Ramona Park

In the 1880s the Grand Rapids Street Railway Company began developing a trolley park at the end of its line at Reeds Lake. In 1886 a Grand Rapids newspaper held a naming contest for the park. A half-dozen judges selected the winning name, “Ramona,” after the heroine of Helen Hunt Jackson’s novel of the same name. In 1897 the company built a theater pavilion that was also named Ramona. It hosted thespians, operettas, dancing troupes, Vaudeville acts, and movies. Popular amusement park attractions included a Ferris wheel, a carousel, a miniature railway, bumper cars, a fun house, and the “Jack Rabbit Derby Racer,” a double-tracked roller coaster. Roller skaters enjoyed the rink at the Ramona Gardens dance pavilion, where big bands also performed. The twenty-acre park was roughly bounded by Wealthy Street, Lovett Avenue, and Lakeside Drive. This is the last section of iron fence that surrounded Ramona Park. For many residents of West Michigan—including President Gerald R. Ford, who recalled Babe Ruth and the New York Yankees playing a Grand Rapids minor league baseball team at Ramona Ball Park—the park was a place for fond memories that included hot-air balloon ascensions on Sunday afternoons and steamboat trips around Reeds Lake. By the late 1940s, new entertainment options and a declining need for public transportation decreased park attendance. Desiring a new use for the area, the community called for the park’s removal. Its last season was in 1954. That December, East Grand Rapids citizens passed a referendum to rezone the park for apartments and a shopping center. The Poisson family’s steamer Ramona, an iconic park feature, toured Reeds Lake one final time in late August 1955.