Maple Leaf Village
| Location | Niagara Falls, Ontario, Canada |
|---|---|
| Opened | May 1979 |
| Closed | 1993 |
Coordinates: 43°05′30″N 79°04′20″W / 43.091668°N 79.072165°W
Maple Leaf Village is a former amusement park and entertainment complex in Niagara Falls, Ontario. Opened in May 1979 it was operated by Conklin Shows (operators of the midway at the Toronto Canadian National Exhibition). Falling on hard economic times in the early 1990s, it was restructured and replaced with Casino Niagara, a government run casino.
In the early 1900s, the land was host to Frontier Amusement Park, which boasted one of Canada's first all-steel roller coasters. By 1910, the amusement park was abandoned and dismantled.
Known today for their manufacture of fine silverware, the Oneida Community Plate Corporation Ltd. constructed their local corporate offices here by the 1940s. It was decided in the 1960s to construct an observation tower with a view of the falls from their north side. (The Seagram Tower, now the Konica Minolta Tower, had been constructed in 1962 with a view from the south side). Billed as the area's first open-steel observation tower, it was opened for business by the 1964 tourist season. This tower was known as the Oneida Tower, and eventually as "Kodak Tower
When Oneida relocated their offices in the late 1970s, York Hannover Developments Ltd. and Wost Holdings Ltd. invested $26 million in the creation of an amusement park concept, after the site was cleared. Its initial annual payroll was $3 million. The park pre-dated by two years the opening of Canada's Wonderland, presumed at that point to cost $105 million when completed.
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