Dante's Inferno was a

dark ride A dark ride—or ghost train when horror themed—is an indoor amusement ride on which passengers aboard guided vehicles travel through specially lit scenes that typically contain Animatronics, animation, sound, music and Special effect#Live spe ...

, Haunted attraction created in 1971 by Anton Schwarzkopf that was located at Astroland on

Coney Island Coney Island is a neighborhood and entertainment area in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bounded by Brighton Beach to its east, Lower New York Bay to the south and west, and Gravesend to ...

; a similar ride, Dante's Dungeon (originally also called Dante's Inferno), is at Morey's Piers in Wildwood, New Jersey. Dante's Inferno is decorated with a purple

Cerberus In Greek mythology, Cerberus ( or ; ''Kérberos'' ), often referred to as the hound of Hades, is a polycephaly, multi-headed dog that guards the gates of the Greek underworld, underworld to prevent the dead from leaving. He was the offspring o ...

in each tower, a

werewolf In folklore, a werewolf (), or occasionally lycanthrope (from Ancient Greek ), is an individual who can shapeshifting, shapeshift into a wolf, or especially in modern film, a Shapeshifting, therianthropic Hybrid beasts in folklore, hybrid wol ...

out of one window, and skeleton warriors in another, its exterior's centerpiece is a large

devil A devil is the mythical personification of evil as it is conceived in various cultures and religious traditions. It is seen as the objectification of a hostile and destructive force. Jeffrey Burton Russell states that the different conce ...

holding a victim in his hand that is connecting to the tongue of an upside-down, lolling eyed creature, and a

pitchfork A pitchfork or hay fork is an agricultural tool used to pitch loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves. It has a long handle and usually two to five thin tines designed to efficiently move such materials. The term is also applie ...

in the other. The ride's exterior resembles a castle, and its open area is decorated in graffiti style artwork including

Medusa In Greek mythology, Medusa (; ), also called Gorgo () or the Gorgon, was one of the three Gorgons. Medusa is generally described as a woman with living snakes in place of hair; her appearance was so hideous that anyone who looked upon her wa ...

's severed head held by a Grim Reaper, as well as a

mad scientist The mad scientist (also mad doctor or mad professor) is a stock character of a scientist who is perceived as "mad, bad and dangerous to know" or "insanity, insane" owing to a combination of unusual or unsettling personality traits and the unabas ...

and several

dragon A dragon is a Magic (supernatural), magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore of multiple cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in Western cultures since the Hi ...

s. The passenger rides in a bumper car-like device and is sent through a maze of dark hallways. Most of the interior imagery is behind glass cases, including a dead woman rising off a table, a shaking

mummy A mummy is a dead human or an animal whose soft tissues and Organ (biology), organs have been preserved by either intentional or accidental exposure to Chemical substance, chemicals, extreme cold, very low humidity, or lack of air, so that the ...

case Case or CASE may refer to: Instances * Instantiation (disambiguation), a realization of a concept, theme, or design * Special case, an instance that differs in a certain way from others of the type Containers * Case (goods), a package of relate ...

, two

gorilla Gorillas are primarily herbivorous, terrestrial great apes that inhabit the tropical forests of equatorial Africa. The genus ''Gorilla'' is divided into two species: the eastern gorilla and the western gorilla, and either four or five su ...

s, a

popping out from behind foliage, skeletons, and various other horrors, in particular, scenes of a violent and gruesome nature such as a

circular saw A circular saw or a buzz saw, is a power-saw using a toothed or Abrasive saw, abrasive disk (mathematics), disc or blade to cut different materials using a rotary motion spinning around an Arbor (tool), arbor. A hole saw and ring saw also use ...

dismemberment Dismemberment is the act of completely disconnecting and/or removing the limbs, skin, and/or organs from a living or dead being. It has been practiced upon human beings as a form of capital punishment, especially in connection with regicid ...

and a man bound on all four limbs begging for help. Suspense is built by relatively long passages of nothing but darkness, strobes that simulate lightning, and

sound effects A sound effect (or audio effect) is an artificially created or enhanced sound, or sound process used to emphasize artistic or other content of films, television shows, live performance, animation, video games, music, or other media. In m ...

, such as screaming, though some of these are lined with small, impish wall tiles. Little direct influence of

Dante Alighieri Dante Alighieri (; most likely baptized Durante di Alighiero degli Alighieri; – September 14, 1321), widely known mononymously as Dante, was an Italian Italian poetry, poet, writer, and philosopher. His ''Divine Comedy'', originally called ...

's '' Inferno'' is to be found, though this was not always the case. The ride seems to have no particular theme in its current state. Across from the first gorilla is an unlit display showing a man with a crown opening a window, which appears irrelevant to a horror-themed ride. The ride has elements similar to a

roller coaster A roller coaster is a type of list of amusement rides, amusement ride employing a form of elevated Railway track, railroad track that carries passengers on a roller coaster train, train through tight turns, steep slopes, and other elements, usua ...

, including hard-whipping turns and, midway through the ride, coming outside and being pulled down a steep slope before being plummeted through another set of doors to more horrors. Early in the ride, one specter is lowered before the tracks, but otherwise there is glass (or in the case of the begging man, mesh) between the rider and the various scares. Unlike either the Ghost Hole or the Spook-a-Rama, the other Coney Island dark rides, nothing comes directly at the rider, or threatens to do so. The ride lasts one minute and forty-five seconds. The admission price was $5.00 at the time Astroland closed. The ride is portable, but its fate is unclear as Astroland closed after the 2008 season. It may be among the rides Astroland's owners have managed to sell for relocation elsewhere on the boardwalk. As of April 2009, the ride had been gutted. The entire façade was removed, leaving the ramp as part of the standing structure. This was removed before the opening of the new Dreamland Park. In 2009, the site housed a giant snake

freak show A freak show is an exhibition of biological rarities, referred to in popular culture as "Freak, freaks of nature". Typical features would be physically unusual Human#Anatomy and physiology, humans, such as those uncommonly large or small, t ...

attraction.http://shutterfreaks.com/gallery21/main.php/d/70784-1/_DSC6010-Giant-snake.jpg It was the only one of the three Coney Island dark rides to have snakes (not real) on the interior, although they were trim to the mummy display. In 2010, the area was renamed Luna Park and a small rollercoaster is in the area where Dante's Inferno was.

References

External links

* * {{Coney Island Dark rides Coney Island Cultural depictions of Dante Alighieri

See also

References

External links