Event Will Benefit Corriganville Group

Those who lament the days of “Bonanza” and the Old West can help resurrect Corriganville Park at a fund-raiser Saturday at Sycamore Drive Community Center in Simi Valley.

A $10 donation will help the Corriganville Preservation Committee, a 9-year-old nonprofit group that wants to revive what was a western-style amusement park and backdrop for cowboy movies, chairman Steve Gillum said.

Old-time country music by Dennis Morgan Strange and the Original Overland Express Band, and Jeff Wolfe and the Horse Soldiers will highlight the event, which runs from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. A barbecue catered by Mavericks BBQ Restaurant will cost an additional $7.

During the 1940s, the rocky landscape of the Corriganville movie ranch, in a southeast corner of Simi Valley, served as a set for hundreds of television western series, Gillum said. In 1949, the property was extended to include a western-style amusement park featuring stunt shows, stagecoach rides and Native American crafts.

A land sale and several fires in the 1970s destroyed Corriganville as many knew it. Now weeds, slabs of concrete and paint ball streaks cover the area.

But in 1988, 190 acres that made up the main areas of the original Corriganville were purchased by the city of Simi Valley and the Rancho Simi Recreation and Park District for use as a regional park.

The Corriganville Preservation Committee was also born about that time, in hopes of working with city and park officials to raise $6 million. The money will go to preserve western film history by re-creating the site with a theater, museum, picnic sites, riding and hiking trails and other exhibits.

“We’re not even halfway there yet,” Gillum said.

The committee is working with the Rancho Simi Open Space Conservation Agency. For information, call Gillum at 581-1428 or Dave Hugo at 522-3738.