Negative-G - Hersheypark 2015

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The Sooper Dooper Looper Rollercoaster at Hersheypark, Hershey, Pennsylvania

A year before Sooper Dooper Looper took the world for a loop the Old Chicago Theme Park and Shopping Center opened a few miles away from my families suburban Chicago house on Dover Street in Romeoville, IL. As Old Chicago was being constructed I got my first taste of how insanely cool coasters are as I had the chance to craw over, under and all around the lead car for the Chicago Loop coaster. From that moment on I was hooked and whenever the word "coaster" popped up in the news, from my mouths of my parents or relatives I was all attention raptly listening or watching for anything about coasters to fill my four year olds mind.

I was stricken with "coaster fever" and there was no going back.

With theme parks and roller coasters exploding across the American landscape in the 1970's every city was building something new and amazing coasters were everywhere. You couldn't avoud coasters with music like the Ohio Players song "Love Rollercoaster" in the movies you could watch "Rollercoaster" or "The Fury" and on television as well with apperances on "Wonder Woman" or the horrible made for TV movie "KISS Meets The Phantom Of The Park" and stricken with "coaster fever" I soaked it all in with a big grin on my face.

With all that in mind when an apperance of the Sooper Dooper Looper at a park I had never heard of called HersheyPark was teased on a promo for some news show I was there in front of our 17 inch color Zenith television ready to throw my arms up and see the ride in action.

Looking back I can still see the report in my head The lifestyle reporter was there to scream and freak out on what was this unbelievably huge and frightening coaster what was pushing the bounds of what people can take. You could substitute The Sooper Dooper Looper for any coaster between then and now and the report is the same.

What is fun to think about is back in 1977 turning upside down was the new big thing and a seventy-five foot tall coaster like Sooper Dooper Looper was extreme. Even though it is dwarfed by the rides of today Sooper Dooper Looper is still a hell of a ride.