Carousel Found, Carousel Lost

Where do I get my ideas? From my life.

Previously in this blog, I described how my novelette CAROUSEL MAGIC came into being from my experience and a sprinkle of magic. Rocky Rapids Amusement Park, the setting for both CAROUSEL MAGIC and my novella RESTORE MY HEART, is based on the amusement park that gave me so much joy as a child: Cascade Park in New Castle, PA. As I wrote both books, I often wondered what happened to the park's carousel, and if it had been created by one of the masters, like Gustav Dentzel. The librarian in me took firm charge, and off I went on the hunt.

My mother often shared stories about the glory days of Cascade Park.The park had opened in 1897 and boasted a merry-go-round as well as several other rides, set among the forested hills outside the city and along the gorge formed by the waters of Big Run. In 1908, the Harmony Short Line, a new interurban streetcar running from Pittsburgh to New Castle, opened a station just east of the park. Streetcars brought people from all over western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio to the site, another of the so-called “Trolley Parks,” the turn-of-the-century precursor to the modern amusement park.

In 1922, history sources document that Cascade Park replaced its original carousel (origins unknown) with a "new" one, one it purchased from Idora Park in nearby Youngstown, OH. I then found this intriguing quote in a roller coaster fan's blog:

This [the carousel pavilion at Cascade Park] once housed a Philadelphia Toboggan Company carousel, PTC #61, that previously resided at another lost Rust Belt park, Youngstown, Ohio's Idora Park. It currently operates at Brooklyn Bridge Park in Brooklyn, New York. (Coaster Talk No BS Zone)

I was ecstatic. The carousel that I remember, that I rode, was a vintage carousel, and not only that, the carousel had been given new life when it had been purchased in 1984, restored and re-assembled in New York with its new name "Jane's Carousel". 

My carousel was found!

Last month I met with Todd Goings of Carousels and Carvings for dinner in Burlington, NC where he had been working on the vintage Dentzel machine. Todd has been my go-to research source for all things related to carousel restoration. It just so happened that he knew the family who had purchased PTC #61, and he shared that the carousel now in New York was purchased from Idora Park, not from Cascade Park. So PTC #61 could not be my carousel.

No! Say it isn't so! 


I wanted to cry out, but we were at dinner, so I kept my dismay to a lower "No, really?"  

Yes, really.

Back to the hunt.

More internet searching, more comparison of records, more reading. What I've learned is the following:

• The origin of Cascade Park's first carousel is unknown to me so far, but it operated in the park from 1897 to 1922.
• I do know that in 1898, in the first season of Idora Park's operation "An electric merry‑go‑round with wooden animals carved by Gustav Dentzel of Philadelphia was a major attraction."
• In 1922, Idora Park purchased a new, magnificent carousel, PTC #61. Idora sold the Dentzel carousel to Cascade Park. 
• 1923 Season at Cascade Park. "A large, circular pavilion, built by James B. McLendon of the New Castle Lumber Company, was also erected to house a new carousel [the Dentzel] acquired from Idora Park."
• The Dentzel carousel ran in Cascade Park from 1922 to 1953 when "The carousel was rebuilt as the old wooden horses were replaced with aluminum ones." 

By the 1980's, vandalism, storm and flood damage, and lack of resources persuaded civic leaders to change the focus of the park from amusement rides to more nature-focused activities. The photo below shows the soon-to-be-abandoned aluminum carousel (c1983). It is likely, notes a Lawrence County historian, that the metal horses were scrapped.

My carousel was lost.
  

My carousel, it seems, was the one with aluminum horses, without a doubt created by skilled metal workers and engineers, but not carved by the master craftsmen of a former era. And it did not regain new life in another park to continue to give joy, but was discarded, scrapped. I'm sad. It brings tears to my eyes. 

But then I look at the picture of the child holding on, ready to choose a horse, ready to travel into fantasy.

I was that child. I made that journey into fantasy. I found joy in the journey. 

My carousel had fulfilled its purpose.

***

For more reading:

Cascade Park of Years Past - New Castle PA Lawrence County Memoirs. Accessed June 27, 2018 

The photo above is taken from this excellent history of the park.

Jane's Carousel, An Old Ride, Gets New Life by the Brooklyn Bridge. by Meghan Barr. The Huffington Post. 2011  Accessed June 25, 2018

The Carousel News and Trader, v. 23, No. 1, January 2007.
This magazine issue carries several articles about Jane's Carousel, its restoration and the history of Idora Park. Accessed June 24, 2018

Where Do You Get Your Ideas: The Making of Shadow Love

Regency England, January 1815. Napoleon has been captured, and the country explodes into celebration. With her family’s finances in tatters, Bethany Hathaway understands that marriage proposals this London Season are critical for both herself and her sister. The influx of visitors to the city makes this the perfect time to enter the Marriage Mart. If only Bethany had not discovered a man’s body in her home. If only the evidence did not point to her mother as the accidental murderer. To Society’s festivities Bethany must now add protecting her family and shielding her heart from a wounded, persistent Viscount--the dead man’s brother.

I adore Regency Romance, especially the classic, Jane Austen-style. There's plenty of sparks arcing between characters, plenty of deep emotion hidden behind Society's manners and strictures. Tension and wit flash off the page. Shadow Love is my first journey into that world, and I'm publishing it independently as a Chapter-by-Chapter book.

How did this novel come to be? We start with my love of this romance novel subgenre and a fascination with all things related to history and manners of the period, including the American War of 1812, which Britain was fighting while trying to throttle Napoleon on the continent, and the Duchy of Warsaw, the surviving remnant of the Kingdom of Poland after Napoleon subdued it.

Being drawn to Napoleonic topics, let's jump first to my introduction in high school to the Modern Pentathlon, an Olympic event which requires the athlete to master five sports: pistol shooting, long distance running, swimming, equestrian jumping, and fencing. These were all skills needed for a courier of the Napoleonic-era armies of both France and Britain. An aside here, the Olympic event specifies that the horse used in the jumping contest be a horse unfamiliar to the rider. Like the intrepid war couriers whose horse might get shot from under them, the Olympic rider must accept a horse chosen for him by lot and guide it over a jumping course with only a little "getting-to-know-you" time.

Then mix in the wonderful books by Bernard Cromwell and the iTV episodes presenting the career of British rifleman Richard Sharpe (love Sean Bean!) and Richard's work for the intelligence agent, Michael Hogan.  Finally, add a PBS show on breaking the code of the Enigma machine during World War II and a brief mention that there was a group of code breakers who worked for Britain during the Napoleonic War.

Now I'm hooked. Who were these code breakers? How did they work? And then, as all writers will tell you, I'm off and riding the "What if...?" wave. What if my hero was a code breaker? What if he fought in the war? What if he were a courier? What if his brother was a courier? What if someone began hunting the British code breakers?

The main characters of Shadow Love, Bethany and Alex, the persistent Viscount, were part of another storyline which included twin girls, mistaken identities, and ill-conceived marriages. Take those characters and give them a different conflict, a new set of circumstances and Shadow Love is born.

Where do I get my ideas? From tugging on the line of some subject that holds my interest and let the ideas and images related to the subject bubble and simmer until they finally boil out into characters and plot. It took years before this story became clear. But it was well worth the wait!

Magic in the Childhood Merry-go-round

Readers often ask, "Where do you get your ideas for your books?". In my experience, the creation of each book rises from a different path, different choices, and the variety of life.  "Carousel Magic", my sweet romance novella, is a strong example of the phenomenon we've all experienced. At some time during life, events, people and the stars seem to align and poof! The outcome is positive and affirming. The author of the book Religious Integrity for Everyone: Functional Theology for Secular Society calls this "Exquisite Timing".  For me it's being in the flow of God's Spirit.  Over the next few posts, let me share with you how "Carousel Magic" came to be.

It all started with a weak stomach. My weak stomach to be exact. As an infant, I had trouble keeping cow's milk down, and my mother experimented with many options and finally settled on goat's milk. Move forward a few years to visits to amusement parks. I loved going to the parks and in Western Pennsylvania, we had many good ones. I tried roller coasters and tilt-a-whirls and spinning teacups, but it seems that spinning and twirling and screaming while shooting down the last coaster hill do not agree with my stomach.

But the merry-go-round? Ah-h-h. I felt grand on the up-and-down horses, flying around with the wind sweeping through my hair. You see, I'm in awe of horses and their riders. I'm frankly intimidated by a horse's size and power. But on a merry-go-round, I could imagine something of the feeling that a rider gets galloping along with a horse under him.

The Magic started with a weak stomach.


Next Time: Tutoring Magic