AMUSEMENT PARKS
G'day folks,
Local
fairs and carnivals have been around since the Middle Ages, but modern
amusement parks can trace their roots to the 19th century, when so-called
“pleasure gardens” and “trolley parks” first flourished in the United States
and Europe. These early resorts featured primitive—and often wildly
unsafe—rollercoasters and rides, but they also included a variety of offbeat
attractions ranging from strongmen and wild animals to freak shows, staged
disaster spectacles and even battle reenactments. Take a trip through six of
history’s most enchanting and influential amusement parks.
1. Steeplechase Park
Steeplechase Park, 1936 (Credit:
UniversalImagesGroup/Getty Images)
Opened in
1897 by entrepreneur George C. Tilyou, Steeplechase Park was the first of three
major amusement parks that put New York’s Coney Island on the map. The park
took its name from its signature attraction, a 1,100-foot steel track where
patrons could race one another on mechanical horses, but it also included a
Ferris Wheel, a space-inspired ride called “Trip to the Moon” and a miniature
railroad. While Tilyou intended Steeplechase to be the family-friendly antidote
to Coney Island’s seamier side, some rides still ventured into territory that
was risqué by Victorian standards. Attractions like the “Whichaway” and the
“Human Pool Table” tossed strangers against one another and gave couples an
excuse to canoodle, and the wildly popular Blowhole Theater allowed spectators
to watch as air vents blew up unsuspecting female guests’ skirts. As the ladies
struggled to cover themselves, a clown would shock their male counterparts with
a cattle prod. Fire destroyed much of Tilyou’s park in 1907, but he responded
by building a more elaborate Steeplechase that remained in operation until the
1960s. Ever the showman, he even charged ten cents for visitors to view the
charred ruins of the original park.
2. Vauxhall Gardens
Vauxhall Gardens, 1751 (Credit:
Guildhall Library & Art Gallery/Heritage Images/Getty Images)
For much
of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, the famed Vauxhall Gardens offered
Londoners a much-needed respite from the grime and sprawl of the big city.
Nestled on the south bank of the River Thames, this verdant pleasure garden
consisted of several acres of trees and flowers, footpaths, and pavilions lit
by thousands of shimmering gas lamps. For the price of one shilling, visitors
could stroll through Vauxhall’s lush groves, admire paintings and sculptures
and take in music performed by the site’s house orchestra. The Gardens also
offered more unusual diversions including a miniature diorama of a village mill
and a resident hermit who told fortunes. By the 1820s, Vauxhall had begun to
abandon high culture and refinement in favor of dancing and other more
mainstream entertainments and soon patrons could take in fireworks displays,
ballooning exhibitions and sideshow acts such as sword swallowers and tightrope
walkers. Before shuttering Vauxhall’s gates for good in 1859, the owners even
used pyrotechnics and troupes of actors to stage large-scale reenactments of
Napoleon’s defeat at the Battle of Waterloo, Roman chariot races and a crusader
attack on the city of Acre.
3. Dreamland
Dreamland, 1905
Coney
Island’s Dreamland only operated for seven years between 1904 and 1911, but
during that time it established itself as one of the most ambitious amusement
parks ever constructed. The brainchild of a former senator named William H.
Reynolds, the site included a labyrinth of unusual rides and attractions lit by
an astounding one million electric light bulbs. Visitors to Dreamland could charter
a gondola through a recreation of the canals of Venice, brave gusts of
refrigerated air during a train ride through the mountains of Switzerland or
relax at a Japanese teahouse. They could also watch a twice-daily disaster
spectacle where scores of actors fought a fire at a mock six-story tenement
building, or pay a visit to Lilliputia, a pint-sized European village where
some 300 little people lived full time. Dreamland featured everything from
freak shows and wild animals to imported Somali warriors and Eskimos, but
perhaps its most unusual offering was an exhibit where visitors could observe
premature babies being kept alive using incubators, which were then still a new
and untested technology. The infants proved a huge hit, but they and many other
attractions had to be evacuated in May 1911, when a fire—ironically triggered
at a ride called the Hell Gate—leveled the property and shut Dreamland down for
good.
4. Saltair
Saltair pavilion, 1901
First
opened in 1893, Saltair was a desert oasis situated on the south shore of
Utah’s Great Salt Lake. The Mormon Church originally commissioned the site in
the hope of creating a wholesome “Coney Island of the West” without the
perceived sleaziness of the New York original. Their family-friendly park
proved an instant hit, as scores of visitors arrived by train from nearby Salt
Lake City to enjoy music, dancing and bathing in the lake’s saline-rich waters.
Saltair’s most striking attraction was its gargantuan pavilion, a four-story
wonder adorned with domes and minarets that sat above the lake on more than
2,000 wood pilings. Along with touring this “Pleasure Palace on Stilts,”
visitors could also show off their moves on a sprawling dance floor, ride
roller coasters and carousels, and watch fireworks displays and hot air balloon
shows. The park boasted nearly half a million visitors a year until 1925, when
the iconic centerpiece burned in a fire. A rebuilt Saltair opened soon after,
but it failed to capture the magic—or the revenues—of the original. The park
closed its doors for good in 1958, and its abandoned pavilion was later
destroyed in a second fire in 1970.
5. Tivoli Gardens
Entrance to Tivoli Gardens (Credit:
fotoVoyager/iStockphotos.com)
Denmark’s
Tivoli Gardens first opened in 1843, when showman Georg Carstensen persuaded
King Christian VIII to let him build a pleasure garden outside the walls of
Copenhagen. Originally constructed on around 20 acres of land, Carstensen’s
creation featured a series of oriental-inspired buildings, a lake fashioned
from part of the old city moat, flower gardens and bandstands lit by colored
gas lamps. The park quickly became a Copenhagen institution, and won fame for
its “Tivoli Boys Guard,” a collection of uniformed adolescents who paraded
around the premises playing music for visitors. Tivoli later added an iconic
pantomime theater in 1878, and by the early 1900s it featured more traditional
amusement park fare including a wooden roller coaster called the Bjergbanen, or
“Mountain Coaster,” as well as bumper cars and carousels. Tivoli Gardens was
nearly burned to the ground by Nazi sympathizers during World War II, but the
park reopened after only a few weeks and remains in operation to this day.
6. Luna Park
Luna Park, 1913 (Credit: LCDM Universal
History Archive/Getty Images)
Founded
in 1903 by theme park impresarios Fred Thompson and Skip Dundy, Coney Island’s
Luna Park consisted of a gaudy cluster of domed buildings and towers
illuminated by an eye-popping 250,000 light bulbs. The park specialized in high
concept rides that transported visitors to everywhere from 20,000 leagues under
the sea to the North Pole and even the surface of the moon. A trip to Luna
could also serve as a stand in for world travel. After a ride on an elephant,
patrons could stroll a simulated “Streets of Delhi” populated by dancing girls
and costumed performers—many of them actually shipped in from India—or take a
tour through mock versions of Italy, Japan and Ireland. If they grew tired of
walking, visitors could relax in grandstands and watch the “War of the Worlds,”
a miniature, pyrotechnic-heavy sea battle in which the American Navy decimated
an invading European armada. The park’s owners also cashed in on the popularity
of disaster rides by staging recreations of the destruction of Pompeii and the
Galveston flood of 1900. The carnage reenacted in these attractions became all
too real in 1944, when Luna fell victim to a three-alarm fire that began in one
of its bathrooms. The original site closed for good a few years after the
blaze, but the iconic name “Luna Park” is still used by dozens of amusement
parks around the globe.
Clancy's comment: Ever been to a fun park? I've been to several; New York and Melbourne. However, not appreciating heights, I've never been on a ferris wheel or big dipper. Nope, not my cup of tea.
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