Monday, June 11, 2007

LAKE OF THE OZARKS, MO - DOGPATCH VILLAGE

Back in the 1940's most people who were regular funny paper readers were big fans of Al Capp’s Li’l Abner and this included Walter and Ada Tietmeyer. Shortly after moving to the Lake of the Ozarks, the Tietmeyers started a thriving tourist trap with a hillbilly theme and appropriately named it Dogpatch. Actually, it started out as the Dogpatch Café in 1947 and as Walter kept adding more buildings and unique oddities, it eventually became Dogpatch Village in the 1950's.

For six decades Dogpatch has entertained many generations of families with hillbilly novelties and kooky attractions. Some of the attractions from the past included a reptile garden, a real African lion, miniature automaton logging village with Paul Bunyan, an educated chicken, frog band, an authentic Ozark cabin, giant Redwood log, coin-op fortune teller, elephant skull, outhouse with a rude hillbilly, a rocket ship, player piano, talking hillbilly greeter, magic water faucet and a giant hillbilly (muffler man) statue.

To help celebrate Dogpatch’s 60th anniversary, I’ve included some vintage postcards and other related items.

This wonderful tourist attraction is still open and if you ever find yourself at the Lake of the Ozarks, be sure to visit Dogpatch.

Click on the scans for a closer look!















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5 comments:

  1. Anonymous3:28 PM

    Oh my gosh those pictures bring back such memories. I wish it looked the same now. Thanks for helping with a trip down memory lane.

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  2. gpence613:17 PM

    Agreed. I spent about 7-8 summers in the 1970's in the Lake of the Ozarks and each year included a trip to Dogpatch! Go carts were my favorite, but I always remember feeding the large mouth bass off of the docks there too. Heck, we paid 5-10 cents for a hand full of dog food dispensed from a gum machine!

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  3. CTrax12:12 AM

    I was doing some research for exploration sites and came across this little article. This is a bit confusing, because the themepark Dogpatch USA (found in AR) was themed after the Li'l Abner comic strip. Are these connected?

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  4. Todd Franklin8:41 AM

    C Trax - There's no connection with the Lake of the Ozarks Dogpatch and Dogpatch USA. The one at the Lake is much older than Dogpatch USA.

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  5. Anonymous9:29 PM

    I too grew up going to Lake of the Ozarks as a kid. Very sad to know many of those things are just faded memories now. Dogpatch, Gold Nugget Junction, the water slides, the strip...sounds like most of it is gone :( Thank you for the trip down memory lane with these pictures

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