Omaha Exploration

One of the more common requests that I get is for Moby Dick Water Slides. I can’t ever recall having gone there but many of you have fond memories so let’s dig in.

After operating a construction company and two different nightclubs, brothers Glen and Bob Petry decided to get into the water slide business with their mother Bessie. All three were from Council Bluffs but decided to open the park in the more populated city across the river. They purchased a six-acre parcel of land just south of the train tracks near 72nd and I-80. The family hired Donald E. Fry and Associates Inc, as the architects while doing the construction work themselves.

They settled on the name Moby Dick, inspired by the 1851 novel of Ahab, the boat captain obsessed with a white whale by the same name. First, they constructed a building that served as a ticket office, snack shop and game room. After that they went to work on each of the four slides. Standing 40-feet high, the slides twisted back, forth and around for 550-feet before landing in a three-foot pool at the bottom. Each of the slides were six feet wide and three feet deep and were different colors: red, yellow, blue and green. They were attention getters for passersby on the interstate. The slides used 400,000 gallons of water per minute while recycling water from the landing pool after going through a filtration and chlorination process. 

Sandwiched between the interstate and train tracks, getting to the park was always a bit challenging. Despite being located at 7505 D Street, visitors had to go to 84th and get on a frontage road and head east. On many occasions, kids were dropped off nearby where they would scale a fence to get to the park. 

Visitors had the option of paying 25-cents per slide or an all-day pass for $5 (those prices remained the same as late as 1989). Its hours of operation were from 10 AM to 10 PM every day. It proved to be quite successful with its busiest day after it opened in 1982 attracting 4,000 to 5,000 customers. 

The brothers unsuccessfully attempted to expand the park in 1989 by acquiring additional land for two more slides and an additional 50 parking stalls. In 1990, the park suffered some minor damage from a nearby weed fire that spread and damaged a wood deck on site.

For reasons unknown, the park closed after the 1991 season. It seems to have done so with very little fanfare. I didn’t find anything in the newspaper announcing its closure. Before the start of the 1992 season, its neighbor, American Linen Supply, acquired the property in order to expand its business. The water slides were removed shortly thereafter.

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