Lagoon: How the Freed Family Kept Utah’s Favorite Amusement Park Spinning for Three Generations

For generations of Utah kids, summer has a soundtrack: the clack of a wooden roller coaster climbing its first hill in Farmington. Lagoon is where Utahns go on school trips, first dates, youth group nights and family reunions. And for nearly 80 of its 140 years, it’s been run by one family.

A resort that lost its lake

Lagoon’s story starts in 1886, on the shore of the Great Salt Lake. The Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad built a resort there called Lake Park. There was just one problem: the lake kept receding. Within a few years, the park was surrounded by mud and far from the water, and it closed after the 1895 season.

Simon Bamberger, who was building a railroad between Salt Lake City and Ogden, saw a chance to give people a reason to ride his trains. He moved most of Lake Park’s buildings inland to Farmington, and Lagoon opened there in July 1896.

The coaster that started it all

In 1921, Lagoon added the ride that would become its signature: a wooden roller coaster designed by famed coaster builder John Miller. It stands 57 feet tall with about 2,500 feet of track, and more than a century later it’s still giving riders that rattling, floaty, old-school thrill. Coaster enthusiasts have named it a landmark.

The Freeds take over

Lagoon closed during World War II. In 1946, the Bamberger family leased the park to a new company formed by Ranch S. Kimball and Robert E. Freed, and the Freed family’s long run at Lagoon began. According to histories of the park, Robert Freed also opened Lagoon’s pool and ballroom to Black visitors by the end of the 1940s, ending a local policy that had kept them out.

Then disaster struck. On the night of November 14, 1953, a fire tore through the park, destroying the fun house, the dance pavilion and the front of the Roller Coaster, with damage put at more than half a million dollars. The family rebuilt, and the coaster reopened in 1954. In the decades since, dozens of new rides have followed, and the Freeds eventually bought the park outright.

Still a family business

Today Lagoon is run by the third generation of the Freed family, with family members leading most of the park’s management areas. “We are a family-run business built for families,” Julie Freed told KSL.

The park now has more than 50 rides and draws over a million visitors a year. Its lineup spans the decades: the 1921 Roller Coaster, the Pioneer Village of historic buildings the park brought in during the 1970s, Colossus the Fire Dragon, the launched coaster Wicked, the towering Cannibal, and Primordial. In 2026 it added Nutcracker, a giant swing that carries 40 riders up to about 150 feet.

How to do Lagoon right

• Ride the 1921 Roller Coaster. It’s a piece of Utah history, and it still delivers.
• Wander Pioneer Village. The old-west town of historic buildings is a nice break between thrill rides.
• Go for Frightmares. In October, weekend nights bring haunted attractions across the park.
• Check the calendar. The season runs from late March through the end of October, and operating days vary, so check before you go.

A lot of amusement parks have come and gone since 1886. Lagoon outlasted a vanishing lake, a war and a fire, and it’s still in family hands, which may be the best ride of all.

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This spotlight draws on the Utah History Encyclopedia, KSL, the Salt Lake Tribune, the Standard-Examiner and Lagoon’s own materials. Top photo: Ntsimp, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.