NEWS

DC Sports' opening in former Fun Central location invokes nostalgia

Jack Howland
Poughkeepsie Journal
Dan Pizzarelli, owner of DC Sports is photographed inside his Route 9 business in Wappingers Falls Dec. 30, 2016.

Through early January, reporters will be looking back at and following up on stories and topics that were the most popular with our readers in 2016, according to metrics on poughkeepsiejournal.com. This story is part of that series.

WAPPINGERS FALLS - The golf simulators, with their artificial turf and state-of-the-art backstops that display and track shots, weren’t there before.

Neither were the walls cloaked in black canvas that surround them. Before this became DC Sports, the main level was open and spread out, and was filled with the dings and flashes and sugary theme songs of vintage arcade games.

The bar and kitchen weren’t there, either — just more of those bulky coin receptacles.

Rachel Primiano, a DC Sports bartender who grew up in Poughkeepsie, still remembers hosting birthday parties here, and receiving that bucket of tokens that might as well have been gold.

NOW OPEN: Family sports center opens at former Fun Central location

EXPANSION: Mini golf returns to former Fun Central site

“You would kind of just run wild,” she said. “My favorite game was skeeball — I would play that for a long time.”

Like countless Hudson Valley residents, her memory of Fun Central is that it was a larger-than-life escape, especially in the summer months, for kids with pockets full of change and short attention spans. On top of the video games, there was also a miniature golf course and bumper boats — features DC Sports has retained.

That’s perhaps why the news of its grand opening back in January 2016 was met with such fervent excitement from those who remember Fun Central.

A customer plays simulated golf at DC Sports on Route 9  in Wappingers Falls Dec. 30, 2016.

Dan Pizzarelli, who owns DC Sports along with DC Golf in Poughkeepsie, said the news tapped into people’s nostalgia, and was something many former customers had likely never expected to hear.

In his first year, he said all that excitement was a boon for the business, which surpassed his expectations. He outlined his aspirations for each attraction at the beginning of the year, and though he admits the numbers fluctuate — mini golf doesn't make as much money in December, for instance — said he's pleased with his investment.

One of the most successful features was a new one, sand volleyball, he said. Last summer, the league attracted eight to 10 teams of six who played on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.

"Our goal this summer is to do four nights, Monday through Thursday," he said.

The enthusiastic response he's seen first-hand, especially from parents who went to Fun Central as children, hasn't surprised him one bit.

“As a parent,” he said, “you want your kids to enjoy the same things you did.”

A staple of the community

Wappingers Falls resident Jim Bosch was away in the Army for Fun Central’s opening in the early 1990’s, and when he returned home as a 27-year-old, found there was a new hot-spot in town.

Although it might have been known and promoted as a business for kids, 20-somethings like himself saw it as a judgment-free place for adults who still love video games, mini golf and bumper boats. There was nowhere else like it, he said.

Fun Central was where he took his wife on their first date, where they sprayed each other with squirt guns in the bumper boat pool and exchanged jokes over putt-putt.

Once they had their three children, the couple came back, this time only to watch their smiling faces.

And since DC Sports' opening in January, Bosch has hit come every now and again to hit some golf balls — meaning this old building has been around for a big chunk of his adult life.

“That’s pretty neat,” said Bosch, who owns Bosch Concrete in Wappingers Falls. “I’ve been in this building 1,000 times, before and after kids.”

Similarly, with people raised in or around this Hudson Valley institution, just a mention of the name is often enough to the surface long-ago memories of carefree summer days with friends or family.

Rachael Ball, a server at County Fare in Wappingers Falls, said she would get a special feeling just driving along Route 9 as they approached the building.

The mini golf course’s medieval castle, with its imposing faux-stone turrets, could be spotted from what seemed like miles away, she said. You could also see the cascading nets of the batting cages — which is now a sand volleyball court — and the lifeguard stand at the pool.

“It kind of drew you in off of Route 9,” she said. “You would be like, ‘Oh my God, I want to go there’ and make your parents take you.”

Since its January 2016 opening, Ball has been back once, and said it immediately brought her back to a more stress-free time of her life, when summer felt like an eternity and video games were a matter of life or death.

The re-emergence of this location, she said, is no different than the current cultural trend of reviving beloved staples.

“Everything is coming back again — ‘Full House,’ ‘Gilmore Girls’ and all that,” she said. “I feel like this is part of it.”

To her, DC Sports is just like a reboot of a great show, one she wasn’t done watching yet.

Back from the dead

The inspiration for DC Sports hit Pizzarelli gradually, dawning on him over time. Driving his daughter to her daycare each morning, always along Route 9, he would pass the boarded-up former Fun Central location that had closed down in 2013.

It had "lost its flare," he said, with no activity and a chipped, fading coat of paint.

After enough drives, a lightbulb went off.

"I wanted to bring it back," he said.

In doing so, he felt like he was doing a service to former Fun Central owners and sisters Kim Redl Lawrence and Kari Redl Daniels — of Herb Redl Properties — as well as all those who miss places like this.

These days, according to the Dutchess County Chamber of Commerce, there are only a handful of local businesses that have similar attributes as that of DC Sports. That includes All Sport in Fishkill, which has sand volleyball for its members, as well as the slides and rides of Splash Down Water Park in Poughkeepsie.

There's also Overlook Golf Course and Recreation Center in Poughkeepsie that has mini golf and batting cages.

Frank Castella, Jr., president and CEO of the Chamber of Commerce, said these types of businesses have traditionally struggled because of factors like the proliferation of more advanced at-home entertainment. But DC Sports, he said, has smartly upgraded its offerings.

"DC Sports has taken an abandoned facility and adapted it for the modern times," he said. "They kept what was popular...(and) removed much of the old and outdated portion of the facility."

​Patrick Daka, who’s from the Bronx but now lives in LaGrange, said he's just happy he gets to come back in this building. He first came at around five years old during a visit to see family in the Hudson Valley, and it was a summer tradition until he was 12.

He remembers, above all else, joyfully sprinting from game to game with his cousins, the only limitation being how much change they had left.

Now that he’s living in the area, as well as dating a DC Sports employee, he often finds himself back in this building, usually at least once a week.

That, to him, is surreal — and something he's grateful for.

“It's honestly the coolest thing ever," he said.

Jack Howland: jhowland@poughkeepsiejournal.com, 845-437-4870, Twitter: @jhowl04.