{"id":739,"date":"2009-09-30T14:03:54","date_gmt":"2009-09-30T19:03:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/columbiaclosings.com\/wordpress\/?p=739"},"modified":"2017-06-16T02:22:15","modified_gmt":"2017-06-16T06:22:15","slug":"the-myrtle-beach-pavilion-ocean-boulevard-30-september-2006","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/columbiaclosings.com\/wordpress\/?p=739","title":{"rendered":"The Myrtle Beach Pavilion, Ocean Boulevard: 30 September 2006"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nPAVILION AND MIDWAY.
\nMYRTLE BEACH, SOUTH CAROLINA
\n\"AMERICA'S FINEST STRAND\"
\n670 Miles South of New York
\n735 Miles North of Miami
\nHome of Miss Universe Pageant of South Carolina
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OK, today is an anniversary of sorts. Three years ago today was the final day of operation for the Myrtle Beach Pavilion. As it happens, I was there, and made a video essay to share with friends and family. The fact of doing that, and not really having any good forum for something like that was one of the things that started percolating around in my brain and eventually led to establishing Columbia Closings<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Below is the essay pretty much unchanged from how I wrote it then, followed by a lot of still pictures (too many, I'm sure) that I took on that day and earlier in the year:<\/p>\n

Last Ride at the Myrtle Beach Pavilion, 30 September 2006<\/H1><\/center><\/p>\n

\nWe didn't actually go to the Pavilion that often as kids, so the closing
\nshouldn't be that big a deal, but we always knew that there was the
\npossibility<\/i> that we might<\/i> go, and that possibility loomed large in our minds.\n<\/p>\n

In the end, Burroughs & Chapin is a business, and they made a business decision to shut the Pavilion down. That said, they actually did it in a classy way. For the Last Ride<\/b> celebration on Saturday September 30 2006, they presold tickets, each of which came with park access from 3PM to 8PM, free parking, and unlimited free pizza, burgers, corndogs, funnel cake and ice cream.\n<\/p>\n

\nAs I happened to be at the beach at the time, I reserved a ticket and took a CVS disposable video camera (as well as my regular film camera, and a disposable film camera) to record some last memories.\n<\/p>\n

\nThis page is devoted to the short videos I shot that day. I have converted the DVD which CVS gives you into an AVI file for each scene. While these files are not huge<\/i> (except for the all-in-one file), you may not be able to stream them unless you have a fast connection. If clicking your left button on a picture does not start your movie player, or if the clip plays jerkily, I recommend clicking your right button over each picture and selecting \"save target as\" or the equivalent to download the clips. They should be playable with Windows Media Player on Windows, or \"mplayer\" on Linux.\n<\/p>\n

\nWe start off on the roof of the Pavilion parking garage, looking out at the roller coaster and other rides:<\/p>\n