They smile in frozen, faded color photos from four decades back. Young people enjoying Thailand’s first theme park, built when the United States still fought in Vietnam, and Thailand endured great sacrifice to enter a new democratic age.
Happy Land, in those images, seemed to have lived up to its name. At least for a time. Then the dying started. One by one, children lost their lives. Some fell to their deaths from coasters. Some drowned on the boat ride. A few just vanished. And others, well, their disappearances led to the worst of whispered suspicions. Today, Happy Land is no more, but tales persist that some of the children who came to visit never left, and for those who listen carefully, can still be heard laughing, giggling and sometimes screaming.
Doomed from the start
Today, the name “Happy Land” can still be found at a junction and in the name of several businesses in Bang Kapi, near Lat Phrao and Nawamin roads. But few remember the place, and reliable information is difficult to come by. Much of what’s remembered lies somewhere between fact and folklore. However, when visiting its former site, it is difficult to imagine an amusement park there and the sound of children laughing through their first roller coaster ride.
Soon after Happy Land opened, a second theme park, Magic Land, opened its doors in 1975. Happiness carried on for families of modest means under Magic’s shadow, which was higher quality and drew larger crowds of wealthier children.
But Happy Land remained a sweet escape for low- to middle-class children in what was the city’s outskirts at the time. There were games, a ferris wheel, a roller coaster and haunted house.
Time passed. Maybe there were money problems, or poor maintenance. Before long the rides were no longer new and shiny. The accidents started happened. The children started dying.
Children left on the Magic Boat ride only to drown in its waters. Some blame inadequate safety for others who plunged to their young deaths from the heights of the coaster. Others were found dead, reportedly without clear cause. Strangely, no adults were killed. Only children.
As the body count continued, people began to believe the young spirits of the departed were to blame for the ongoing deaths. Why? Because they needed more friends to play with, it was said.
A place of death
Then the tragic happenings of Happy Land took an even darker twist. Children disappeared. Night searches turned up nothing. In the dawn of morning, their little bodies were found, sometimes missing pieces. But these were poor children, and according to the folklore, the park owner was desperate to conceal all of the accidents, deaths and murders to sustain the business.
To this day, no one knows who the killer or killers were, as no investigation was ever pursued. Families continued to arrive, unaware of the fact Happy Land had become a place many children had come to die.
As word spread and accidents continued, it eventually became impossible to conceal the truth. People immediately stopped visiting the cursed park. Happy Land didn’t remain open long after that, and although reliable information is difficult to come by, seems to have closed in September, 1979.
Many years passed and the land became the site of a fresh food market. Always bustling with people and activity, the noise and the chaos of the place have dispelled the juvenile wraiths and aura of fear. Now it just seems like any other busy, commercial area in the Thai capital.
But older locals say that appearance is deceptive. Late at night, some claim to hear the laughter and giggles sweeping by like on a phantom cart track. Sounds of children penetrating the night. But never anything to be found.
Today, some still believe the former site of Happy Land continues to be haunted by dead children, who do not realize they are dead because they perished in the middle of a joyful experience. The rides are long gone, but some locals say the children’s shades will continue to frolick until something convinces them it’s all over, that it’s and time to go home.
Information adapted from online sources, postings and discussions.
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