement park, which eventually became today's Codona's Amusement Park. By the 1970s, the number of visitors began to decline, but the park remained viable due to a combination of relatively low unemployment in the area, the beach's attraction, local support from the people of Aberdeen, and contributions from UK holidaymakers.In February 2022 it was reported that the amusement park had suffered a loss of £4.5 million due to the COVID-19 lockdown in [the United Kingdom].