Horses on Circular Courses

In 1972, Billy Preston topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart with the catchy “Will It Go Round In Circles”. A year later, The Spinners spent five weeks at #1 on Billboard’s R&B chart with “I’ll Be Around”. More recently, Kacey Musgraves’ debut single “Merry Go ‘Round” won the Grammy Award for Best Country Song.  All of which is to say, if I’m asked to celebrate “National Carousel Day” I have a great choice of theme songs for the occasion… played on endless loop, of course.

A double-decker!

National Merry-Go-Round Day (I prefer “Carousel”) was this past July 25th, as it has been every year since 2014.  Did you skip it like I did?  The holiday claims to “celebrate the carousel’s history and joy, particularly marking the first U.S. patent by William Schneider in 1871.”  And to celebrate, we’re meant to visit a local carousel, go for a spin, and post pictures of ourselves doing so online.  So we drop everything we’re doing on July 25th and climb on a wooden horse?  National M-G-R Day doesn’t even rate as a Hallmark holiday (and don’t waste your time trying to find a card to prove me wrong).

Contrary to my opinion about M-G-R Day, I think carousels are charming and a bit of innocent fun (other than those brass rings, which we’ll get to in a second).  Carousels inspired memorable scenes in Mary Poppins and Big.  Carousel was the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical that Time magazine deemed “the best of the 20th century”.  The “Carousel of Progress” was (and still is) one of the more unique attractions at Disneyland.  And of course, carousels led to those pipe and metal spinners we all played on at the park when we were kids.

Carousel is derived from the French word for “little battle”, which hints at why we’re riding them at all today.  In 17th century Europe, equestrian tournaments included “ring jousting”, where the rider attempts to spear a ring-on-a-string with his joust as he flies by.  To practice this sport without wearing out the horses, a clever soul invented the carousel, complete with wooden horses on poles and a real horse to pull the device in circles.  Eventually carousels made their way into carnivals, and then to the prominent locations where you find them today.

Care for a ring?

Now you also understand why early carousels had ring dispensers.  They were a nod to ring jousting!  The dispensers were filled with iron rings along with a few brass ones.  If you were lucky enough to ride an outside horse and grab a brass ring (which is harder than it sounds as your horse goes up and down), you could exchange the ring for a prize or another loop on the carousel.  For good reasons – safety being one – ring dispensers have been removed from most carousels today.

The people who came up with National M-G-R Day should’ve probably gone with “International”, because many of the world’s most distinguished carousels spin outside of the United States.  The Carousel El Dorado in Tokyo, Japan, built in 1907, is the oldest amusement park ride still in operation in the country.   The Lakeside Park Carousel in Ontario, Canada (1905) includes a self-playing organ that uses rolled sheets of music, rewinding one while playing the next.  The Letná Carousel in Prague, Czechia (1892!) is one of the oldest in Europe, remodeled in 2022 but still housed in its original wooden pavilion.

Looff Carousel (1911)

America has its share of prominent “gallopers” as well.  The Looff Carousel in Santa Cruz, CA is one of the few remaining with a ring dispenser, and entertains with the music of three organs.  The Over-The-Jumps Carousel in Little Rock, AR (1924) simulates the natural movement of a horse instead of just going up and down on a pole.  And the Flying Horse Carousel in Westerly, Rhode Island (1876!) is exactly as advertised.  The horses are attached to the center spindle instead of the wooden platform, creating a better sensation of flying through the air.

Dorothea Laub Carousel (1910)

Okay, I have a confession.  I had the perfect opportunity to celebrate National M-G-R Day just days after it happened this year.  My wife and I traveled to San Diego with our children and grandchildren for a beach vacation and found ourselves in Balboa Park, home of the Dorothea Laub Carousel (brass ring dispenser!)  If we hadn’t already worn out the little ones on a long walk through the Japanese Friendship Garden we might’ve made it to the wooden horses.  But I’m not losing sleep about it.  After all, National M-G-R Day will come ’round again next year.

Some content sourced from Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.

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Author: Dave

Five hundred posts would suggest I have something to say… This blog was born from a desire to elevate the English language, highlighting eloquent words from days gone by. The stories I share are snippets of life itself, and each comes with a bonus: a dusted-off word I hope you’ll go on to use more often. Read “Deutschland-ish Improvements” to learn about my backyard European wish list. Try “Slush Fun” for the throwback years of the 7-Eleven convenience store. Or drink in "Iced Coffee" to discover the plight of the rural French cafe. On the lighter side, read "Late Night Racquet Sports" for my adventures with our latest moth invasion. As Walt Whitman said, “That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.” Here then, my verse. Welcome to Life In A Word.

26 thoughts on “Horses on Circular Courses”

    1. I thought you might mention the SeaGlass Carousel, which I came across in my research. Thought about including it but it’s too many steps removed from the traditional ones.

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    1. I suppose it could be overlooked if you weren’t looking in the right direction but it’s immediately adjacent to the main parking lot of the zoo. Same place you’ll find the miniature railroad. Go be a kid again!

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  3. A new carousel was installed in Cincinnati, OH about ten years ago, housed in a glass building, to be enjoyed no matter the weather. It’s a beautifully-appointed specimen if I do say so myself! A group of artists, under the direction of Jonathan Queen, worked together on detailed, decorative panels that depict landmarks around the city. Some are rather whimsical (a deer in one of the parks, with his mug of morning coffee, for example); others are more realistic. Our son was one of the artists.

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    1. I’m glad I looked it up, Nancy. It’s like a jewel in a glass box. I hope it’s getting a lot of use. And I did see the decorative panels you’re referring to. Wonderful how your son played a part. Now if only I could figure out who Carol Ann is!

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      1. Thank you Dave for taking an interest–even looking up our “jewel in a glass box!” The carousel is named for the late philanthropist Carol Ann Haile. She and her husband donated $5 million dollars toward the project.

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  4. Thanks for jogging a memory for me! When I was a child, now and then we got to ride on the Bowness (Alberta, Canada) Carousel. It was built by the Herschell-Spillman Company of North Tonawanda, New York, in 1904. The carousel was eventually sold to the Calgary Heritage Park where it got a major restoration in 1990. The steam-operated military-ban organ went missing, sadly.

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    1. Looks very “old-school”, and I wonder if the portraits of the ladies around the spindle are based on real women? Those steam organs are a fond memory, as much for the music they make as for the unmistakable loud hiss as the engine did its thing.

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  5. Dave, thanks for the scoop on M-G-R Day, which I was not aware of and missed. I would prefer “carousel” as well. I can’t remember when and where I last rode a carousel … was I still a kid? Was it at Cedar Point in Ohio on a day outing for Senior Skip Day in June 1973? (I’d have preferred that ride to the roller coaster my friends dared me to go on.) It’s been a while at any rate and I don’t remember going on one that fancy to have a brass ring. So now I understand the concept of the expression of grabbing the brass ring. As to the merry-go-rounds that were on children’s playgrounds, I never saw one of those in Canada when we lived there, so my first experience was at age 10 and I was one-and-done with it. Scared of my little ol’ life I guess!

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    1. Having grandchildren helps my memory since I’m absolutely sure my last ride on a carousel was to accompany one or more of them. In our lawsuit-happy society, I’m surprised certain playground equipment still exists (including metal slides that get white-hot in summer). Maybe there’s some kind of disclaimer in the fine print of the playground signage 🙂

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      1. I guess not only having kids but grandkids helps your memory a lot … since I have never had either, I have to reach back pretty far to remember playground equipment. Yes, the metal slides and the merry-go-rounds where you had to hang on for dear life – what were manufacturers thinking? At Belle Isle, for many years there was a ride called “the giant slide” and they waxed the 40-foot-tall metal slide to make it even slicker. It was wavy and bumpy and you went down in a potato sack, to avoid metal contact/burns. They closed down the ride and opened it up a few years ago and people got hurt, even with some back injuries from going down crooked and getting hurt at the bottom, so they closed it down again. There is now a much tamer slide, with less wavy bumps and less wax. 🙂

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  6. Dave, how could you omit mention of the carousel at the Santa Monica Pier? The Looff Hippodrome (that’s the building) opened in 1916 with a carousel handcrafted by Charles Looff himself. Yes, there was a brass ring dispenser. Sadly, in 1939 that carousel was sold to Belmont Park in Mission Beach, in 1939 (it’s no longer there). Today, the Santa Monica Pier has a 1922 Philadelphia Toboggan Company carousel, installed in 1947. The ride is accompanied in part by music from an original Wurlitzer Model 46 Automatic Band Organ..

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    1. I don’t remember a carousel on the Santa Monica Pier (only the roller coaster way out on the end), but I’m not surprised to know it had one. My research came from Wikipedia, which included a list of “notable” carousels from the early 1900s. Another of their lists includes the one at Great America in Santa Clara (relatively youthful – built in 1976!)

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  7. Cedar Point in Sandusky Ohio still operates the Cedar Downs Racing Carousel from the early 1920s. It is set up as a simulated horse race, and spins pretty fast, at least as I remember it.

    I suffer from an aversion to spinning rides now, so don’t know how I would manage.

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    1. The Cedar Downs carousel was included in the list of “notables” I found on Wikipedia. There was a time when spinning rides were my thing, but a decade or two ago my body suddenly decided, “Nope, not interested anymore”.

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  8. I loved the merry-go-round when I was a kid – it was always my favorite ride at the fall fairs, as I hated heights. I think Paris has a number of famous carousels too.

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    1. It’s a good point about Paris, Joni. Since “carousel” is based on a French word, you’d think there would be several good ones in France. My research didn’t go quite that far.

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      1. I knew about the Paris ones, as I’ve been researching things to do in Paris and keep seeing mentions of several different ones, one near the Eiffel Tower I think!

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  10. Great read! I never knew carousels had such a cool history with “little battles” and ring jousting. It’s funny, all this talk of things going ’round in circles reminds me of the big cleanup project I’ve got going on at home. I rented a dumpster and I’ve been circling my house for days, tossing old stuff out. Maybe I should have played some of those theme songs while I worked

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    1. Ever since the carousel post I’ve had “Will It Go Round in Circles” in my head – ha. As for the history of carousels, I had no idea about those details either. It’s a fringe benefit to pursuing topics of interest – you end up learning little things you never knew before.

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