Marineland functions as an entertainment and swim-with-the-dolphins facility, and reopened to the public on March 4, 2006 (charging the original 1938 admission price of one dollar).

On June 23, 1938, "Marine Studios" (the name "Marineland of Florida" would later be adopted) began operations with its main attraction a bottlenose dolphin.

A Texaco service station was adjacent to the Periwinkle Snack Bar, and Greyhound Bus Lines stopped regularly during its St. Augustine to Daytona Beach run.

[citation needed] The total property area consisted of 125 acres (51 ha) sandwiched between the Atlantic Ocean and the Intracoastal Waterway.

Originally planned for the St. Augustine area, residents of that community did not look favorably on the attraction being located there; thus the new site south of Matanzas Inlet was chosen.

The rectangular oceanarium was the largest of the Marine Studios tanks, it had two 12-foot (3.7 m) deep sections, the northern and southern thirds, while the middle had a depth of 18 feet (5.5 m).

The shallow tank saw several functions held dolphins for a while and eventually became a sea lion display with shows added in the early 1980s.

Having the grandson of Leo Tolstoy involved in the project helped Marineland become a very fashionable destination in its early days, prompting writers Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, John Dos Passos, and Ernest Hemingway to visit Moby Dick's Bar located there.

A few exhibits were added as well, moving the electric eel show to the west side of the park from the east, all of these reached by winding landscaped pathways that crossed a network of brooks and streams on wooden bridges.

Additional expansion on the ocean side through the 70s included Whitney Park north of the stadium, featuring a boardwalk, exhibits, and an observation deck.

When the show first started in the 1950s a platform was used, but then in the early 1970s Marineland purchased a Skyworker unit; this was essentially a bucket on a movable arm suspended from two arches that met above the tank.

The show then would transition downstairs, announcers guiding the crowds to where a hard hat diver would descend into the oceanarium and feed the marine mammals by hand as visitors viewed through 188 portholes on two levels surrounding the tank.

The diving operation always consisted of two people, a diver in the water and a person on the top deck to manage the air hose and safety monitoring.

There were additional employees beyond show staff to keep things running; these included two aquarists, exhibit attendants, ticket takers, guides, custodians, pump crews, lab techs and tank cleaners as well as security.

These included the Stadium, lab, maintenance, water plant, gift shops, snack bar, theater, grounds crew, restaurant and administration.

Other exhibits complemented the shows including "Wonders of the Sea" allowing a close up of marine specimens in aquariums, an electric eel demonstrations, a penguin and flamingo displays.

Treated waste water was sprayed by a huge sprayer called a "rain bird" that was located behind the electric eel exhibit on the western side of the property.

When a power outage of even short duration occurred, the on duty pumpman was required to quickly restart the pumps or the tanks could start to drain.

A large high wattage step down transformer was located directly under the circular oceanarium to help supply power to the Marine Studios facility.

[5] Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney, who was the major stockholder of the private company opted to sell the marine park in 1983 to a group of St. Augustine businessmen during the summer of that year.

The show presentation order had been changed a few times during the mid 1980s in attempts to better accommodate visitors, with the first part still starting on the Top Deck then the stadium and ending underwater.

Another large expansion occurred, the last one made to the original park, when a campground, affiliated with the Jellystone brand, was built on the southwest side of the property.

Following these changes attendance began to decline, and along with poor management decisions and expensive schemes which yielded no return on investment, the ownership group was unable to meet their loan payments and the attraction was again put on the market.

The Skyworker unit used during top deck shows failed and sat useless, while the dolphin stadium also became unusable with large sections of it cordoned off.

In addition, the already-strapped oceanarium had been reconfigured as a non-profit foundation as part of the sale and was responsible for its own sustenance as well as repayment of the bond issue.

With no direct ownership, no funding, and the financial burden of bond interest payments, employees were left to cope with equipment failures, safety hazards, no marketing, loss of credit, bounced paychecks, further government inspections and the custodianship of the marine mammals, fish and birds.

In the end, the foundation repaid the bondholders with pennies on the dollar, a large part of Marineland's dolphin population was sold off to Seaworld in Orlando, and new ownership took over the attraction's operation.

Damage was extensive with the famous boardwalk destroyed and the walkways to Whitney park collapsing due to erosion, and the filtration plant under threat of falling into the ocean.

Large new tanks which contain nearly 485,000 US gallons (1,840,000 L; 404,000 imp gal) of water were constructed as part of a structure built where Whitney Park once stood.

The staff at Marineland had a "first responder team" for hundreds of stranded whale emergency calls along the southeastern Atlantic Coast during its existence.