grounds (1959 photograph)
Burge/Williams era (1958–1981) In 1958, the park opened along
Route 66, now Interstate 35. It featured a haunted farm, a mine train, robberies, and jails. Initially, guests entered for free, but had to pay a quarter to watch the gunfight shows. It started out as Boomtown, a replica of an Oklahoma pioneer town that was built for the state's semicentennial celebration in 1957 at the
Oklahoma State Fair grounds. Jimmy Burge, the leader of the committee that built Boomtown, decided to open an amusement park with the same theme. Rather than a traditional ribbon cutting, it was scheduled to have an old-fashioned six-shooter aimed at a piece of rope stretched across the stockade entrance. That is the same manner used today for its opening. It added spinning rides, roller coasters, and a log flume ride starting in the 1960s and 1970s. The park was originally owned and operated by Oklahoma City businessmen James Burge and Jack Williams. James Burge had been a publicist in Hollywood for twenty years, with clients that included
Joan Crawford and
Robert Taylor. He visited
Disneyland when it opened in 1955 and was impressed with the theme park business. Being from Oklahoma City, he knew his hometown would be a natural location for a western-themed amusement park. After World War II, he returned to Oklahoma City and was later appointed to lead the Oklahoma Semi-Centennial Committee, which was planning the 1957 Oklahoma Semi-Centennial Exposition in Oklahoma City. After the 1957 Exposition was over, he negotiated with the fair board to purchase many of the buildings and props at the "Boom Town" exhibit. Burge laid out the land and facilities with four initial investors, then entered a partnership with Jack Williams, a wealthy businessman who owned a chain of laundries. Although Williams was initially interested in the park's linen rental contract, he was convinced by Burge's vision and became the principal investor. The four square blocks of streets contained a Marshall's office, saloon, bank, post office (with its own
postmark), fire department, hotel, and numerous storefronts. However, the oil crunch slowed down the local real estate boom, and the startled company found itself with a sagging amusement park to operate. The president of the company realized Oklahoma City needed a local amusement park but also knew that throwing a few million dollars at the park was not going to be enough to solve its problems. In 1983, the owners hired a management company to operate it. Gary Story was named the general manager in 1984.
Tierco Group/Premier Parks/Six Flags era (1987–2006) In 1987, the contract with the management company was not renewed, but the management staff went to work directly for the park owners, Frontier City Properties, a wholly owned subsidiary of Tierco Group, Inc. In 1995, The Tierco Group, Inc. changed its name to
Premier Parks. On February 9, 1998, it was announced that Premier Parks would purchase the Six Flags chain from
Time Warner for $1.9 billion and change its name to
Six Flags, Inc. The world headquarters for Six Flags were located at the southeast corner of the park's property until 2006, when the company's offices were moved to
New York City and
Grand Prairie, Texas. On January 27, 2006, Six Flags put Frontier City and
White Water Bay,
Six Flags Magic Mountain,
Elitch Gardens,
Darien Lake, a couple of water parks, and Wild Waves/Enchanted Village for sale. At the same time, it also announced its plan to close its corporate offices in Oklahoma City and move to
New York City and
Grand Prairie, Texas. Mark Shapiro, Six Flags CEO at the time, said that he expected the parks to continue operating after the sale, but rumours surfaced that some of them could close. The announcement also created a lot of confusion in the Oklahoma City market. Many people misunderstood the announcement, instead thinking that Frontier City was shutting down and relocating to New York.
CNL Properties and PARC Management era (2007–2010) On January 11, 2007, Six Flags opted to keep Magic Mountain but then announced that it would sell Frontier City and White Water Bay, along with Elitch Gardens, Darien Lake,
Splashtown (near
Houston) and Wild Waves/Enchanted Village, to PARC 7F-Operations. As a part of the deal, the Six Flags prefix was removed from Elitch Gardens and Darien Lake. Frontier City and White Water Bay were never branded as Six Flags parks. PARC sold them to
CNL Income Properties, Inc. and the two companies set up a long-term agreement in which CNL would lease the parks to PARC, which would operate them. In 2008, a new suspended roller coaster,
Steel Lasso, was added to celebrate the park's 50th anniversary. On November 24, 2010, CNL Lifestyle Properties, Inc. announced that it had reached an agreement to terminate PARC's lease of the park and up to 17 other locations due to PARC defaulting on its contractual lease and loan obligations. The move came after, according to their 2010 SEC filings, PARC defaulted on their lease obligations on the properties. Five of the original six parks originally purchased from Six Flags are also involved in the lease termination.
Premier Parks, LLC era (2011–2016) In 2011, it was announced that as the result of an agreement with owner
CNL Lifestyle Properties, former Six Flags executives Kieran Burke and Gary Story would begin managing the properties as Premier Parks, LLC. In 2012, a new multi-million dollar water play structure was erected in a former parking lot. The area is called Wild West Water Works and features seven slides, a 1,000-gallon tipping water bucket and hundreds of water gadgets. In 2014, the park turned to
Plainview, Texas-based Larson International for the new Winged Warrior ride and again in 2015 for the new Brain Drain, a seven-story looping thrill ride. Another new attraction was added in 2016 called The Gunslinger, a 60-foot-tall spinning thrill ride made by Italian ride manufacturer, Zamperla. It was relocated from
Magic Spring in
Hot Springs, Arkansas, a park also owned by CNL Lifestyle Properties, Inc. 2016 also celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Wildcat. Much of the ride was re-tracked in 2016 to make for a smoother ride.
EPR Properties/Premier Parks era (2016–2018) After the 2016 season the park was again sold, this time to
EPR Properties which was operating it under the name Frontier City Holdings LLC. Premier Parks continued as the management company, with Stephen Ball continuing to act as its general manager. For the 2017 season, the Wildcat received a complete train makeover with rebuilt cars. A new million dollar water ride was added to the Wild West Waterworks called the Gully Washer, which consists of three high-thrill water slides that will start from a tower approximately 66 feet tall. One of the new shows for the 2017 season performed in the Opera House is called "Shake, Rattle, and Roll," which replaced the show "Industrial Movement" and revisited the music of the 1950s and 1960s.
EPR Properties/Six Flags era (2018–present) On May 22, 2018, Six Flags Entertainment Corporation announced that they had entered into a purchase agreement with Premier Parks to acquire the lease rights to operate the park, which would remain under EPR Properties ownership. Before the start of the 2020 season, Six Flags suspended all operations across all their properties due to the
COVID-19 pandemic. After over two months of the park operations being closed, Frontier City became the first park in the company to reopen on June 5, with new health and safety protocols. As of June 2020, Frontier City operations have resumed. ==Special events==