Chasing a Carrousel

I find it interesting how things come around – carousel horses too evidently. I lived a number of years in London, Ontario. This would be in the 70’s. I photographed a carousel that I had seen in Springbank Park and later on actually made a painting of one of the images. Actually it was more of a ‘paint by number’ picture really. I did it by projecting a 35mm slide onto a canvas and then traced the image with a pencil and painted it in, but you know what I mean, that is if you still remember what a 35mm slide is. I can’t draw worth a damn. Hey, maybe I should take up photography.

One of the reasons that drew me to the carousel in the first place, and the reason I took the photograph, was to capture the expression on the horses’ faces. I took a close up shot of the heads of three horses that were running abreast. From the expressions you would think that the animals were running for their lives.

I still am very much interested in the faces of the horses, as you no doubt know if you’ve read any of these carousel ramblings. And as the old joke goes this horse walks into a bar. The bartender looks up an says, ‘Hey horse, why the long face?’ I’m still looking at those faces, and recently I saw some very interesting ones. And some were long indeed.

Part of this story is about how I got to the next attraction, well me and my brother, eh.

At each of these rides that I visited I got a little bit of new information; from a pamphlet, a display, or I met and talked with a person who passed on a tidbit, and this iota was the thread that lead to the next discovery. It’s become a process. In this particular case the mention occurred in the town of Roseneath, Ontario where my brother Ralph and I had made a day trip to see and photograph the carousel there (see one of the previous bloggings). One of the people responsible for keeping this particular carousel running mentioned that the carousel, although a C. W. Parker, had on it several Herschell/Spillman horses.

What, who? I wrote the name down. I spelled it wrong.

I was also told that it was likely that Herschell worked for Parker for a time. They also mentioned that there might be some sort of a tie in to a young person who eventually because President of the United States. I haven’t even tried to untangle that thread.

Well when I finally got back to Scarberia I went to the Internet and did a search. That’s where I found out who this Alan Herschell was, the companies that he was associated with, and discovered that the company had been located relatively close by, in North Tonawanda, New York, for many years. The really cool thing about this particular fact was, or is, that the factory still exists.

It’s still there, wow, you got to be kidding. I have to see this.

So I talked Ralph into going on another road trip. Actually it didn’t take much convincing, Ralph was pretty keen on going once I mentioned it to him. The only problem stopping us from jumping in the car and heading off into New York at the first available day was the fact that my passport had just lapsed. Zut alors!

We pause in the narrative in order for me to deliver a minor rant: My brother and I happen to be from Niagara Falls, Ontario. In our yutes (that’s a ‘My Cousin Vinny’ reference) crossing over to the United States was no big deal. Here’s an example.

I can remember, after some function at one of the high schools, probably after the closing night of a musical (I attended one high school, Stamford, and most of my friends attended another, Westlane, so I ended up hanging around at their high school a lot. I participated in some of their events, like the musical, in a backstage or set construction capacity. I even had a key to their students council room, but don’t tell anyone that.), a bunch of us piled into some dad’s station wagon (back when station wagons were more tank than car and more like large personnel carriers) and crossed the bridge to the American side intending on alcoholic libation no doubt. We were stopped at customs on the American side and were made to get out of the car and enter the waiting room, all 15 or so of us. Now, as I recall, nothing major happened, no real hassles or anything, they probably just thought that 15 teens in a station wagon was a bit too excessive or dangerous (and they’d be right) so they turned us back as I recall. But I digress.

And maybe this isn’t the best example of getting across ‘the big ditch’ because we didn’t actually make it into the country per se. Okay, I agree with that. I’m sorry. All that I’m trying to point out here is that the crossing to the United States was like going to your Uncle Sam’s, no big deal as I said. Hell, it was the place where we did a certain amount of our underage (in Canada, legal in the U.S.) drinking. Well, when we could get across.

Oh, and by the way, our destination, North Tonawanda, was where our cousins the Carrs lived (whom we had visited on a number of occasions). It’s not like we were strangers in a strange land, although there are some who might insist that we were just strange.

Now though it is certainly a different world and a different border. Another point that I’d like to get across is that you didn’t need a passport to visit your Uncle Sam’s, or your cousins either; oh you usually needed some sort of ID, but you didn’t need a passport. I ended up having to put off the trip for a couple of weeks while I waited to get my bloody passport back (at the added cost of close to $100).

Finally the day arrived and Ralph and I headed out from Toronto (Scarberia actually, and I think I’ve already done that joke already, right?) and headed for the States. We crossed the border at Queenston, which is on a more direct line from where we started than the other bridges at either the Falls itself or the Peace Bridge that crosses from Fort Erie to Buffalo. We had to wait over half an hour at the border doing the car crawl up to the customs booth but that wasn’t too bad at all. It was a hot day, bright and sunny, and we had packed lots of music to listen to for the day. Soon we had left customs behind.

We amused ourselves on the trip, particularly on the New York side of the border, by talking back to the GPS unit that Ralph had programmed to guide us to the location. We ignored most of its routing suggestions because we wanted to drive to North Tonawanda by way of the river. We drove through some depressed sections of NFNY as we worked our way to the Parkway, and tried to follow some very bad maps that I had printed out the night before on my computer at home – maps that you could hardly read or make out any of the streets. Don’t let me get started on the limitations of Google Maps, I’ve already had my rant allotment for the day.

Still we made our way, a pilgrimage of sorts, to…

Ta da.

The Roseneath Carousel

And yet again I have had an opportunity to visit a piece of art. This one is located in a small town in Ontario called Roseneath. It’s another C.W. Parker carousel and it is an early one (actually the number 3 is stamped on the ring gear). It was built in Abilene Kansas in 1906 (before Parker moved the facility to Levenworth in 1911).

The carousel is only open on Sundays for a 3 hour period in the afternoons (until their fall fair in October when it will be open longer). I spent the weekend at my brother Ralph’s place and on the Sunday we headed out early in order to see if we could locate the carousel, he operating as official navigator for the trip.

There were no signs to point the way (a fact that I’m somewhat mystified by since this carousel is worth on the order of a million dollars) but we managed to find the site and the barn in which it is housed. We were, in fact, a couple of hours early for it to be opened and so we spent the time in and around the town talking to people and generally being tourists (which is another story that I might go into at another time).

When the sixteen-sided building was finally opened for business my brother and I made our way over to the entrance and entered the enchanted realm.

This is a carousel built in the ‘Country’ style, or ‘County Fair’ style if you will. It is slightly smaller than some of the bigger ones (which means, probably, that is was meant to be taken apart and moved with the circuit of a traveling carnivals). It has a much happier group or herd of horses; the horses don’t have that same panicked look that I’ve seen on other carousels and horses. Many of them seem to smile at you.

There are 40 hand carved basswood horses, 3 abreast, and for some reason there are 2 boats (which also rock) as part of the grouping.

It travels at a whopping 4 ½ miles per hour, although it seems faster than that. I don’t know where you clock the speed of the carousel, whether from the inside row of the deck near the gearing or from the outside edge because it does make a difference on how apparently fast the horses are going.

In addition there is a slightly different mechanism in place for the jumpers, which gives it more of a forward and back ride rather than just the up and down movement. It’s meant to more closely emulate the movement of a horse. You can see it, if you look closely, in some of the photographs here.

The middle row of horses, somewhat smaller than the others, were carved by a gentleman named Hershell who for a time was an assistant of Parker, so they are often referred to as Hershell/Spillman horses or Armitage/Hershell horses.

In the time that we were there it was interesting, in retrospect, that there were no children around, well except for those children of my age bracket, who had come to see, to appreciate, and to photograph the carousel. It was a pleasure to see the smiles of the big people as they rode the ride.

Another cool aspect of this expedition is that the people who operated it allowed us to climb over the ride, they even let me into the centre ring (when the carousel was not whirling) so that we could take photographs.

The music that played while the ride was in operation was a delight. They have several rolls of music that are played on a 1934 Wurlitzer Military Band organ (itself worth $300,000.00), another aspect of the charm of the day.

They are looking for funding to help with the ongoing restoration work and to build a new climate controlled building for it to be housed in. Ralph and I spent some money on the goods available to purchase (I finally bought myself a carved carousel horse, in miniature, and at what I thought was an excellent price, so that I could finally claim one for my own).

And I would also like to give a special thank you to my friend Lorie who told me about it.

All photographs here are by me. I hope you like the black and white shots as well, they add a certain nostalgia to the scene, and black and white photography, like carousels themselves, are sort of a dying art.

Centreville Carousel

Toronto Ontario, Centre Island

Here I is again, carrying on about carousels, and I has another goodie for you.

This posting and the last are actually part of my ‘what I did on my summer vacation’ well, vacation type thingy, and actually happened to occur during my official vacation. What I did, well what I am still doing as of this writing, is to chase down carousels (and most of them travel at a very sedate speed I can tell you, although this one, that I’m about to talk about, I swear is a faster beast than most).

I don’t know how I miss these things, like the Looff carousel in Pt Dalhousie. I may have already mentioned in some blog article that Toronto Island is a secret gem of the city (or other such phraseology). This carousel, which again for years had slipped under my radar, is one of the ultimate proofs of that.

Although it is rare this isn’t a C. W. Parker carousel, it isn’t a Charles I. D. Looff either, this carousel happens to have been manufactured by the G. A. Dentzel Steam and Horsepower Company of Germantown Pennsylvania. Wow, what a mouthful.

An interesting tidbit of information is that it suffered a lot of damage in the hurricane of 1938 but was rebuilt by one of the master carvers of the Detzel yadda yadda yadda, of Germantown Pensylvania.

And it is a true menagerie: Lions ...check.

Tigers ...check. 

Bears, ...um sorry (although it should be said that there was a twirling bear ride for the kiddies not far from this attraction).

But it did have bunnies, or are they hares? We'll have to ask Alice.

And how about deer?

And ostriches.

Well, the ostriches are shy, they're sort of checking you out from the other side of the horse.

Even pigs, or are these boars? I get so confused sometimes.

And cats with fish in they mouths.

And again, what I fell in love with, beautiful horses.

This carousel has 53 animals, which are 3 abreast. There are 36 jumpers and 2 chariots.

This time I had to take a ferry ride from downtown Toronto to Centre Island (it costs $7 bucks return) and so, on this hot and pleasant day, I made my way to the island and to the amusement park there, Centreville.

I had met the mayor of Centreville before, a few years ago, and gotten day passes for all the attractions for me and my sons, but it’s weird, somehow (again) I missed out on the carousel (it’s sorta’ on one edge of the amusement area and I guess I was herded in the other direction and ended up with the bumper cars). I guess it just wasn’t time for me to take it in. Life is like that. I guess carousels are like that too.

But they come around.

So, as I mentioned, this is a fast sucker. It’s gotta’ be a whopping 9 or 10 mile an hour.

But it’s certainly a beauty, and the music (which I haven’t really mentioned in the last couple of entries) was fun to listen to (we could get into a whole long discussion about vintage Wurlitzer organs and what they are worth today).

I’m running out of superlatives and so I guess I’ve come to an end of this narrative. You’ll just have to come and take it for a spin and let me know what you think.

And once again I did the photographs.

The second Looff, Lakeside Park Carousel

Port Dalhousie, Ontario

This charmer is another Looff carousel and it’s been in operation here for years and years. It has celebrated over a hundred years of service, think of that! You’ll be glad to note that the fee for riding this carousel (and in spite of the fact that I’m, well, shall we say a large lad I rode on this one twice, damn the expense) is still 5 cents a ride.

The tones of this carousel are more like the wood that they, the horses, were carved out of. Yes, these are the original horses that were hand carved, unlike the animals mentioned in the previous blog article. There are a lot of shades and tones of browns as well as other colours which were added to the harnesses and to the other animals. It has a rich texture and is very beautiful. I liked it a lot.

Oh, did I forget to mention, this is a bonus round. The bonus here is that this carousel is a menagerie. Not quite lions and tigers and bears, oh my, but it does have lions and camels at least. And don’t forget the wonderful horses themselves. With real horse hair tails.

It took me a while to find it. I’ve always had a tendency to get lost in St Catherines, Ontario, and Port Dalhousie is now an offshoot of St Catherines (and it’s not far from my home town of Niagara Falls) and this day was no different. I only got lost 5 or 6 times before I found what I was looking for.

The carousel is located in Lakeside Park, Port Dalhousie (pronounced Deloozey).

Now I’ve mentioned in the last posting how I was kicked out of a mall for photographing the carousel there. Here I not only gave the cashier $5.00 for rides, and got 7 ride tickets for my contribution, (I used two of them myself and then gave the other 5 away to a mother with her 5 charges), but I also bought the t-shirt and the posters in order to support the cause, and after all that I still felt like I had an excellent deal. And I did too.

So this carousel was not as flashy as the other Looff one but I think it’s a charmer and I hope it continues for many, many more years, giving lasting memories to the young and young at heart.

You know, I’ve traced where I think my interest in carousels comes from (see previous blogs), but I don’t think that I mentioned that the fact that I came from Niagara Falls happens, in my estimation, to be part of the attraction.

I’ve done postings on the Falls before (and here I should explain that 'the Falls' is the generic term for both city and cataract) but what I don’t think that I have conveyed properly is that 'the Falls' is part natural wonder and part freak show (and those who have been on Clifton Hill and walked past the tourist traps will know what I mean with all the bright lights, glitz, trash and glamour). In one of the compartments of my mental filing system I associate carousels with that whole circus, carnival, amusement, tourist attraction broad category.

So I have developed an affinity for the carousel and it has achieved a special place of honour for me because, well, I think they are classy. They are also harken back to an older and possibly more stylish age. I am glad some of them have survived to work their charm on the young and the old in this most disillusioned time.

So here, on a beach on the shore of Lake Ontario, is something more beautiful, more graceful and more lasting than much that is the freak show of Niagara, an enchanting little whirling dervish of an attraction.

It's funny, you know, I never knew this was here while I was growing up. But I know where it is now (sort of).

Come on by and spend your nickel on a trip of your lifetime.

And again, these pictures were taken by yours truly.

The Looff Carousel of Fantasy Fair

The Stampede

I was going to name this entry something like ‘how I spent my summer vacation’ but not only has that particular horse been figuratively beaten to death but in actual fact I got to photograph this carousel last month, in May, a month before I was to take my first week of vacation (and working in public transit it’s actually been years and years since I had the chance to take time off in June, but my digression is showing).

Singing to the skylight

I was with my friend Walter Borchenko, who I’ve mentioned elsewhere in this blog, and we were looking for someplace to wander, take pictures, and to talk. I hadn’t seen him in a long time so it was good to get together and do just that. Anyway, the day before he asked me where I’d like to go and I suggested a mall on Rexdale Boulevard in Toronto (carousel not being mentioned in the initial stages of the conversation). He was pretty fast on the uptake however and his computer was even faster so he soon discovered the why and the where.

The Singer, detail.

The next day we actually went first to the site of the old Guild Inn in Scarberia, sorry I mean Scarborough, and walked the gardens and took pictures of the sculptures and environs (the Guild is also another thing cited in earlier blog entries) me with my digital Nikon and Walter with his medium format equipment (and a 4X5 pinhole camera with a digital back no less). Then we got in his car and drove to Rexdale in order to go into the mall (the mall, ooh aah).

They have a children’s amusement area inside which is called Fantasy Fair, and one of the attractions, and to me the best one (but I’m biased) is a 1910 Looff carousel. I’m not going to go into the history of I. D. Looff (there are too many other more definitive sources of information available on him) but let me put these two cents worth in here (And hey, did you know they’re, the g’uvment that is, planning to take the penny out of circulation? Well, to my way of thinking it’s just another way that your pocketbook is shrinking) the original wooden horses were lost and so they were replaced by fiberglass replicas of Looff’s originals, at a cost of something like 30 grand a horse. Wow.

What are you looking at?

But they are beauties.

There are 44 jumping horses, 8 stationary horses and 4 chariots on a 54 foot deck.

Glamour Queen

Now this carousel is mostly painted white and decked out with mirrors and most of the horses are also light in colour, I guess in keeping with the Fantasy Fair concept (I don't know if the original was this light in colour). It also sits underneath a large skylight which was the major source of illumination. Both these elements created a very different look to the ride and to the animals themselves; an eerie or etherial glow which was quite wonderful.

The Beauty

So we photographed this thing until the security guards came over and kicked us out.

Well actually we were 'escorted' to customer service where we were told that it would cost us $50.00 each, plus tax, to continue to photograph.

Sylvester Stallion and the Palominos

Well, we ended up leaving and I never got the chance to shoot this gorgeous grey that I was working my way toward.

All photographs here, by the way, were taken by me.