(This is primarily a podcast! Click play on the player below!)

Philadelphia Toboggan Company

When last I focused heavily on carousels, it was October of last year, and I was telling you about the amazing Dentzel/Looff Carousel down at Seaside Heights in Florida. Well, that was a different time. It’s now March, we’re all inside, and recent updates are that the Dentzel/Looff Carousel has been disassembled for storage and refurbishment. 

This turned my mind to other carousels out there, so I went digging, and I found the subject of today’s episode: PTC #15. To explain, we must start at the beginning, and to start at the beginning, we must begin.

It starts with a guy, as always. Two guys. Henry Auchy, and his buddy, Chester Albright. In 1904, the two joined up and started a company. That’s what you did back in the day, you started a company instead of a podcast. They wanted to “build finer and better carousels and coasters”. These two guys did something smart, which was to purchase inventory from the E. Joy Morris Company.

E. Joy Morris

Now E. Joy Morris was a small carousel manufacturer right around the turn of the century, really lesser known, even in carousel circles. If you recall from the last carousel episode, there are three major styles of carousel carving: Coney Island style, Country Fair style, and Philadelphia style. It’s the latter that we’re going to talk about today, possibly unsurprising given the name.

So EJ Morris Jr. was a Philly man, born in 1860. Interesting tidbit, his father EJ Morris Sr, was US Minister to Turkey under Abraham Lincoln. With the family money, because of course there was family money, Morris was able to get in on the nascent amusement park trade. He patented a roller-coaster related invention in the late 1890s, and established his own company to build figure 8 toboggans (rollercoasters), carousels, and water chutes. Morris loved animals, loved children, and wanted to make them happy.

The famed Gustav Dentzel was Morris’ direct competition, and Morris aimed to outdo him by embellishing and adding incredible small whimsical details, perhaps also in a nod to his own playful nature. Morris also did something unique by keeping an inventory on hand. Prior to this, carousels were built on demand, but Morris’ firm built many carousels at once, perhaps as a way to keep the craftsman retained during slower months, or perhaps as a way of getting a leg up on Dentzel by being able to deliver carousels to customers faster.

Late in 1903, after building and selling well over 20 carousels and/or coasters, Morris’ business plans changed. For the sum of about $30,000, EJ Morris sold over 200 completed carousel figures to Auchy and Albright, allowing them to build four carousels outright and to jumpstart their business, recouping their investment almost immediately. 

Why’d EJ Morris sell his business? It appears to have been health problems – it’s said he was in the hospital shortly before he sold the manufacturing business, and though he lived another 20-some-odd years afterwards, it seems his health was always in decline. Though he divested himself of the manufacturing side, he did remain active in the business end of the amusement rides he already owned through about 1920.  

Philadelphia Toboggan Company

Morris then was a huge inspiration and jumping off point for the newly-formed Philadelphia Toboggan Company. As I said earlier, they quickly established themselves as a company after their inception in 1904, building four carousels in short order with their acquired E.J. Morris stock. Interestingly, this is why Morris isn’t as well known these days – his work is often mistaken for PTC work.  Neither Auchy nor Albright were carvers, unlike most other carousel companies at the time, so their house style varies quite a bit based on who was head carver at the time. 

I loved this quote from a 1904 Topeka State Journal article about Vinewood Park, one of the first PTC locations in the world. “The word carousell is probably a new-one in the west. The machine, which bears the name as its “official title,” is a revolving, circular platform about 80 feet in diameter, upon which is built a regular modern menagerie. All of the animals are fitted with saddles, and one can get a ride on anything from an elephant to a jackrabbit. The scheme is a new one, and has only been out of the factory for a few years. A number of the eastern parks have put in carousells, and they are proving very popular.”

Vinewood Park, interestingly, was one of the first Philadelphia Toboggan Company locations: carousel and rollercoaster #2 were both shipped to the same park. In fact, the first ten carousels and the first ten rollercoasters manufactured by PTC went to the same theme parks (ie, the park ordered both at once).

The carousel we’re interested in wasn’t built until 1907 – PTC #15. The PTC carousels are fairly unique in that each was numbered on their massive central poles. For historians, the numbering system did become confusing, as sometimes a new number was assigned to the same carousel after it went back to the factory for refurbishing. However, overall, it appears that the company kept excellent records based on the articles I’m reading. 

PTC #15 was built in 1907. This was PTC’s first four-row machine, as well as PTC’s first all-horse carousel (no other animals, no “menagerie” in carousel parlance). And, all the horses jumped (traditionally, the outer row of most beautiful carved horses were “standers” – stationary) – another first. Master carver Leo Zoller, head carver at PTC from 1906 to 1910, is said to have been responsible for many of the carved horses, as well as carver Daniel Muller, who often worked at Dentzel’s shop. 

PTC #15 was gorgeous, featuring large and highly animated figures with exquisitely-carved details. From the National Register of Historic Places entry, the horses on this carousel are “among the most realistically carved pieces ever done anywhere”. The carousel also featured two large, rare, well-carved lovers’ chariots, and handpainted rounding boards depicting animals frolicing in a mythical landscape. (Rounding boards, if you’re uncertain, are the painted boards decorating the tops of carousels – they hide machinery, and attract guests with both paintings and lights. Since they go “around”, the name is rounding boards.)

PTC #15 was built in 1907. (You already said that, I hear you saying.) That was one hundred and thirteen years ago. How many different places do you think this carousel has been since then? Let’s find out.

Fort Wendell / Fort George Amusement Park (New York, NY)

PTC #15 was initially delivered to Fort George Amusement Park in New York. This was located in New York City along the Harlem River, around West 190th St. This location is the northernmost tip of Manhattan, what is now Highbridge Park and George Washington Educational Campus, where George Washington fought the British during the Revolutionary War two hundred and fifty years ago. At the time of its construction, the park was of course, a trolley park, at the end of the Third Avenue Trolley Line. 

Fort George was known as Harlem’s Coney Island, and did its best to rival its Brooklyn amusement counterpart. This was a classic turn of the century amusement park resort, full of dance halls, roller rinks, fortune tellers, gambling, beer halls, restaurants, hotels, and of course, the latest in amusements: Ferris wheels, roller coasters, and carousels. It was less of an amusement park as we might think of today, and more of an amusement district, with many different owners and operators and many different smaller “parks” within the area. 

PTC #15 was actually not the first carousel at Fort George. In fact, 1905’s PTC #8 was the first carousel there, at Paradise Park within Fort George. (And though the RCDB lists the Fort George rollercoaster as “unknown”, a 2010 Carousel News and Trader article confirms that the first ten PTC carousels and coasters operated at the same parks. So PTC coaster #8 also would have operated here at Paradise Park at Fort George, a classic Figure 8 coaster similar to Leap-the-Dips, a coaster still operational today.)

Paradise Park was opened by two brothers, Joseph and Nicholas Schenck, who saw the potential in the area and wanted to develop it further with this separate, extra-admission park. They indeed made the park a huge success for the time – estimates in contemporaneous articles state 50,000 people in one evening in June 1906. The park was located on a hillside, and I saw an anecdote that in the earliest years, some guests had to climb unsafe ladders up the hillsides before more permanent stairs were added.

Different places will describe the location for PTC #15 differently: Wendell’s Park, Fort Wendel, and so forth. This was actually a small resort hotel owned by one Captain Louis Wendel, famed for its rooftop panorama views across the river. Here is where PTC #15 was said to have lived, a few years after its sibling began operation, and was operated by Henry and Frank Kolb. A contemporary photo from the Museum of the City of New York shows Fort Wendel located just across the street from the large Paradise Park entrance. A large faux castle turret facade stands atop the hotel roof, hoisting a big sign labeled “Wendel”.

It all must have been very glamorous at the time, especially on a hot summer night – feel the breeze off the river to cut some of the summer heat, have a drink, go dancing or roller skating, buy an ice cream or a beer, and ride an amusement ride: a coaster, a ferris wheel, a chair swing, a carousel. 

By 1910, however, public opinion of the locals was souring. Newspaper reports had headlines like “police will have their hands full there”, and other references talk about Fort George’s history describe “public drunkenness, noise, crime, and racial tensions”. Neighbors began pressuring the various local authorities and committees to shut down the amusement district.

The next year, 1911, saw an arson attempt. Perhaps related to the neighborhood sentiment, but who’s to say. The district reopened in 1912 after repairing the damages. Unfortunately, then came 1913. In June of 1913, another arsonist started a fire. Damages were reported at over $100k, with the entirety of the Paradise Park section destroyed completely by fire. 

This time, Fort George Amusement Park couldn’t recover. The local political groups ultimately took over the property and incorporated it (at the time) into Highland Park.

Now luckily, our hero, PTC #15, was located at Fort Wendel, across Amsterdam Avenue. Though the fire was said to have jumped across the street, where it destroyed a “four story frame building”, it did not apparently destroy PTC #15. 

With the destruction of Paradise Park and the generally unfavorable neighborhood sentiment, any remaining amusements likely moved out over the next few years. 

(Oh, and remember Joseph Schenck? He ultimately moved to California, became president of a little company called United Artists, created the company Twentieth Century Pictures (which of course became Twentieth Century Fox), and then was said to have played a key role in launching Marilyn Monroe’s career.)

Summit Beach Amusement Park (Akron, OH)

Park #2 for our carousel is a bit of a question mark, in that it’s uncertain when exactly PTC #15 moved to Summit Beach or when it left. 

Summit Beach Amusement Park was located in Akron, Ohio. It went by the names “Akron’s Fairyland of Pleasure” and “Akron’s Million Dollar Playground”. Local businessmen conceived of the idea in 1914, and had incorporated an amusement company by 1916. They took applications from independent concessionaires to fill the park: the Dixie Flyer, a huge coaster; a Whip and a Ferris wheel and a motordrome, for racing. And of course, a carousel. 

Now here is the point of contention, because the recent 2017 retrospective newspaper article about Summit Beach claims that the carousel at the park was a Dentzel menagerie from 1917 with a Wurlitzer band organ. Indeed, another article (Akron Beacon Journal, 2010) shows many pictures of the carousel, and it’s definitely a menagerie – black and white photos show children gleefully perched atop lions and pigs, neither of which are on a equine-only PTC #15. 

However, despite this, the fairly official and well-referenced history of Philadelphia Toboggan Company from Carousel News and Trader states that PTC #15 did go to Summit Beach Amusement Park. 

One possibility is that PTC #15 went not to Summit Beach, but to the adjacent Lakeside Park, which was later absorbed by Summit Beach as it grew. Lakeside began as a trolley park and picnic grounds back in 1886, and was primarily known for its casino theater. One image, which I’ve only been able to find in a Google Books preview of a vintage Ohio postcards book, does show this carousel – located not far from some canoe rentals, next to an open air building. The carousel is decently visible, with at least one horse in the outer row. The scan or photo aren’t clear enough, but it’s possible that this was in fact a four-row all-horse carousel. 

However, the provenance on PTC #15 at Summit Beach is not very clear at all. So let’s not dwell on it. We’re all tired, it’s March of 2020. Let’s call it a mystery and come back to it another time.

(Summit Beach was ultimately quite successful, absorbing Lakeside Park and operating for about 40 years before shutting down in 1958. It was primarily notable outside of the local amusement scene for the 1918 coaster derailment that killed several.)

State Fair Park (Milwaukee, WI)

From here, PTC #15 moved to Wisconsin for a while, heading in 1924 to the newly-opened permanent amusement park at the state fair in Milwaukee. Land of some of my favorite food groups, beer and cheese! 

To talk about the Wisconsin State Fair, we’ve got to go back – way back. The first fair was held in 1851! That year, the fair had between 13,000 to 18,000 guests, and was the largest gathering in Wisconsin at that point. Abraham Lincoln delivered the annual oration at the 8th annual fair, in 1859, and spoke about free labor. For many of the early years, the fair rotated through Wisconsin’s bigger cities: Madison, Milwaukee, Janesville, and Fond du Lac. In 1892, the fair’s 40th year, a permanent home was chosen: West Allis, a Milwaukee suburb. Apparently this was a controversial choice, as many at the time were campaigning instead for a home in Madison, where Camp Randall Stadium is today – right on the university campus, in the middle of the crowded downtown isthmus. By contrast, West Allis was out in the middle of nowhere (at the time) near Milwaukee. It’s interesting to think how that one simple choice could’ve drastically changed an entire city’s downtown! 

Interesting anecdote for the football fans – apparently for several decades (between 1934 and 1951), the Green Bay Packers played several of their regular season games at the State Fair Park, including the 1939 NFL Championship. 

1924 saw the introduction of the signature Wisconsin State Fair food: the cream puff. But it was predated by a few years by the Midway, in 1922, the “old State Fair Midway” (https://www.westalliswi.gov/DocumentCenter/View/362/Historical-and-Architectural-Resources-Survey—Volume-1-of-2?bidId=) and the PTC #15. The midway was “Disneyland before Disneyland”, according to Jerry Zimmerman, the state fair historian, in a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article from 2007. This new midway was a spot for permanent rides, operating under the care of a guy named Charles Rose, and supplemented by the annual travelling shows. Rides were open from Memorial Day to Labor Day. By some accounts, the area was called Fun City.

“”It had a great roller coaster that ran from the front of where the Expo hall is now down to Greenfield Avenue. There was a Ferris wheel, the bug, the hammer, the whip, the octopus, the electric scooter and the old mill that was a tunnel of love, and a great penny arcade,” Zimmerman said. 

The carousel, old PTC #15, was a fair staple for decades at State Fair Park in Wisconsin. I’ll link to a couple of historical photos. https://www.flickr.com/photos/uwmadarchives/5938518204/ https://content.mpl.org/digital/collection/HstoricPho/id/6027/ (Great photo gallery of the entire fair history here.) Apparently Zimmermann used to pretend he was the Lone Ranger when he rode it as a kid at the fair each year, which is an image of great delight to me. 

As these things always go, the old State Fair midway didn’t last. The fair saw a downfall in attendance after World War II, and it was nixed. The fair is still there in West Allis today, but the “old” permanent midway closed at State Fair Park after the 1960 season. 

Dandilion Park / Muskego Beach Park (Muskego, WI)

Following the closure of the permanent midway at State Fair Park, rides were sold to new homes. Our friend Carousel #15 didn’t go far – only about 15 miles southwest, in what is today an outer suburb of Milwaukee, a town called Muskego. 

At that time, the carousel’s new home was called Muskego Beach Amusement Park, or Muskego Beach Resort.

Muskego Beach Amusement Park had been in operation almost as long as the Wisconsin State Fair itself – since 1861! Not much information is available about the earliest years, but regular listeners could probably make a safe guess: that it started out as a picnic grounds type of park. It was opened by Civil War veteran John C. Schuet in 1861, a man called the “King of Muskego” in 1880s politics.

Back then, it was called Muskego Lake House and Beach Resort, where visitors could partake in “picnicking, fishing, boating, swimming and dancing”. (Here’s an interesting tidbit for you – the Muskego Center Cemetery was established on that property in 1881, bordered on three sides by the park. The little pioneer cemetery weathered poorly, stones weather-worn and indecipherable, described in an article as “a nuisance to the community.” Validity of that opinion is up to the individual, but it does seem the small cemetery had lost most interest. It wasn’t until 1955 that all the bodies in the cemetery were exhumed and moved to a different cemetery, Prairie Hill Cemetery in Waukesha.)

Schuet owned the park for over 60 years, selling it in 1928 to its second owner, a guy named William Boszhardt. The details are vague, but Boszhardt definitely added to the amusement park side of things, and is credited with changing the name to Muskego Beach Amusement Park. And while Boszhardt was the owner, a familiar name did the managing: Charles Rose, the same guy from the state fair. 

By 1929, a classic wooden John A. Miller coaster called Cyclone had been installed by Charlie Rose. There were all kinds of our favorite early and mid century theme park rides, like The Whip. But why Muskego?

Here’s the connection for you, and likely the reason that the carousel went where it did. In 1944, in the middle of the war, Charlie Rose bought Muskego Beach Amusement Park from its then-owner, the recently widowed Mrs. William Boszhardt – birth name Nellie Lou Krebs. The park was shut down for the war, but Rose reopened and renovated it afterwards.

For the better part of two decades, then, he owned both the midway at State Fair Park as well as Muskego Beach Amusement Park. When the midway shut down, it was a simple decision that most of the rides would be acquired by Muskego Beach Amusement Park (which Rose also owned), replacing the older and smaller rides at this regional park with bigger rides worthy of a state fair. And Muskego was a short electric rail ride away from downtown Milwaukee, too.

Under Rose’s ownership, the park expanded and developed further. There was a ballroom for dancing operated under private ownership called the Starlight Ballroom, operated by Elsie and Robert Schmidt. Open only on the weekends, it held an air of mystery for younger daytime park visitors. During the weekend days, the ballroom was used as a rollerskating rink. Weekly dances and regular bands were hosted there, and it was said to be a popular evening event. Big names like the Everly Brothers performed, all the way down to smaller local bands.

Other items around the park were upgraded as well. There was an even larger beach for bathing. New rides like the Rolloplane were added, and massive increases made to concession stands and other outbuildings. A man named George gave boat rides on the lake in a fancy Chris-Craft boat from Dandilion Park that were fondly remembered.

TailSpin Coaster at Dandilion Park / Muskego Beach Amusement Park (WI)

The Cyclone coaster closed in the 1950s. I did see one news report of a death on the ride due to a rider standing up while the coaster was in motion and falling off. However, a line from another newspaper article indicates the Cyclone was damaged irreparably in a storm, so this may be the reason for the closure. Indeed, another short blurb from a 2015 issue of Amusement Today notes that the Cyclone was damaged twice in 1950 by wind, with some saying that it “fell over like a set of playing cards”.

Most of the broken ride was removed by the beginning of the 1951 season, according to Amusement Today. Rose was savvy, though, and 700 feet of the Cyclone’s easternmost turnaround was retained and incorporated into the newly-built TailSpin coaster, which opened in 1955. Rose himself designed the TailSpin, built to the tune of about $75,000.

TailSpin had a rough start though. A huge windstorm knocked over 250 feet of the TailSpin tracks, crushing the new Whip and Caterpilar rides in the process, two weeks before the park was set to open for the season and debut the coaster. Damages were estimated at around $125,000, but all save for the coaster were able to open on time two weeks later.  When TailSpin finally did open, it was worth the wait. This coaster is the park’s most famous and memorable. Remembrances online indicate this was a very good coaster – said to be one of the fastest and the steepest for its kind. The drop was a very high 75 feet!

Decline and Closure of Dandilion Park / Muskego Beach Amusement Park (WI)

In or around 1968, the park was sold to a man named Willard Masterson, who changed the name to Dandilion Park. It continued to be a popular place with local school groups, employer celebrations from small businesses and giant Milwaukee area manufacturers alike, reunions, and so forth. 

Around the same time, we had another addition to the park – choo choo, it’s time for The Abandoned Train! Yes, Dandilion Park rode the wave of all of the other theme parks in the mid-1960s and got itself a miniature steam train. Not only a generic train. Nope, Dandilion Park purchased a Chance C. P. Huntington direct from the factory in Wichita, serial number #61. It ran for the remaining years of the park’s operation. 

Trouble started brewing in the early 1970s, though. A young boy fell from the Ferris wheel and died, which may have led to rumors about the park’s safety. Additionally, rumors of a new, massive park being built only an hour away in Gurnee, IL. See, Marriott, the hotel chain, wanted to branch out in the tourism industry. They had three different regions planned: Chicago-Milwaukee, San Francisco, and Baltimore. The Baltimore park was to be the flagship park, but faced a series of bueracratic and local opposition. Ultimately, it was canceled. 

And in 1976, Great America opened, a park you now know as Six Flags Great America. With only two months separation, Marriott opened a Great America park in California and a Great America park in Gurnee, IL. The park was an immediate success, both due to the timing (the 1976 bicentennial) and the use of the licensed Looney Toons character theming. 

And Dandilion Park, only an hour away, felt the pinch. Milwaukee and Chicago residents started going to Great America over Dandilion Park. Why did Dandilion Park / Muskego Beach Amusement Park close? The inevitable economic cycle began – lowered crowds, less money, maintenance falters, crowds stay away, and eventually it became unprofitable to continue operating Dandilion Park. 

Dandilion Park closed in 1978.

The park stayed SBNO, standing but not operating, for several years, until 1983. Ultimately, the land was purchased in order to be turned into condominiums. The park was burned down as practice for the local fire department. Gone up in flames, all but memories.

(That’s not entirely true – the sign from the TailSpin was recovered, restored, and today is owned and displayed by the Muskego Historical Society. The CPH also did not get burned. It was sold to the Tulsa Zoo in Tulsa, OK, where it still operates today, with CPH #90 and #358.) At one point around 2010, a proposal went around to potentially rebuild a beach park at the lake. I’m not sure if that actually went forward or not. And as I said earlier, the land where the park used to be became condos. So it goes. 

Lost Years for Carousel #15

You might be saying, where did the carousel go?

Don’t worry, it didn’t get burned up. That sucker is 70+ years old by this point in our story and has already survived multiple theme parks and at least one fire. This little planned fire wouldn’t stop it.

Carousel in Oshkosh

No, our friend PTC carousel #15 survived. It was purchased prior to the fire by a private group in Oshkosh. At the time, the trend was for carousels to be broken up, selling the desirable horses at higher individual cost to private collectors. The Carousel of Oshkosh, Incorporated group was formed to prevent Carousel #15 from being served the same fate.

The goal was for the carousel to become part of a park in Oshkosh, WI, home of a very good chocolate shop, Oaks Candy. This was to be a new park located near the Oshkosh Airport, to open in 1980. “Scheduled to open in May, 1980, the park will be themed to the turn of the century and will include other amusement rides and attractions typical of that era.”

I’m sure it will come as no surprise to you that this never happened. Oshkosh is an incredibly small town, and the startup costs for a theme park are very large. 

Carol and Duane Perron of the International Carousel Museum of Art bought the carousel in 1984 from the defunct Carousel Oshkosh park company to the tune of $150,000, and began restoring it – almost 80 years old at this point, and the big carousel could certainly have used a day at the spa by then.

The Perrons lived on the West Coast, so the carousel got to take its biggest trip yet by this point, all the way to Oregon. Between 1984 and 1986, they restored the carousel fully to perfect working condition.

Touring with Carousel #15

1986 saw the carousel being sent out of country for the first and only time, up to Vancouver, British Columbia for the Expo ‘86. Interestingly, this move resulted in the carousel being removed from the National Historic Register, as the move was done without consulting the Register first. 

I had to Google this one, but Expo ‘86 was another classic World’s Fair, held in fall of 1986 in Vancouver. World’s fairs are designed to be places for nations to showcase their achievements for one another, and may or may not be themed. (These World’s Fairs are still a thing, by the way, if you didn’t know. I didn’t. The 2020 Expo will be held in Dubai, UAE in October of this year, 2020, should gatherings of more than 10 people be allowed by then.) The very first Ferris wheel was invented for the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago, for instance, as a rival for the previous stunner, 1889’s Eiffel Tower.

Anyhow, back to the Expo ‘86. The theme was “Transportation and Communication: World in Motion, World in Touch”, so you can see how a carousel fit nicely. In a quote from the NY Times writeup: “Its scientific theme should not dissuade vacationers because there is something for everyone, from rival United States and Soviet space stations to a painstakingly restored 1907 carousel with hand-carved and painted wooden horses.” (Again, sidebar: another interesting attraction from this Expo was something called “McBarge”, a floating McDonalds. It’s the subject of a great Bright Sun Films YouTube documentary – check it out.) The carousel lived at the Expo for several months, and was quite a popular attraction, especially for young guests. Here’s a video of the carousel in action at the fair – fast forward to timestamp 19:26.

After the Expo, Carousel #15 spent the next three years traveling on various exhibits up and down the West Coast. While the carousel was not built as a portable model per se, it was clearly able to be assembled and disassembled without much fuss.

Carousel #15 at the Mall

As Robin Sparkles might say, let’s go to the mall, today! Well, at least virtually Following the carousel’s travels with Perron’s International Carousel Museum of Art, Carousel #15 was installed at a California mall.

Puente Hills Mall (City of Industry, CA)

The Puente Hills Mall is located in City of Industry, CA, a made-up-seeming town name that is in fact real, and located in a Los Angeles suburb. The mall opened in 1974 and is still operational today. My perusal of Wikipedia tells me it was most notable for being the filming location for the parking lot scenes from Back to the Future, aka “Twin Pines Mall”. Puente Hills also was home to the first ever Foot Locker store, apparently. 

One of my newest favorite YouTube channels is called Retail Archaeology – videos of malls from active to “dead malls” – malls that are on the verge of closure. Erik from Retail Archaeology did a 2018 video on Puente Hills, and it was nice to watch that last night while doing podcast research on the topic. 

Anyhow, in 1991, our friend Carousel #15 moved to the Puente Hills Mall. It was located on the first floor, in the center of the plus-shaped mall, underneath some massive skylights that really illuminated the newly refreshed carousel. Patrons shopping on the upper levels could easily look down to watch the carousel spin in the atrium below. The carousel seems to have done well for a period of time, and I’m sure all the wooden horses appreciated being inside a nice air-conditioned space instead of weathering decades of Wisconsin winters and summers.

Unfortunately, the late 90s were a period of struggle for Puente Hills Mall, and they had less than 50% occupancy around this time, a terrible sign for a big mall. Things did slowly rebound, but our friend Carousel #15 was removed in 1998 – too expensive, and losing money for the mall operators. 

Today, Puente Hills Mall is operational but struggling again, despite a 2007 remodel. Where the carousel once stood is now just boring carpet, and where visitors once walked through bustling halls, today few gather. Several of the larger stores have been closing in the last few years, including Sears and Forever 21, and anecdotal reports online are that more store closures are inevitable. 

Dead malls are a topic I don’t think I’ve touched on at all here on the podcast yet, but they’re fascinating and I’d say quite relevant given our present day state. Check out Retail Archaeology, Sal’s Expedition Logs, or Dan Bell’s Dead Mall Series on YouTube for days of interesting content on the subject.

Palisades Center Mall (West Nyack, NY) 

So 1998, the Philadelphia Toboggan Company Carousel #15 was removed from Puente Hills Mall in California. It didn’t stay idle, however. 

No, the carousel went on another cross-country trip, back to New York, back to another mall. 

This mall was brand new at the time, though it had been under plan and development for around 16 years. Palisades Center Mall was built on the site of two former landfills, surrounding an old cemetery, and faced down opposition from locals who feared noise and crime well before any construction was even begun. When it opened in 1998, it became the second-largest shopping mall in the New York metro area, and the eighth-largest shopping mall in the US. 

PTC #15 was installed in the third-floor food court, a glorious anachronism against modern tubular white architecture and pipes (“industrial style”). There it spun, tinkling organ bouncing amongst the fast food restaurants and tables and trashcans, shimmering and brightly colored against the white of its surroundings.

Palisades Center Mall is apparently popular on YouTube with elevator enthusiasts, for having high speed “Montgomery Kone traction elevators”. (Did you know there’s an elevator Wiki? Of course there is. https://elevation.fandom.com/wiki/List_of_Montgomery_elevator_fixtures)

Here is where the carousel was re-added to the National Register of Historic Places, in 2001. The carousel lasted for eleven years there in the mall food court, until mall management decided to replace the vintage machine with a modern double-decker masterpiece. In 2009, then, the PTC #15 was last seen operational in public, there in West Nyack, New York.

Carousel #15 in Oregon

Evicted from Palisades Center Mall, Carousel #15 was returned to the Perrons in Oregon. 

For some time, there were plans for a physical carousel museum. Well, there was a physical carousel museum, in Hood River, Oregon. It opened in 1999, and featured over 100 carousel animals on display for visitors to photograph. From an article about the museum, I learned that basswood is what both carousel horses and rulers are made out of, as it is a wood that doesn’t buckle, sweat, crack, or change shape. (The more you know!) 

Whether one or more horses from Carousel #15 was ever on display is not clear, but it’s unlikely, given that the carousel returned to Oregon in mid-2009.

The museum closed in 2010, with the intent of relocating, but this never occurred, and the museum stayed permanently shuttered. 

Conclusions

This then is the last time we hear from the Philadelphia Toboggan Company carousel #15. By all accounts, the carousel is in storage there in Oregon, awaiting a new home. Out with a whimper and not a bang.

As recently as 2018, Jerry Zimmerman at the Wisconsin State Fair was still hoping to get PTC #15 back to Wisconsin – a news article from 2018 described it as his white whale.  “I have tried for years to find someone to bring that back, and I would like to tie that merry go round into a standalone unit on State Fair Park, anchoring a Wisconsin State Fair historical collection,” he said. “I would need a sponsor for about $1.5 million to bring it back to Milwaukee.”

At the height of the American carousel boom, there were said to be thousands of carousels, big and small, mostly handcarved. As the Depression wore on, production slowed, machines were dismantled or lost to fire, and today, there are said to be less than 150 vintage carousels remaining, with less than 50 of the caliber of PTC #15.

At this point, the magnificent carousel is still is storage somewhere in Oregon, under the care of the Perron family after Duane Perron passed away in 2018. Waiting.

56 horses. 52 feet in diameter. Many “firsts”. 600 lights. Four theme parks. Two malls. 

One truly historical carousel: Philadelphia Toboggan Company’s carousel #15.

Remember that what you’ve read is a podcast! A link is included at the top of the page. Listen to more episodes of The Abandoned Carousel on your favorite platform: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | RadioPublic | TuneIn | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Castro. Support the podcast on Patreon for extra content! Comment below to share your thoughts – as Lucy Maud Montgomery once said, nothing is ever really lost to us, as long as we remember it.

References

1. Muskego Historical Society – Photos. https://www.facebook.com/pg/Muskego-Historical-Society-125936920767648/photos/?tab=album&album_id=919519408076058. Accessed March 22, 2020.
2. Remembering Muskego. https://www.facebook.com/groups/74076678068/permalink/10152318693168069/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
3. Remembering Muskego. https://www.facebook.com/groups/74076678068/permalink/10153595412623069/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
4. Remembering Muskego. https://www.facebook.com/groups/74076678068/permalink/10155268807723069/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
5. Remembering Muskego. https://www.facebook.com/groups/74076678068/permalink/10155280218838069/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
6. 9 Jun 1913, Page 1 – The Evening World at Newspapers.com. World Collection. http://newscomwc.newspapers.com/image/78666530/?terms=%22fort%2Bgeorge%22%2Bcarousel&pqsid=mJkpnDv4BLTXj9a0-CyIXA%3A66000%3A260207193. Accessed March 16, 2020.
7. 23 May 1909, Page 1 – The Sun at Newspapers.com. World Collection. http://newscomwc.newspapers.com/image/78185331/?terms=%22fort%2Bgeorge%22%2Bcarousel&pqsid=mJkpnDv4BLTXj9a0-CyIXA%3A66000%3A260207193. Accessed March 16, 2020.
8. 30 Jun 1907, Page 33 – The Brooklyn Daily Eagle at Newspapers.com. World Collection. http://newscomwc.newspapers.com/image/57655397/?terms=%22fort%2Bgeorge%22%2Bcarousel&pqsid=mJkpnDv4BLTXj9a0-CyIXA%3A66000%3A260207193. Accessed March 16, 2020.
9. 1900s MANHATTAN NEW YORK NY. https://www.celebritycarsblog.com/store/1900s-Manhattan-New-York-Ny-wendel-s-Fort-George-Hotel-Nr-Amusement-Park-Token_372978905691.html. Accessed March 15, 2020.
10. Malina C. A Look Back At The History Of The Wisconsin State Fair. Wisconsin Public Radio. https://www.wpr.org/look-back-history-wisconsin-state-fair. Published August 5, 2015. Accessed March 21, 2020.
11. A Piece of Muskego’s Past for $2.2 Million | Muskego, WI Patch. https://patch.com/wisconsin/muskego/a-piece-of-muskego-s-past-for-2-2-million. Accessed March 24, 2020.
12. Inc NBM. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc.; 1950.
13. Inc NBM. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc.; 1956.
14. Inc NBM. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc.; 1957.
15. Inc NBM. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc.; 1958.
16. Inc NBM. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc.; 1958.
17. Inc NBM. Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc.; 1959.
18. Billboard. Billboard Publications; 1950.
19. Brass Ring Entertainment: 1907 PTC Carousel #15. http://web.archive.org/web/20130304172119/http://carousel.com/antique/ptc.html. Published March 4, 2013. Accessed March 22, 2020.
20. Brief History of the Wisconsin State Fair. Wisconsin State Fair Park; 1992.
21. Carousel Rounding Boards Part 1. The Woodcarver’s Cabin. http://www.thewoodcarverscabin.com/workshop/carousel-rounding-boards-part-1/. Accessed March 19, 2020.
22. Dandelion Park in WI – CoasterBuzz. https://coasterbuzz.com/Forums/Topic/dandelion-park-in-wi. Accessed March 22, 2020.
23. dandilion.html. http://freepages.rootsweb.com/~howardlake/history/amusement16/dandilion.html. Accessed March 22, 2020.
24. Dead Mall Watchlist: Puente Hills Mall. reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/deadmalls/comments/cjtph6/dead_mall_watchlist_puente_hills_mall/. Accessed March 23, 2020.
25. Expo 86. In: Wikipedia. ; 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Expo_86&oldid=946051749. Accessed March 22, 2020.
26. Expo 86 (Vancouver, B.C.) – City of Vancouver Archives. https://searcharchives.vancouver.ca/expo-86-21. Accessed March 22, 2020.
27. Expo 86: When Vancouver wooed the world, in 30 photos. Vancouver Sun. https://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/expo-86-when-vancouver-wooed-the-world-30-photos-30-years-later. Accessed March 22, 2020.
28. Fort George Amusement Park. In: Wikipedia. ; 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Fort_George_Amusement_Park&oldid=939676110. Accessed March 16, 2020.
29. Fort George Amusement Park | Museum of the City of New York. https://www.mcny.org/story/fort-george-amusement-park. Accessed March 19, 2020.
30. Fort George: Manhattan’s long-lost amusement park. 6sqft. https://www.6sqft.com/the-history-of-fort-george-manhattans-long-lost-amusement-park-in-inwood/. Accessed March 15, 2020.
31. ftgeorgeny.html. http://freepages.rootsweb.com/~howardlake/history/amusement7/ftgeorgeny.html. Accessed March 16, 2020.
32. Fun City (West Allis, Wisconsin, United States). https://rcdb.com/9434.htm. Accessed March 22, 2020.
33. Help Identify this coaster! https://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=66558. Accessed March 24, 2020.
34. Historic Carousel Rides Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters. Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters, Inc. https://www.philadelphiatoboggancoastersinc.com/active-rides/historic-carousel-rides/. Accessed March 15, 2020.
35. Historical-and-Architectural-Resources-Survey—Volume-1-of-2.pdf. https://www.westalliswi.gov/DocumentCenter/View/362/Historical-and-Architectural-Resources-Survey—Volume-1-of-2?bidId=. Accessed March 22, 2020.
36. Cindy. History in Pictures- Summer Fun Edition. Akron Ohio Moms. http://www.akronohiomoms.com/activities/camps/history-pictures-summer-fun-edition/. Published April 29, 2016. Accessed March 16, 2020.
37. admin. History of the Fort George Amusement Park. | My Inwood. November 2013. http://myinwood.net/fort-george-amusement-park/. Accessed March 15, 2020.
38. History Of The Wisconsin State Fair. WISN. https://www.wisn.com/article/history-of-the-wisconsin-state-fair/6294484. Published July 30, 2009. Accessed March 21, 2020.
39. International Museum of Carousel Art – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Museum_of_Carousel_Art. Accessed March 18, 2020.
40. International Museum of Carousel Art on Oregon.com. archive.is. http://archive.is/5mvN0. Published January 31, 2013. Accessed March 23, 2020.
41. Janesville Rd. | National or State Registers Record. Wisconsin Historical Society. https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Records/NationalRegister/NR969. Published January 1, 2012. Accessed March 15, 2020.
42. Hullum R. Jerry Zimmerman and the Hope for a Year-Round State Fair History Exhibit. Shepherd Express. https://shepherdexpress.com/api/content/78ed81f4-89eb-11e8-8a5d-12408cbff2b0/. Published July 17, 2018. Accessed March 21, 2020.
43. Lake George trip – 7/7-9/06 – jimvid. https://jimvid.smugmug.com/Amusement-Park/Lake-George-trip-77-906/i-b9fkfd7. Accessed March 24, 2020.
44. Lake Land Was Once a Cemetery. Muskego, WI Patch. https://patch.com/wisconsin/muskego/bp–lake-land-was-once-a-cemetery. Published June 30, 2012. Accessed March 22, 2020.
45. Gottlock B, Gottlock W. Lost Amusement Parks of New York City: Beyond Coney Island. Arcadia Publishing; 2013.
46. Lost Amusement Parks of New York City: Beyond Coney Island – Barbara Gottlock, Wesley Gottlock – Google Books. https://books.google.com/books?id=gdl2CQAAQBAJ&pg=PT33&lpg=PT33&dq=%22Ptc+%2315%22&source=bl&ots=QHoqH_jb_U&sig=ACfU3U1fmiBwBPc3fkitZQMt8ZCnvMm9uQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjTvMfowqDoAhUIHc0KHQutD8gQ6AEwD3oECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22Ptc%20%2315%22&f=false. Accessed March 22, 2020.
47. Mall carousel. The Journal News. June 20, 1999:16.
48. Mall carousel. The Journal News. June 20, 1999:16.
49. Mall’s Future in Doubt Amid Many Questions – The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/12/nyregion/mall-s-future-in-doubt-amid-many-questions.html?src=pm. Accessed March 23, 2020.
50. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. https://www.jsonline.com/services/cobrand/header/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
51. Kaczkowski M. Milwaukee’s Historic Bowling Alleys. Arcadia Publishing; 2010.
52. Museum of the City of New York – Audubon Ave. [Amsterdam to Battery Place.]. https://collections.mcny.org/CS.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UP1GCO8NEI&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=597. Accessed March 19, 2020.
53. Nuclear_Art. Muskego Beach.; 2012. https://www.flickr.com/photos/36625118@N00/6827404335/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
54. Muskego Beach. http://www.muskegohistory.org/MuskegoBeach.aspx. Accessed March 22, 2020.
55. Muskego Beach / DandiLion Park. http://retrocom.com/milwaukeetalk/index.php?topic=172.0. Accessed March 22, 2020.
56. Muskego Beach Amusement Park. http://www.wisconsinhistoricalmarkers.com/2014/12/muskego-beach-amusement-park.html. Accessed March 22, 2020.
57. Muskego Beach new owners 1968. Waukesha Daily Freeman. May 31, 1968:23.
58. Muskego Cemetery, Muskego Township Waukesha County, Wisconsin – Waukesha County WI. https://www.linkstothepast.com/waukesha/104.php. Accessed March 22, 2020.
59. Muskego Historical Society – Posts. https://www.facebook.com/125936920767648/photos/a.125939274100746/1504840396210620/?type=3. Accessed March 22, 2020.
60. Muskego Historical Society – Posts. https://www.facebook.com/125936920767648/photos/a.125939274100746/1516183058409687/?type=3. Accessed March 22, 2020.
61. Muskego injury 1952. The Oshkosh Northwestern. July 14, 1952:13.
62. National Carousel Association – Major Carousel Builders and Carvers, by Brian Morgan (Page 2 of 3). https://carousels.org/Carvers_Builders2.html. Accessed March 18, 2020.
63. New York Carousels | RoadsideArchitecture.com. https://roadarch.com/carousels/ny2.html. Accessed March 22, 2020.
64. Department of the Interior. National Park Service. (3/2/1934 – ). New York SP Philadelphia Toboggan Company Carousel Number 15.; 2013.
65. Ohio’s Amusement Parks in Vintage Postcards – David W. Francis, Diane DeMali Francis – Google Books. https://books.google.com/books?id=T1H_lzFYRngC&pg=PA8&lpg=PA8&dq=%22lakeside+park%22+ohio+%22summit+beach%22&source=bl&ots=sMflBVu97f&sig=ACfU3U2FZWY1atqVb2hJNRQIsIA9C2L0eA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjU-ruciqPoAhUZHs0KHQ9WBl4Q6AEwCHoECAsQAQ#v=onepage&q=%22lakeside%20park%22%20ohio%20%22summit%20beach%22&f=false. Accessed March 17, 2020.
66. Palisades Center. In: Wikipedia. ; 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Palisades_Center&oldid=945239926. Accessed March 23, 2020.
67. PALISADES CENTER REPLACES HISTORIC CAROUSEL. https://nypost.com/2009/08/27/palisades-center-replaces-historic-carousel/. Accessed March 16, 2020.
68. Philadelphia Toboggan Company Carousel Number 15. In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Philadelphia_Toboggan_Company_Carousel_Number_15&oldid=915065516. Accessed March 15, 2020.
69. Philadelphia Toboggan Company Carousel Number 15. LandmarkHunter.com. http://landmarkhunter.com/108842-philadelphia-toboggan-company-carousel-number-15. Accessed March 15, 2020.
70. caboose_rodeo. PTC #15 Palisades Mall NY.; 2007. https://www.flickr.com/photos/cemeteryrodeo/2150437385/. Accessed March 16, 2020.
71. Puente Hills Mall. In: Wikipedia. ; 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Puente_Hills_Mall&oldid=941783781. Accessed March 23, 2020.
72. Puente Hills Mall Aka Twin Pines Mall From Back To The Future! | Dead Mall Documentary. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-t8mQhlOjA. Accessed March 23, 2020.
73. Quassy Lake Carousel HistoryCarouselHistory.com. https://carouselhistory.com/quassy-lake-carousel-history/. Accessed March 18, 2020.
74. Remembering DandiLion Park in Muskego. WTMJ. March 2019. https://wtmj.com/we-love-wisconsin/2019/03/14/remembering-dandilion-park-in-muskego/. Accessed March 22, 2020.
75. Remembering the carousel museum that nearly came to Tacoma | Tacoma News Tribune. https://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/larry-larue/article26251600.html. Accessed March 18, 2020.
76. Sep-Oct_10.pdf. https://stacks.stanford.edu/file/druid:xx941jv5034/Sep-Oct_10.pdf. Accessed March 19, 2020.
77. summit beach Archives – Akron Postcards. https://akron.thomconte.com/tag/summit-beach/. Accessed March 17, 2020.
78. Summit Lake. Paranormal Playground. http://paranormalplayground.weebly.com/summitlake.html. Accessed March 16, 2020.
79. Summit Lake: A Place of History and Transformation. http://www.akronciviccommons.org/summit-lake-a-place-of-history-and-transformation1.html. Accessed March 16, 2020.
80. The History of Waukesha County, Wisconsin, Containing an Account of Its Settlement, Growth, Development, and Resources … Waukesha County Historical Society; 1880.
81. Glauber B. The surprising history of State Fair Park. Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/2017/07/31/state-fair-park-sees-125-years-wisconsin-cows-carnies-and-cream-puffs/510023001/. Accessed March 21, 2020.
82. Wren CS. Vancouver Unwraps Its World’s Fair. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/1986/04/20/travel/vancouver-unwraps-its-world-s-fair.html. Published April 20, 1986. Accessed March 22, 2020.
83. Department of the Interior. National Park Service. (3/2/1934 – ). Wisconsin Philadelphia Toboggan Company Carousel No. 15: Withdrawn.; 2013.
84. Wisconsin State Fair. Wisconsin Historical Society. https://www.wisconsinhistory.org/Records/Article/CS3963. Published December 14, 2014. Accessed March 21, 2020.
85. Wisconsin State Fair Park. In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wisconsin_State_Fair_Park&oldid=928281377. Accessed March 22, 2020.
86. Wisconsin State Fair, 1900-’90: Entertaining, daring, unusual looks at life. https://www.jsonline.com/picture-gallery/entertainment/festivals/2019/07/30/wisconsin-state-fair-1900-90-entertaining-daring-unusual-looks-life/1864998001/. Accessed March 22, 2020.

The post Carousel #15 appeared first on The Abandoned Carousel.

When one is trying to visit Little Amerricka, the first impression is always along the lines of “Are you sure you typed the right address into the map?”

To get to Little Amerricka, one heads west from Milwaukee or east from Madison, there in the heart of Wisconsin. Exit number 250 off I-94. And then you drive another five miles along WI-73, past farmhouses in groves of shady trees, big fields of corn starting to grow tall in the summer sun. A nice little two lane road. It’s just rural enough and just far enough off the beaten path that you invariably ask your fellow car-riders: “Are you sure this is the right way?”

But eventually you hit the small town of Marshall and take a right at the Ace Hardware, and then there it is, just down Main Street. The first thing you see is a bizarre tree – no, is that a roller coaster? And that, no, THAT is definitely a giant inflatable tiger butt.

And that, my friends, is how I met the Little Amerricka theme park.

Lee Merrick and Darryl Klompmaker

The park is spelled A-merrick-a, a somewhat troubling yet ultimately harmless spelling, named after its founder, Lee Merrick.

Lee Merrick was born in Illinois. He was a farm boy. Eventually, he found his success in the necessary but unpleasant field of livestock rendering. (His son, Garth, currently runs the Merrick’s brand of pet food, seen in stores all over.) 

In his spare time, Lee Merrick found a hobby in large-scale miniature trains. Not train sets like in someone’s basement, but “grand scale” or rideable miniature trains. Such as those we might talk about here on The Abandoned Carousel, for instance. Yes, my friends, we are talking about trains again, so hang on to your hats.

Merrick had been involved in the grand scale miniature train scene since the mid-60s, but it took until 1987 for Merrick to meet up with the other main figure in our story: Darryl Klompmaker. That year, 1987, Merrick purchased the land in Marshall, WI that is now Little Amerricka, and set up himself a nice miniature train loop. According to Klompmaker in an interview with Parkworld Online, the train was the genesis for Little Amerricka. You see, they set it up so that the train took guests out to pick Christmas trees and then took them back to their cars – can you imagine how fun that would be, a steam engine on a snowy Wisconsin winter day, maybe some hot chocolate?

The train ride was incredibly popular, and they soon added a second building near the train loop. This building can still be seen today: it’s right at the entrance to the park, and is now the main concessions and offices. 

Even back at this time in the late 1980s, Klompmaker said that Merrick already had four rides in storage. These were reportedly the Ferris wheel, the tilt-a-whirl, the fire truck ride, and the bumper cars. Reportedly, Merrick offered Klompmaker a job, and in 1989 plans for the park began in earnest. 

Klompmaker is quoted as saying: ““I kind of fell into the amusement industry. Lee didn’t really have a plan, he just had the railroad. He thought that if we added a miniature golf course and a couple of rides alongside the train, it might draw people in and keep them longer. ””

In 1991, Little Amerricka opened, with those original four rides, the mini golf course, and the extended train loop. By the time of this episode in 2019, the park has 26 operating rides, catering to the young family crowd in southern Wisconsin. 

The park, unlike some, wasn’t planned. There were no blueprints, and some of the rides have moved a few times during the park’s lifetime. “It just kinda grew, almost like a mushroom”, said Merrick in a video interview from years ago. “Wasn’t planned, it was just spontaneous”.

What I personally love about Little Amerricka is how it has taken all of these seeds of older parks and planted them to grow anew. Little Amerricka has only been open for 28 years, but it feels like a place from out of time, like it’s been there in the cornfields longer than forever.

Ambience 

Like I said, the park is situated about five miles from the nearest “big road”. Location is key, yes, but this is still close enough and easy enough to access that the park hasn’t suffered as a result. 

You park your car adjacent to the theme park, either in a grassy field or a muddy field, depending on how recently it’s rained. There are two entrances, one from the parking lot and one right off Main Street, for any pedestrians. Of course, entrance to the park itself is free. Little Amerricka has a wristband/ticket system and allows guests to bring in their own food and drink. This obviously makes the park a cost-effective place for families to visit. 

Rides at Little Amerricka

The atmosphere is charming and freewheeling, like something out of a history film. Each of the park’s 26 rides tell a story. Today, I’ll be telling you a little bit about a lot of different defunct theme parks, because that’s the thread that weaves through Little Amerricka.

Wild & Wooly Toboggan at Little Amerricka

Take the connective tissue between this episode and the last. Perhaps you’re not listening in release order. That’s fine, this isn’t a serialized podcast. In last week’s episode, I talked about Dogpatch USA, that theme park down in Arkansas based on Al Capp’s Li’l Abner comic strip. Well, Dogpatch USA closed at the end of the 1993 season and began selling off its assets. One of the rides being sold was that original prototype Chance Toboggan, called Earthquake McGoon’s Brain Rattler. This was different than later Chance Toboggans, in that it was not on a trailer but a permanent installation, built in 1969. 

I misspoke slightly last week, though, so let’s correct the record. Before Dogpatch was closed, the Toboggan was sold in an effort to cut costs, reportedly around 1988. A little park called Enchanted Forest in Chesterton, Indiana purchased the ride in a last-ditch effort to stay operational itself. We’ll talk more about Enchanted Forest in a minute, but know that that effort was in vain. Enchanted Forest operated through the 1990 season and did not reopen in 1991. In the fall of 1991, all their assets went up for auction, and we’ve got a delightful treasure online – the original 1991 auction flyer. In the link for the auction flyer, you can see pictures of the rides on offer, including Toboggan, painted its distinctive tan on brown, and see the serial number: 69-4101. 

Well, Merrick and Klompmaker purchased the Toboggan at the auction for a cool $30,000, and installed it at Little Amerricka soon after. Klompmaker is quoted in the Little Amerricka mini-documentary as saying that the color scheme (brown and tan) appealed greatly to Merrick, and though they hadn’t planned on purchasing the ride, they knew they had to have it. 

Interestingly, the Indiana state inspection sticker on the ride could be seen in 2001, years after it had been operating in WI.

Today, the Toboggan at Little Amerricka is the last currently operating Toboggan at the time of this recording, according to the Roller Coaster Database, although there are a few nominally in storage. One such “in storage” is the Toboggan at Connaut Lake Park in Pennsylvania, which can be seen folded in pieces in a summer 2019 photo, overgrown with vines and other flora, rusting apart https://rcdb.com/1671.htm#p=102417.

Funnily enough, this coaster is often one of the major draws to Little Amerricka, at least for out-of-towners, due to the novelty of the coaster. See, apparently “coaster counts” or “coaster credits” are a thing, where coaster enthusiasts travel the world and log as many coasters as they can ride. The current leader on the website Coaster Count, George, has ridden 2,872 coasters as of the time of this recording.

Back at Little Amerricka, some in trip reports describe the Toboggan as the worst coaster ever devised. One trip report says: “Ironically, after 500 roller coasters, the scariest rides are no longer ultra-intimidating stratacoasters but things like this.” There’s about 450 ft of track, crammed into about 45 ft of length. The coaster cars are tiny, small claustrophobic enclosed cages for two. This is not the ride for a tall person. 

How does the ride work? The chain winches you vertically up the central tube, staring at the sky like an astronaut about to launch. Then, a dizzying downward spiral, five and a half times around the outside of the lift tube. Since visibility is compromised in the cage-like car, the violent little bunny hills at the end are a jarring surprise. Your knees, head, and back take a beating on this ride, despite the car’s padding, despite the apparent simplicity of the ride, as you slam back into the station. 

It’s either a blessing or a curse for the rollercoaster enthusiast.

Every ride at Little Amerricka has a history, though of course we don’t know about all of them in as much detail. The rides are almost entirely secondhand, allowing the visitor in the know to trace the connections to parks past, parks still operational or parks defunct.

Mad Mouse at Little Amerricka

Let’s go back to Enchanted Forest. Klompmaker and Merrick had gone to the auction at Enchanted Forest in Chesterton, Indiana, intent on purchasing a Scrambler ride. They ended up with a lot of stuff: the Scrambler, the Toboggan. 

Something else that was there caught their eye though, at that auction, and like the best of the impulse purchasers among us, they bought it: the Mad Mouse coaster, to the tune of $6,000. The coaster can be seen in operation there in this vintage TV commercial on YouTube and in a still photo from the 50s or 60s here.

(Enchanted Forest sat in a state of flux for a few years, as I’ve alluded to a few times – it’s a park worthy of its own episode. But briefly, for now, the park operated between 1994-2009 as Splash Down Dunes. It then operated from 2013-2017 as Seven Peaks Water Park Duneland, and is currently abandoned. Like I said, it’s worthy of its own episode.)

Here’s a great aerial shot of Mad Mouse: http://www.coastergallery.com/2001/LA05.html. As noted in the Dogpatch USA episode, this coaster is not the mouse coaster from Dogpatch – that was a Monster Mouse model, with an extra loop of track to the left of the lift hill. Demonstrated in this image, Little Amerricka has a Wild Mouse model, which doesn’t have that extra track. The Allan Herschell Mad Mouse is an endangered species. This specific coaster, a “Wild Mouse” model, was manufactured in 1960 (serial number 432760), and has been at Little Amerricka since 1993. It was the only Herschell Mad Mouse in operation until just a few months ago, when another Wild Mouse opened at the small Arnolds Park in Iowa, its third location.

I’m not sure that we’ve talked about a Mad Mouse coaster in any depth yet here on The Abandoned Carousel. If you’re unfamiliar, mouse coasters run with single wide cars instead of trains of cars; the wide cars overhang the edges of the tracks and contribute to the psychology of the ride. The track itself is characterized by many tight, unbanked turns, as well as short bunny hills. Despite their name and descriptions, mouse coasters are often quite thrilling, with abrupt negative G forces and quite good airtime (the cars often are without seatbelts, particularly on vintage models). The original ride operator instructions were apparently “”Sit down, shut up, and hold on!”” an exact quote, apparently.

Some chide the appearance of the Mad Mouse. One review describes it as “it’s basically a giant plug-and-play erector set roller coaster”. Another commenter online describes it thusly: “Mad Mouse twists and turns on a naked track that weebles and wobbles”. And still others call it rickety, rusty, horrifying, “deathtrap” and “never quite seen one like it”. BUT they also usually love it. The Mad Mouse at Little Amerricka is generally considered its most popular coaster.

In a final fun fact, the cars all have padded bumpers on the front, because originally at Enchanted Forest, seven cars were run at a time, and if they bumped into each other, well, how about a little padding from a pool noodle? Now at Little Amerricka, they usually only run 3 or 4 at a time. 

Monorail and Other Rides at Little Amerricka

Merrick and Klompmaker have found impulse purchases at other places, too. The auction for the former Peony Park, in Omaha, NE, occurred in 1994. They went down to purchase the kiddie boat ride, where a handful of boats spin in endless circles over a pool of water. (Spoiler alert, this is one of my kids’ least favorite rides.) In addition, though, they picked up an incredibly unique ride on a whim: the monorail, formerly called “Sky Rail”. Apparently it took about six trips with one truck back and forth between Marshall WI and Omaha NE to move the pieces of the Sky Rail.

This is technically not a monorail since there are three rails, but let’s not be pedantic about things. The ride is actually Mad Mouse-esque, with wide cars that overhang the tracks. However, it’s ultimately just one big loop that circles most of the park, allowing for lovely views. One report claims without source that only two of these rides were ever made, and that this is the only one in operation. I do believe it, because despite my research I have been unable to find another other rides like this.

Other rides we have less details on. 

Take that Ferris wheel, stored away and opened with the park. “12-Car Eli Ferris Wheel came from Wonderland Park in Amarillo, Texas, when Wonderland upgraded” their wheel. It can be seen operating at Wonderland here: https://www.wonderlandpark.com/our-history?lightbox=dataItem-ixxq564f3 Otherwise, not much is known about it. 

The carousel reportedly came from somewhere in Boston. The Tilt-a-whirl “possibly” came from Ohio, and has been moved twice on the Little Amerricka grounds. One report pings this as the oldest permanent currently operational Til-a-whirl in the world, with serial number 614 from 1939, though Wikipedia cites without sources a claim that a Midwest traveling carnival called “Evans United Shows” still operates a 1927 model. Little Amerricka’s Tilt-a-whirl has a licensed Mario sculpture in the center.

Little Dipper, the Allan Herschell classic kiddie coaster, came from a private owner who’d been running the ride in his backyard. It came to Little Amerricka when the Missouri town he lived in decided to institute a “no coasters in the backyard” policy. The Little Dipper was manufactured in 1953 and still has the original flat iron wheels. It makes a small circuit around the kiddie ride area at Little Amerricka, with an 11-ft lift hill and a few bunny hills before the station. Apparently in most parks, this ride has a MAXIMUM height limit; here at Little Amerricka, anyone can ride. 

I don’t need to go through the entire list of the park’s ride, but suffice to say there are plenty: bumper boats, a haunted house, mini-golf, an inflatable slide, a carousel, bounce house, etc. The only ride the park purchased brand new was the Red Baron kiddie airplane ride. 

Roll-o-plane at Little Amerricka

The Roll-o-plane at Little Amerricka (“Test Pilot”) is a gem in the crown of the park. If you’re not familiar with the ride, this was a 1934 improvement on the 1931 Eyerly Loop-o-Plane. Not familiar with that? The rides were built by the Eyerly Aircraft Company. Another Lee, Lee Eyerly, had always been a mechanically inclined person. He built and raced his own cars and airplanes in the early 1900s, and actually began his own flying school, there in Oregon. He built a custom flight trainer for his students, called simply “Aeroplane” (originally the Orientator). The students did well, but Eyerley began being approached by a salesman who saw the flight trainer while passing by the school’s parking lot. (Video of this early trainer can be seen here.)

The salesman proposed selling the Aeroplane to theme parks and carnivals, and Eyerley reluctantly agreed. Upon seeing the profit totals that next year, though, he was happily surprised, and the Loop-o-plane came out soon after. A 1951 Billboard article notes that over 500 of these had been produced at that point, saying “there is scarcely a show or a park that doesn’t have one.”

The Rolloplane, then, came in 1934. This ride executes an “Immelmann turn”, named after the WWI ace Max Immelmann. An Immelmann goes as follows: the plane accelerates at level flight, then climbs vertically (a half loop). The plane then completes a half-roll, coming back to level flight at an altitude above the original flight path. Reportedly, this is a difficult maneuver. 

Anyhow, despite once being such an incredibly popular ride, this is now 2019, and very few Loop-o-planes or Roll-o-planes are operational anymore. Merrick and Klompmaker picked up their Roll-o-plane from “a very small park in northern Indiana” for $75,000. Klompmaker is quoted describing his pride in their restoration of the ride. Apparently, the same ride inspector who’d once inspected the ride in Indiana came and did the inspection on the ride in Wisconsin, and didn’t believe it was the same ride until he’d checked the serial number.

The ride is pristine, shiny and gorgeous, and the operators are generous with ride time. It’s probably the most thrilling ride at Little Amerricka.

Meteor at Little Amerricka

The Meteor is the shining star of the Little Amerricka ride pantheon. It’s reportedly the only wooden coaster that’s been successfully moved twice. The Meteor, you see, was originally called the Little Dipper. It was manufactured by PTC, Philadelphia Toboggan Company, for the Kiddietown park in the Chicago area (Norridge, IL), beginning in 1953. 

It was a nice little junior coaster, and reportedly was one of six manufactured; today only one nearly-identical sister coaster survives, at Kiddieland in Melrose Park, IL.

Little Dipper, as it was known then, operated there until Kiddietown was shuttered. The coaster has serial number 120 from PTC, and was designed by Herbert Paul Schmeck. Do you remember another coaster I’ve already talked about here on TAC that was also designed by him?  I’ll post the answer in the website shownotes.

Hillcrest Park, another Chicagoland location (Lemont, IL) purchased the classic wooden coaster in 1966 for $6,000, and spent another $66,000 to move the coaster 30 miles from one side of Chicago to the other. Images of its disassembly at Kiddietown can be seen here: https://rcdb.com/2571.htm#p=8287. The former site of Kiddietown is now a bank. 

Hillcrest is not a very well-known place. It was a private “picnic park”, used for corporate outings, weddings, etc. The park handled between 200-2000 guests, depending on the day. Little Dipper operated there from 1967 until 2003. Images can be seen here: https://rcdb.com/327.htm In addition to the coast, Hillcrest operated a helicopter ride, bumper cars, a merry go round, and had a C. P. Huntington miniature train: number 41. 

In 2003, Hillcrest Park simultaneously saw a decline in the number of corporate outings and an increase in the value of the land. It became not profitable to operate the park, so it was closed in 2003. Today, the land is warehouses, storage, and parking lots.

The auction for Hillcrest Park was held in October of 2003, and of course, Klompmaker was in attendance. He purchased the little woody coaster for between $9-10k. Lest these numbers start making you think you might open your own park in your spare time, it then took Klompmaker another three years and over $100,000 to restore the ride and install it at Little Amerricka. 

Little Amerricka had to replace about 75% of the lumber in the wooden coaster, but “it was still cheaper than buying new”. (You can find 2005 pictures of the disassembled coaster sitting in a field at Little Amerricka here) Today, the coaster sits in the center of the park, looking as though the rest of Little Amerricka had been planned around it, despite being one of the newest additions to the park. It has a unique curved loading station and still uses the classic large person-sized wooden handles for braking the coaster.

The sister coaster I’d mentioned earlier was purchased from Kiddieland Melrose Park by Six Flags Great America in 2009 and currently operates there at the time of this recording.

One of the best parts of Little Amerricka is the ride operators, who give you plenty of bang for your buck. For your two tickets ($3), you get at least three complete circuits on the coaster. More, depending on how the operator is feeling that day. 

A Comet Coaster at Little Amerricka?

Interestingly, the Meteor is, according to some, only practice for a larger event. 

Merrick and Klompmaker took a trip to New England in the early 2000s, inspecting some defunct coasters: at Whalom Park and Lincoln Park, both Massachusetts theme parks. 

Whalom Park’s Flyer Comet

At Whalom Park, they were looking into the Flyer Comet coaster (vintage on-ride video). Opened in 1940 and closed around 2000, the Flyer Comet was a classic old figure-eight style woodie designed by Vernon Keenan (image). Whalom Park shuttered, as seems to be the common refrain, due to financial struggles and competition for audiences from mega-parks like Six Flags. However, the park sat abandoned for half a decade after its closure, as assets were sold off piece by piece, or left to rot. The Flyer Comet fit both these categories. Unfortunately, weather and time had not been kind to the ride, some 70 years old at the time it enters our story. 

Klompmaker and Merrick inspected the ride, and found the wood of the Flyer Comet coaster in very poor shape. (Unsurprising, as trip reports and memories of the park from its active years in the late 90s described the coaster as dangerous and wobbly. Some even remember seeing actual pieces of wood fall off during coaster rides.) 

Despite the quality of the wood, Klompmaker and Merrick were able to salvage the lift motors, lift chain, and other station parts. This required the track of the coaster to be cut apart, reportedly the final death knell for the original Flyer Comet. The coaster sat, cut up and overtaken with greenery, for several more years, prior to its demolition. 

Lincoln Park’s Comet

Their next stop was Lincoln Park, in North Dartmouth (an unrelated, unlisted, hilarious video: “link in park”). This park had been around since 1894, operating first as a picnic park, traditional to that time period, and then later becoming an amusement park. There, they were looking at another vintage wooden coaster: the Comet, opened in 1947. This one was designed by Vernon Keenan (wait – screeching noise – yes, the same Vernon Keenan who designed the Flyer Comet we just talked about! Funny world, that). Keenan designed the Comet (with Edward Leis) and it was built by Harry Baker. Keenan and Baker also built the 1927 Coney Island Cyclone coaster. Ironically, the oldest of this family of coasters is the only one still operational. 

(As a sidebar to a sidebar, the Coney Island Cyclone was saved from demolition by a massive refurbishment effort in the mid-1970s and millions of dollars have been invested since in order to keep the ride running, along with another major refurbishment in 2011. Apparently the structure is considered “irreplaceable”, since wooden coasters can no longer be built under NYC building codes. A single ride today on this 92-year-old coaster costs $10.)

There’s a great video from opening day of the Comet (1947) available on YouTube.

Again, we’ll only go into it briefly since this is a Little Amerricka episode and not a Lincoln Park episode, but the downfall of /this/ park, for once, was not solely finances. In fact, it revolves around the coaster we’re talking about. This time the story is a bit more grim. In 1986, there was a fatal accident on the Comet coaster. The owner reportedly invested $75,000 in upgrades and park safety, but it wasn’t enough. Only four months after the owner was quoted in the papers talking about the ride’s safety, the coaster’s brakes failed (or were applied too early, according to others). This caused a coaster car to actually jackknife on the track and derail, leaving passengers dangling over the edge and reportedly injuring four (image of the incident). The coaster’s cars are quite arresting-looking, even moreso when they’re not on the tracks correctly. This 1987 ride was the coaster’s last, and ultimately the park closed as a result a few months later. 

The park changed hands several times before its current development company owner purchased it. This didn’t do the park any favors, as it suffered heavy damages from arson and vandalism. Many of Lincoln Park’s assets were auctioned off, but the coaster was left, standing but not operating. It was already 40 years old at the time of the park’s closure. And there it sat. Reportedly, the jackknifed coaster car stayed in place on the track well into the 90s.

Well, come the mid-2000s, Merrick and Klompmaker investigated the coaster and its components, now up for sale after the lift hill collapsed in 2005. The wood from the track was obviously in poor shape, unsurprising considering it had been unmaintained in the elements for almost another two decades since the park’s closure. Despite the coaster’s somewhat grim ending, they ended up purchasing the trains from the Comet, as well as the blueprints for the ride. Reportedly, one train is in decent shape while the other (probably our jackknifed friend) needs significant work.

Ultimately, the plan is to refurbish the original trains, and then to use new lumber to build a copy of the Comet at Little Amerricka. (For the interested, here is an archived page detailing the structural components of the Comet.) This is obviously a huge plan for a little park, and there is no expected timetable for this to occur at this time. But what an eventual tribute to two longstanding wooden coasters this will be when it’s completed!

The Comet’s remaining wooden structure was demolished in 2012. The land is now condominiums. A company named Marion Millworks reportedly was given salvage rights for the former coaster’s lumber, and is said to have created unique outdoor furniture and other items with the wood.

Log Flume at Little Amerricka?

Not only are they planning on a larger coaster. They also have plans for a water ride, too.

Klompmaker and Merrick had been on the trail of a log flume for the park for years. They passed on a poor-quality flume at the auction for the Old Indiana theme park; they never heard back about their offer on the log flume from Miracle Strip Amusement Park in FL. Ultimately, they purchased a log flume called the “Log Jammer” from Kiddieland in Melrose Park, IL, which opened in 1995 and closed in 2009. (You might remember me mentioning Kiddieland in Melrose Park a few minutes ago – it was the original home of the sister to the Meteor coaster.) The pieces to the log flume have sat in a field at Little Amerricka for years, maintained but not yet assembled, visible from the monorail. Eventually, the log flume will be installed at Little Amerricka. One blog reports that the estimated concrete costs alone are up around $1M, so it is not expected that this flume will open anytime soon.

Whiskey River Railway at Little Amerricka

We talked about the train at the beginning of the episode, but I haven’t really made it clear that this park has a fairly legit railroad. Little Amerricka operates three different steam trains. Their first was the Atlantic, nicknamed The Little Engine That Could, was built in 1969 and came from the Sanford Zoo in FL. This engine was a 16” gauge, which is why the Whiskey River Railway is made to 16” and not the more common 15”.

The next train to come was the Oakland Acorn, built in 1949 by George Reddington and Robert Blecha in Oakland Park in California. It has a sister, the Gene Autry Melody Ranch Special, “Daylight”. These two trains are actually identical, just “dressed” differently. 

Here’s a great video showcasing the WRR; it includes a video interview with Lee Merrick before he passed.

The track itself covers a great distance, about 2.5 miles, and takes about 20 minutes to traverse. There are grade crossings, a tunnel, and a roundhouse. Trains can reportedly hold around 150 people at a time, and the train is actually the park’s most expensive ride. 

The train starts out by looping through most of the park; it then meanders through outbuildings before moving into farmland and fields. There are farm animals, including sheep and llamas. A fairly recent addition is a second stop at the Whistle Stop Campground, the new accomodations adjacent to the park. 

Ups and Downs for Little Amerricka

Things haven’t been perfect for Little Amerricka over the years..

A fire in 2000 caused over $200k in damages, and ruined a train machine shop. Said Merrick to the paper: “I don’t believe in insurance.” And in 2018, a ride operator was fired for seemingly nodding off while operating a kiddie ride.

Reportedly, Merrick “never made a nickel” on the park, at least during his lifetime. He died in 2011. Klompmaker continues to run the park, per Merrick’s wishes. 

In an interview online, Klompmaker describes the park as filling a void. This is a small, quaint, classic kiddie park, a dying breed, a working collector’s museum. The park allows parents and grandparents an inexpensive place to take kids and grandkids, standing out in the area, in a sea of over-the-top thrills at other massive parks. 

Little Amerricka is rough and tumble. There’s essentially no theming, the rides’ mechanisms are laid bare for all to see, fences are a suggestion at best. A ride operator was fired for seemingly falling asleep while operating a kiddie carousel. The whole place does seem like it’s waiting for a massive public outcry. 

At the same time, it’s a hobby park, like a real-life museum. It “personifies old-fashioned amusement traditions.” The rides are meticulously maintained and painted. History is an important part of Little Amerricka. Klompmaker is quoted as saying “we try to keep the nostalgia alive.”

Did I mention all of Little Amerricka’s borders? Main street, on one side. The parking lot, on another. The railroad tracks, on another.

And the town cemetery, on the other. 

Yes, as your children spin in endless circles on the vintage car carousel or the Pinto Brothers 1940s fire truck ride, you the adult get to stare out at Marshall’s town cemetery and contemplate the similarly endless cycle of life and death. 

“Buy the ticket, take the ride,” said Hunter S. Thompson, and the contrast between the flower-bedecked headstones and the regular whoosh of the Little Dipper invites you and your children to do just that.

Little Amerricka is real, authentic, fun. It’s a great place to visit.

Remember that what you’ve read is a podcast! A link is included at the top of the page. Listen to more episodes of The Abandoned Carousel on your favorite platform: Apple Podcasts | Google Podcasts | Spotify | RadioPublic | TuneIn | Overcast | Pocket Casts | Castro. Support the podcast on Patreon for extra content! Comment below to share your thoughts – as Lucy Maud Montgomery once said, nothing is ever really lost to us, as long as we remember it.

References

1. “The Oakland Acorn” Trainorders.com Discussion. http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,954146. Accessed September 12, 2019.
2. Whiskey River Railway / Marshall, Wisconsin / (16″gauge) – Photos. https://www.facebook.com/pg/Whiskey-River-Railway-Marshall-Wisconsin-16gauge-258337366872/photos/?tab=album&album_id=10150983969361873. Accessed September 16, 2019.
3. Long Time Lemonters. https://www.facebook.com/groups/35998934826/permalink/10157249986579827/. Accessed September 14, 2019.
4. 2008 Total Timber Tour Blog Day 6 | Coaster2Coaster.com. https://www.coaster2coaster.com/blogs/2008/2008_day_06.html. Accessed September 12, 2019.
5. Amusement Park «Little Amerricka Amusement Park», reviews and photos, 700 E Main St, Marshall, WI 53559, USA. http://amusements-parks.com/Wisconsin/Marshall/Little_Amerricka_Amusement_Park. Accessed September 15, 2019.
6. An End To Whalom Park | Retro Junk Article. https://www.retrojunk.com/article/show/2649/an-end-to-whalom-park. Accessed September 16, 2019.
7. As coaster falls, many bid final farewell to Whalom Park – The Boston Globe. http://archive.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006/10/19/coasting_to_a_stop_at_whalom_park/. Accessed September 16, 2019.
8. Billboard – Google Books. https://books.google.com/books?id=8h4EAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA91&pg=PA91#v=onepage&q&f=false. Accessed September 15, 2019.
9. Enchanting stories of Enchanted Forest. nwitimes.com. https://www.nwitimes.com/blogs/nwi-history/blog-enchanting-stories-of-enchanted-forest/article_fe0aef23-387e-5937-9769-229f92cb0f0a.html. Accessed September 12, 2019.
10. Chadster’s Vacation Adventures: Final Edition! https://themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1106616. Accessed September 11, 2019.
11. Coaster Census – American Coaster Enthusiasts (ACE). https://www.aceonline.org/page/Census. Accessed August 14, 2019.
12. Coaster Trips: 2009: Knuckleheads, Little Amerricka, Indiana Beach. https://www.bannister.org/coasters/trips/2009/0704.htm. Accessed September 11, 2019.
13. CoasterGallery.com — Little Amerricka (formerly Little A-Merrick-A). http://www.coastergallery.com/2001/LA08.html. Accessed September 13, 2019.
14. Comet – Lincoln Park (North Dartmouth, Massachusetts, United States). https://rcdb.com/451.htm. Accessed September 12, 2019.
15. Decaying Lincoln Park | Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/photos/41658249@N02/albums/72157623404867978. Accessed September 16, 2019.
16. EnchantedForest-AuctionFlier-October19-1991-SS.pdf. http://www.inportercounty.org/Data/Misc/EnchantedForest-AuctionFlier-October19-1991-SS.pdf. Accessed September 13, 2019.
17. Eyerly Aircraft | LAGOON HISTORY PROJECT. http://lagoonhistory.com/project/eyerly-aircraft/. Accessed September 15, 2019.
18. Flyer Comet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8dQ_6sE_GQ. Accessed September 16, 2019.
19. Flyer Comet – Whalom Park (Lunenburg, Massachusetts, United States). https://rcdb.com/217.htm. Accessed September 14, 2019.
20. Flyer Comet (Whalom Park) – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flyer_Comet_(Whalom_Park). Accessed September 16, 2019.
21. Great American Road Trip! Part 1 – Timber Falls, Mt. Olympus, Little Amerricka, SFGAmerica. FORUMS – COASTERFORCE. https://coasterforce.com/forums/threads/great-american-road-trip-part-1-timber-falls-mt-olympus-little-amerricka-sfgamerica.41788/. Accessed September 12, 2019.
22. Cook MJ. Hometown Wisconsin. Savage Press; 1994.
23. Immelmann turn – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immelmann_turn. Accessed September 15, 2019.
24. Kiddie Parks | RoadsideArchitecture.com. http://www.roadarch.com/fairyparks/kid5.html. Accessed September 12, 2019.
25. Wild M. Life, death, and the timeless amusements of Little Amerricka. Milwaukee Record. August 2018. https://milwaukeerecord.com/city-life/life-death-timeless-amusements-little-amerricka/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
26. Lincoln Park (Dartmouth, Mass) Sold.. – CoasterBuzz. https://coasterbuzz.com/Forums/Topic/lincoln-park-dartmouth-mass-sold. Accessed September 12, 2019.
27. Lincoln Park (Dartmouth, Massachusetts) – Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_Park_(Dartmouth,_Massachusetts). Accessed September 16, 2019.
28. Lincoln Park Comet North Dartmouth MA Comet Roller coaster Fan Site. http://web.archive.org/web/20160409011556/http://www.lpcomet.com/. Accessed September 16, 2019.
29. LINCOLN PARK COMET Roller Coaster, North Dartmouth, New Bedford, MA 1947. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HqFgsdfNCQw. Accessed September 14, 2019.
30. Lincoln Park Comet, Technical Details and photographs, What makes the Comet work | Lincoln Park Comet Fan Site. http://web.archive.org/web/20150611014412/http://www.lpcomet.com/roller-coasters/about-the-comet/the-comet-anatomy-of-a-coaster. Accessed September 16, 2019.
31. Lincoln Park’s Comet roller coaster demolished today in Dartmouth, evoking memories of thrills past | Boston.com. https://www.boston.com/uncategorized/noprimarytagmatch/2012/07/11/lincoln-parks-comet-roller-coaster-demolished-today-in-dartmouth-evoking-memories-of-thrills-past. Accessed September 16, 2019.
32. Lincoln Park’s Comet roller coaster demolished today in Dartmouth, evoking memories of thrills past | Boston.com. https://www.boston.com/uncategorized/noprimarytagmatch/2012/07/11/lincoln-parks-comet-roller-coaster-demolished-today-in-dartmouth-evoking-memories-of-thrills-past. Accessed September 16, 2019.
33. Philosopher TC. Little Amerricka. Roller Coaster Philosophy. https://www.rollercoasterphilosophy.com/2011/little-amerricka/. Published September 4, 2011. Accessed September 11, 2019.
34. Philosopher TC. Little Amerricka. Roller Coaster Philosophy. https://www.rollercoasterphilosophy.com/2011/little-amerricka/. Published September 4, 2011. Accessed September 12, 2019.
35. Little Amerricka. In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Little_Amerricka&oldid=905446086. Accessed September 12, 2019.
36. Little Amerricka. http://www.karenandjay.com/trips/amerricka/amerricka.html. Accessed August 14, 2019.
37. Little Amerricka. http://www.midwestinfoguide.com/2008/06/little-amerricka.html. Accessed August 14, 2019.
38. Little Amerricka. https://www.bannister.org/coasters/parks/little_amerricka.htm. Accessed September 12, 2019.
39. Little Amerricka : Park World Online – Theme Park, Amusement Park and Attractions Industry News. https://www.parkworld-online.com/little-amerricka/. Accessed July 22, 2019.
40. Little Amerricka | The FUN starts when you pull into the station! https://whistlestopcampground.com/little-amerricka/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
41. Thompson J. Little Amerricka 001.; 2011. https://www.flickr.com/photos/rollercoasterphilosophy/6130990540/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
42. Little Amerricka Amusement Park – Home. https://www.facebook.com/littleamerricka/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
43. Little Amerricka Amusement Park – Welcome. https://www.littleamerricka.com/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
44. Little Amerricka amusement park operator fired after video shows him nodding off on the job. https://www.tmj4.com/news/local-news/little-amerricka-amusement-park-operator-fired-after-video-shows-him-nodding-off-on-the-job. Accessed September 11, 2019.
45. Tanzilo B. Little Amerricka amusement park provides good, old, inexpensive fun. OnMilwaukee.com. https://onmilwaukee.com/visitors/articles/littleamerricka.html. Published August 28, 2014. Accessed July 23, 2019.
47. Little Amerricka Tour & Review.; 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fDNzAYZnDJs. Accessed September 12, 2019.
48. Little Dipper – Hillcrest Park (Lemont, Illinois, United States). https://rcdb.com/327.htm. Accessed September 14, 2019.
49. Lost Tourist Attractions of the Dunes exhibit extending its stay here. http://chestertontribune.com/Local%20History/820101%20lost_tourist_attractions_of_the.htm. Accessed September 12, 2019.
50. Mad Mouse – Little Amerricka – Roller Coasters. https://www.ultimaterollercoaster.com/coasters/madmouse_littleamerrick. Accessed September 11, 2019.
51. Merrick Light Railway Equipment Works. http://www.jvlnet.com/~gardyloo/. Accessed September 12, 2019.
52. Meteor – Little Amerricka – Roller Coasters. https://www.ultimaterollercoaster.com/coasters/meteor_littleamerrick. Accessed September 11, 2019.
53. Museum General Photo Collection. http://durhammuseum.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/search/collection/p15426coll2/searchterm/%22Sky%20Rail%22/order/nosort. Accessed September 12, 2019.
54. Negative-G A Farewell To Kiddieland Page Ten. http://www.negative-g.com/kiddieland/2009/kiddieland-closing-2009-10.htm. Accessed September 13, 2019.
55. Negative-G Little Amerricka 2011 Pictures Page One. http://www.negative-g.com/little-amerricka/2011/little-amerricka-park-2011-1.htm. Accessed September 11, 2019.
56. Pohlen J. Oddball Wisconsin: A Guide to 400 Really Strange Places. Chicago Review Press; 2013.
57. Peralta Playland – Oakland – LocalWiki. https://localwiki.org/oakland/Peralta_Playland. Accessed September 12, 2019.
58. PERSONAL — Kurt Raether | Director, Producer. http://kurtraether.com/documentary/#/short-film-little-america/. Accessed September 16, 2019.
59. Photo Gallery | National Amusement Park Historical Association. http://www.napha.org/LibraryResources/PhotoGallery/tabid/62/Default.aspx. Accessed September 11, 2019.
60. Porter County, Indiana, GenWeb – Photographs & Historical Images. http://www.inportercounty.org/PhotoPages/Chesterton/EnchantedForest/Chesterton-EnchantedForest006.html. Accessed September 12, 2019.
61. r/rollercoasters – Little amerricka trip report. reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/rollercoasters/comments/8mfjcg/little_amerricka_trip_report/. Accessed August 14, 2019.
62. r/wisconsin – TIL there is an amusement park in Marshall, Wisconsin called Little Amerricka. reddit. https://www.reddit.com/r/wisconsin/comments/8831mo/til_there_is_an_amusement_park_in_marshall/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
63. Ranking – Ridden coasters. https://coaster-count.com/ranking/ridden. Accessed September 14, 2019.
64. Rides in Peony Park :: Museum General Photo Collection. http://durhammuseum.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p15426coll2/id/2958. Accessed September 12, 2019.
65. Scrambler (ride). In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Scrambler_(ride)&oldid=907175058. Accessed September 12, 2019.
66. Search: “lincoln park” dartmouth | Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/search/?license=2%2C3%2C4%2C5%2C6%2C9&text=%22lincoln%20park%22%20dartmouth&advanced=1. Accessed September 16, 2019.
67. Seven Peaks Water Park Duneland. In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Seven_Peaks_Water_Park_Duneland&oldid=890355012. Accessed September 12, 2019.
68. Show Me The Coasters – Part 1. https://www.themeparkinsider.com/discussion/thread.cfm?page=2114. Accessed September 15, 2019.
69. ST 00039 – Lincoln Park aerial 1966 : Dartmouth | Geometry o… | Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/photos/spinnerpub/3972615152. Accessed September 16, 2019.
70. STC-D 00426 – Lincoln Park : Roller Coaster Accident 1987 … | Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/photos/spinnerpub/3277050236. Accessed September 16, 2019.
71. STC-D 00441 – Lincoln Park : Roller Coaster 1979 : Dartmou… | Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/photos/spinnerpub/3276232447/in/album-72157613395102606/. Accessed September 16, 2019.
72. The Digital Research Library of Illinois History Journal^TM: Hillcrest (Amusement) Park in Woodridge (formerly Lemont), Illinois. (1952-2003). https://drloihjournal.blogspot.com/2017/12/hillcrest-amusement-park-lemont-illinois-1952-2003.html. Accessed September 14, 2019.
73. The Digital Research Library of Illinois History Journal^TM: Hillcrest (Amusement) Park in Woodridge (formerly Lemont), Illinois. (1952-2003). https://drloihjournal.blogspot.com/2017/12/hillcrest-amusement-park-lemont-illinois-1952-2003.html. Accessed September 14, 2019.
74. Ph.d NG. The Digital Research Library of Illinois History Journal^TM: The History of Kiddieland in Melrose Park, Illinois. (1929-2009). The Digital Research Library of Illinois History Journal^TM. January 2017. https://drloihjournal.blogspot.com/2017/01/the-complete-history-of-kiddieland-in.html. Accessed September 11, 2019.
75. Album of Enchanted Forest photos, operating and defunct. https://jimvid.smugmug.com/Amusement-Park/Enchanted-Forest-defunct-park/i-xWH63HZ. Accessed September 13, 2019.
76. The End of Whalom. http://www.angelfire.com/nh/whalom/destruction.html. Accessed September 16, 2019.
77. The FUN starts when you pull into the station! | Whistle Stop Campground. https://whistlestopcampground.com/. Accessed September 11, 2019.
78. Conceicao A. The Hidden Rides and Themed Attractions of…Wisconsin. http://www.parkscope.net/2018/08/the-hidden-rides-and-themed-attractions_22.html. Accessed September 12, 2019.
79. The only operating Chance Toboggan in the world [Great Midwestern Coaster Trip Day 5] : rollercoasters. https://www.reddit.com/r/rollercoasters/comments/8wq4nk/the_only_operating_chance_toboggan_in_the_world/. Accessed September 15, 2019.
80. DiRienzo D. The Retro Amusement Park In Wisconsin That Will Take You Back To The Good Ole Days. OnlyInYourState. https://www.onlyinyourstate.com/wisconsin/retro-amusement-park-wi/. Published August 8, 2019. Accessed September 12, 2019.
81. TR: Old School Road Trip Pt. 8 – Wisconsin Craziness & Conclusion (6/7- 6/8/2014) | realtalkguidetoawesome. https://realtalkguidetoawesome.wordpress.com/2014/06/26/tr-old-school-road-trip-pt-8-wisconsin-craziness-conclusion-67-682014/. Accessed September 15, 2019.
82. Trip Report – The Whiskey River Railway. Vintage Trains | DVDS, CDS, Video on Demand. January 2014. https://yardgoatimages.com/trip-report-whiskey-river-railway/. Accessed July 23, 2019.
83. Unique amusement park owner Lee W. Merrick dies at 92. madison.com. https://madison.com/news/local/unique-amusement-park-owner-lee-w-merrick-dies-at/article_d7909c0c-c218-11e0-b082-001cc4c002e0.html. Accessed September 11, 2019.
84. Updated: Affordable, Beginner Amusement Parks for Little Kids. Trippin’ Midwest Mama. May 2017. https://trippinmidwestmama.com/affordable-beginner-amusement-parks-for-little-kids/. Accessed August 14, 2019.
85. Vernon Keenan Rollercoasters | Lincoln Park Comet Fan Site. http://web.archive.org/web/20150611011520/http://www.lpcomet.com/roller-coasters/about-the-comet/the-comets-family. Accessed September 16, 2019. 92. Whalom Park | Flickr. https://www.flickr.com/groups/whalompark/pool/. Accessed September 16, 2019.
86. Whalom Park 2001-2006. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kiit_5IPD9s. Accessed September 16, 2019.
87. Whalom Park sale can go forward – CoasterBuzz. https://coasterbuzz.com/Forums/Topic/whalom-park-sale-can-go-forward. Accessed September 15, 2019.
88. What Was This Once-Common Carnival Ride??? | Roller Coasters, Theme Parks & Attractions Forum. https://www.ultimaterollercoaster.com/forums/roller-coasters-theme-parks/168263. Accessed September 15, 2019.
89. Whiskey River Railway at Little Amerricka Amusement Park. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdVr_oPHiIw. Accessed September 16, 2019.
90. Whiskey River Railway at Little Amerricka Amusement Park / Marshall, Wisconsin (16 Inch Gauge).; 2010. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdgSwmLtrSU. Accessed September 12, 2019.
91. Whiskey River Railway Day 2014.; 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4dqRNkob0g. Accessed September 12, 2019.
92. Wild Mouse roller coaster. In: Wikipedia. ; 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wild_Mouse_roller_coaster&oldid=909564349. Accessed September 13, 2019.
93. Vanderwilt D. Wisconsin Dells. Channel Lake, Inc.; 2008.
94. Marsh C. Wisconsin Rollercoasters! Carole Marsh Books; 1994.
95. Wisconsin’s 10 permanent standing roller coasters offer history, heartburn. https://www.jsonline.com/story/travel/2018/08/02/wisconsin-roller-coasters/873697002/. Accessed September 11, 2019.

The post Little Amerricka appeared first on The Abandoned Carousel.