Detailed History of Kings Dominion's General Managers

[Mushroom]

I've always had an immense interest in business leaders, particularly in the leaders of theme parks. Kings Dominion is my home park, so over the years I've done a lot of research into its eight general managers whose leadership has shaped the park's history. This timeline details the history of each of Kings Dominion's general managers, their backgrounds, and their influence on the page. Last updated: 6/1/2025

1. Dennis Speigel
1973-1980

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Dennis Speigel was Kings Dominion’s founding GM and led the park’s planning, construction, and early years of operations. According to interviews, Speigel was given an enormous amount of free reign by Taft, the park’s parent company, and was responsible for calling the shots on everything from the design of paths and buildings to the placement of trees and rides; a great amount of Kings Dominion's original design can be owed directly to Speigel. A graduate of Morehead State University, Speigel had gotten his start in the industry as a ticket-taker at Coney Island in 1960, working his way up the ranks to become Assistant Park Manager of Coney Island. When Kings Island opened in 1971, he became its Assistant General Manager, and he was put in charge of building the company’s new theme park in Virginia in 1973. In 1980, he left Kings Dominion to become Taft’s Vice President of Operations. Today, Speigel is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of International Theme Park Services, a consulting company for theme parks worldwide. He is also a member of the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions (IAAPA), where he is head of the association’s Strategic Long-Range Planning Committee, and was appointed as Premier Advisor to China's Association of Amusement in 1994. He is also the leading contact for media outlets regarding theme park news, and is frequently cited as an expert in national media when a theme park-related issue is in the news.

2. T. Lewis Hooper
1980-1985
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There isn’t much information available about Kings Dominion’s second GM, “Lew” Hooper, but his leadership was mostly an extension of Speigel’s. A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Hooper began as a group sales manager at Kings Dominion’s sister park, Carowinds, in 1972 and worked through the ranks to become its GM. He was promoted to GM of Kings Dominion in 1980, and later became GM of Kings Island. In 1984, Hooper and other senior managers of Taft’s parks division bought the parks, forming Kings Entertainment Company. Hooper later became president of the company, a role which he held until 1992, when the company was bought by Paramount. Hooper died of natural causes in 2006.

3. Wilson H. Flohr, Jr.
1985-1998

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Other than Dennis Speigel, Wilson Flohr may be the most influential GM in Kings Dominion’s history. He oversaw the transition from Taft/KECO’s later years to Paramount’s ownership, leading much of the park’s “Paramountization.” Flohr has said that the early years of Paramount’s ownership were what put the park on the map, and Flohr led aggressive marketing to expand the park’s reach and appeal. A graduate of Rollins College, Flohr was the chief lobbyist for the “Kings Dominion Law,” a 1986 Virginia law that prohibited public schools from beginning before labor day in order to boost demand and staffing for tourist destinations at the end of the summer, and was instrumental in the legislation’s passage. Flohr’s tenure as GM—13 years—is the longest of any GM in the park’s history. Flohr retired in 1998 but has remained active in the Richmond community, taking unpaid positions as CEO of the nonprofit organizations Richmond Region 2007 and Richmond 2015, which organized the UCI Road World Championships cycling event. Flohr is also often cited in local media when Kings Dominion-related news breaks.

4. Richard Zimmerman
1998-2007

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Richard Zimmerman took over as GM from Flohr in 1998. Having previously worked as a strategist at Paramount, Zimmerman is the park’s only GM to have had no experience working in the theme park industry before taking the job. A graduate of Georgetown University, Zimmerman oversaw the latter half of Paramount’s ownership of the park and the early stages of the park’s transition to Cedar Fair’s ownership. In June 2007, he was promoted to Cedar Fair’s newly created position of regional vice president; he became the company’s executive vice president in 2010 and its Chief Operating Officer in 2011. He was named president of Cedar Fair in 2016, and in January 2018 he was named president and CEO of Cedar Fair. In 2024, when Cedar Fair and Six Flags merged, Zimmerman became the CEO of the combined Six Flags Entertainment Corporation. While he was GM of Kings Dominion, Zimmerman also served as director of the Richmond Chamber of Commerce and the Richmond Convention & Visitors Bureau and as chairman of a nonprofit swim school and aquatic training center.

5. Pat Jones
2007-2016

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Pat Jones oversaw the park’s full transition into its ownership by Cedar Fair. Jones began her career at Kings Dominion in the early 1980s, working as a season associate at a game booth to help pay for college. According to an interview with her, she continued to rise through the ranks of the park and was eventually offered a full-time management position before she finished college, which she immediately took. She eventually became the park’s vice president of food and beverage before being named GM. Jones was reportedly the driving force behind the park’s 40th anniversary celebration, which saw the return of many of the park’s beloved icons from its early years. In June 2016, Jones moved to Carowinds to become its new GM and oversee the park’s $50 million five-year capital growth plan. In 2019, she was one of 25 women honored with the “Charlotte’s Women in Business” award by the Charlotte Business Journal. She later became one of Cedar Fair's two Senior Vice Presidents of Operations, overseeing the operation of half of the parks in the Cedar Fair portfolio, including Kings Dominion. Pat Jones left the company in 2025 following the Cedar Fair-Six Flags merger, which resulted in the elimination of the SVP of Operations position.

6. Gary Chadwick
2016-2018

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Gary Chadwick’s one-and-a-half-year tenure as GM, from June 2016 to January 2018, is the shortest in the park’s history. A native of England and a graduate of Manchester Metropolitan University, Chadwick began working at Kings Dominion as a seasonal food and beverage associate in 1999, the inaugural year for the park’s international workers program. He continued to return to the park for the next three years, and accepted a full time management position at the park in 2003. He later moved to Carowinds, where he became vice president of food, retail, and entertainment. As GM, Chadwick took on a public role in communicating with guests, with an active social media presence where he frequently posted about the park and his work. In January 2018, it was abruptly announced that Chadwick had left the company for publicly unknown reasons, making Chadwick the park’s only GM to neither have moved elsewhere in the park’s parent company nor have retired after serving as GM (until the GM position was eliminated in 2025). He went on to serve as founder, president, and CEO of Tang & Biscuit Social Club in Richmond, before later becoming GM of a South Carolina zoo and then an independent business consultant. Fun fact: in 1999, Chadwick received a job offer from Kings Dominion and Busch Gardens Williamsburg on the same day, but chose the former because he “didn’t want to possibly end up wearing lederhosen.”

7. Tony Johnson
2018-2021

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Tony Johnson has the most storied history with Kings Dominion of any GM. Johnson, who originally worked as a teacher in Hanover County, took a job as a tower guard at the park’s Lion Country Safari in 1974 to earn extra money during the summer; his job was to open and close gates to make sure none of the animals wandered outside of their drive-through enclosures. Johnson, a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (like his predecessor, T. Lewis Hooper), continued to return to the park each summer, until the early 1980s when he left his teaching job for a full-time position as safety and security manager at the park. He later became the park’s vice president of operations, a role he held for a decade before moving to sister park California's Great America as vice president of operations in the late 1990s; he later moved to Carowinds in the same role. In 2013, he became Cedar Fair’s corporate director of operations, although he performed the role from an office at Kings Dominion rather than from the corporate headquarters. Johnson retired from the GM position in January 2021, ending a 47-year career with the park.

8. Bridgette Bywater
2021- 2025

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Bridgette Bywater served as Kings Dominion's eighth and final general manager. Bywater began her career at sister park Worlds of Fun, where she worked her way up to becoming the park's director of operations. She later became Cedar Fair's corporate director of operations, succeeding Tony Johnson in that role when he became Kings Dominion's general manager. Bywater had a lifelong connection to the theme park industry, noting in interviews that her parents met while working at Worlds of Fun. Having grown up near Worlds of Fun and Silver Dollar City, she was a strong advocate for theming and had stated that her vision was to build Kings Dominion into a proper theme park. Under her leadership, the park rethemed and expanded the highly themed Jungle X-Pedition, and several rethemed restaurants and amenities were added around the park. Following the Six Flags-Cedar Fair merger, the position of general manager and park president was eliminated across all of Six Flags' parks; as a result, Bywater and her counterparts across the country left the company in May 2025. Unless this decision is reversed in the future, this makes Bridgette Bywater the last general manager in Kings Dominion's history.

 

[Mushroom]

OP has been updated. I never would have guessed when I wrote this post in 2021 that the list was final and there would never be the chance to add another GM to the list

 

[Mushroom]

This new strip of bricks has appeared on KD’s “Walk of Memories” near the Kings Dominion Theater. It’s every GM the park has had, in order. I really appreciate this little yet permanent tribute to the KD’s past leaders, whose visions defined the park. I think it’s especially touching that it just appeared now — many months after the GM position was eliminated. Someone at the park must have felt it important to preserve the legacy of these people.

 

[RideThroughTime]

Does Gary Wachs have a brick somewhere? He was named the first General Manager in 1972 when they started work on it, but was promoted to a corporate position at Taft in 1973.

 

[Mushroom]

Not that I saw. I don't think KD considers Gary Wachs part of their GM canon; they've always referred to Dennis Speigel as their first GM.

I actually didn't know Gary Wachs was originally named KD's GM. Do you know any more info about that @RideThroughTime?

 

[RideThroughTime]

Not that I saw. I don't think KD considers Gary Wachs part of their GM canon; they've always referred to Dennis Speigel as their first GM.

I actually didn't know Gary Wachs was originally named KD's GM. Do you know any more info about that @RideThroughTime?

He became the park's first General Manager in August of 1972 and was replaced by Ed McHale at Kings Island. He oversaw the development and early construction of the park. In 1973, he became the VP of Operations for Taft's Amusement Park Group, then in March 1976 he became the Executive VP of the Amusement Park Group. He exited the company late in 1980. So he was very involved with Kings Dominion from its inception until 1980.