The Memorabilia Man

McCarthy in a House of Horrors car he refurbished. Photo by Wolf Matthewson

The Warwick resident — born in 1999, four years after the park closed — has amassed quite the collection of Rocky Point keepsakes in his sizable garage, including a life-size Rocky the lobster, hand-painted signs and a House of Horrors car that he restored
to pristine condition.

A Rocky the lobster figurine. Photo by Wolf Matthewson

He became hooked after reading a Rocky Point comic book in the third grade and hearing his parents talk about their visits to the park. And it didn’t hurt that his grandfather had a huge collection of Hot Wheels toy cars in his basement.  

“I always thought, how cool would it be to have the big neon signs and stuff like that hanging in a garage?” he says.

He started collecting memorabilia at age seven, buying wax cups, tickets and employee shirts from the park on eBay, Facebook and Craigslist. As he got older, and people started reaching out to him with finds, his collection grew: full sets of plates from the Shore Dinner Hall, menus, gift shop items, a bumper car and signs for the House of Horrors, the Windjammer and the Palladium. 

There’s also a Rocky the lobster figurine, the park’s mascot, which belonged to a former park manager. Only about ten of the fiberglass statues exist, McCarthy says. And an old ski lift chair from the Skyliner sits in his backyard, cleverly converted into a bench swing near a firepit.

Signage from the park. Photo by Wolf Matthewson

McCarthy’s tattoo. Photo by Wolf Matthewson

But his most prized possession is the bright yellow House of Horrors car, with the Creature from the Black Lagoon on the front, that he repaired from the ground-up. It’s the second such car he’s restored: The other, emblazoned with a wolfman, sits in the lobby of Warwick City Hall. 

“I always wanted to restore one so badly, ever since I was a kid,” says McCarthy, who also sports an impressive sleeve of Rocky Point tattoos on his left arm. “So when the opportunity came up for me to work on one, I had to do it.” 

His father, David, taught him how to do the body work on the fiberglass car. He covered the creature — original artwork from the 1980s — in a layer of epoxy, sanded down nine layers of paint, and painted it a rich shade of goldenrod. 

It’s the only privately owned House of Horrors car he’s aware of. There were only eight in all, and the city of Warwick has three of them, including the wolfman version that McCarthy refurbished for free. 

Until he’s lucky enough to find another, McCarthy will continue housing his collection in his 800-square-foot garage, and showing it to people who still love, and miss, Rocky Point. 

“It’s history,” he says. “People smile when they see this stuff. So it’s huge that people can relive that.”

 A Skyliner car repurposed into a backyard swing. Photo by Wolf Matthewson