Cave Spawns Silver Dollar City, Family Theme Park, as Leader in Branson Tourism
by Randall Murphree
October 6, 2006
(AgapePress) - - When Jack Herschend and Sherry Nickel began courting in 1950 at Branson, Missouri's Marvel Cave, they could not have dreamed of the adventure life had in store for them. Jack talked his father, developer of the cave, into letting him leave college. He insisted he wanted to stay home and work with the crew, helping transform the new family venture, Marvel Cave, into a top-rate tourist attraction. The truth was, Jack hated to leave Sherry behind. But Dad relented.
"They gave me the job of tearing out the wooden stairs, and then bringing sacks of cement to the waterfall which is 505 feet below the surface," Jack remembers. "You just carry one sack down, and then go back up the stairs and get another sack, and do that all day long. College looked pretty good. After missing one semester, I went back to school."
Fortunately, the relationship flourished anyway. Just after Jack graduated, he and Sherry married in the Cathedral Room of Marvel Cave on June 26, 1954.
Hugo Herschend, Jack's father, a first-generation immigrant from Denmark, had a successful business career in Chicago. But his entrepreneurial nature led him to lease Marvel Cave April 1, 1950. He began improvements immediately to make it a more attractive mid-America tourist destination. Over the next few years, the family moved from Chicago and purchased 640 acres of land around the cave to maintain control of all approaches to the cave.
Marvel Cave was soon on the way to becoming a top regional attraction but still had a ways to go. Hugo Herschend's fatal heart attack in 1955 left his widow Mary, Jack and Sherry, and Jack's brother Pete (still in college) facing the decision of whether or not to proceed with the family enterprise. Not surprisingly, they decided to forge ahead with Hugo's dream. It was in their blood.
To retain the authentic sense of the Ozarks, they employed local residents to help develop the attraction and to serve the growing crowds. By 1959 they were hosting up to 600 adults daily.
Crowds kept growing, and the family began building an Ozark village near the entrance to the cave. It gave people something to do while they awaited the next Marvel Cave tour. The village was an authentic, working community that demonstrated crafts and lifestyles of the unique Ozark mountains in the 1880s.
Two reconstructed log structures and five other frontier-style buildings were opened to the public May 1, 1960. The Herschends named the park Silver Dollar City and, for years, gave change in silver dollars.
Those original buildings still form the heart of Silver Dollar City. And they still house crafts, demonstrate a working small Ozark farm, and provide a front-porch venue for authentic Ozark music. The Wilderness Church, one of the old log buildings, offers a peaceful place to sit and rest for awhile, even to worship.
In fact, the church could be symbolic of the Herschend family's earliest decisions regarding principles by which they would operate. The corporate mission statement says unapologetically that they will operate "in a manner consistent with Christian values and ethics."
Even so, the company is not a church, or even a parachurch organization. "The objective of this company today is not to bring people to the Lord," Pete Herschend said. "We are in the entertainment business and we work very, very hard to provide worthwhile entertainment."
And, sure enough, blooming and bustling all around the quiet oasis of history and tradition, a whirlwind of activity invites families to enjoy the latest in family theme park features - games, rides, concerts, the works. Just last summer, the Grand Exposition opened a new section of the complex with ten new family rides.
These days, the Herschend brothers and their wives, Sherry and JoDee, are committed to countless community, church and ministry endeavors. But after more than five decades at Silver Dollar City, they remain involved in its operation. Just can't get it out of their blood.
Randall Murphree, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is editor of AFA Journal, a monthly publication of the American Family Association. He visited Silver Dollar City near Branson, Missouri, over Labor Day weekend. This is the first in a five-part series of stories about the people behind Silver Dollar City. For more information on events, schedules and days of operation during the theme park's Christmas festival and other special events, call 800-831-4FUN or visit SilverDollarCity.com.
