Roller coaster amusement rides have origins back to ice slides constructed in 18th-century Russia. Early technology featured sleds or wheeled carts that were sent down hills of snow reinforced by wooden supports. The technology evolved in the 19th century to feature railroad track using wheeled cars that were securely locked to the track. Newer innovations emerged in the early 20th century with side friction and underfriction technologies to allow for greater speeds and sharper turns. By the mid-to-late 20th century, these elements intensified with the introduction of steel roller coaster designs and the ability to invert riders.
The world's oldest roller coasters descended from the "Russian Mountains", which were hills of ice built in the 17th century for the purpose of sliding, located in the gardens of palaces around the Russian capital, Saint Petersburg.[1] Other languages also reference Russian mountains when referring to roller coasters, such as the Spanish (la montaña rusa), the Italian (Roller coaster), and the French (les montagnes russes [fr]). The Russian term for roller coaster, американские горки [ru] (amerikanskie gorki), translates literally as "American mountains".[2]
The recreational attractions were called Katalnaya Gorka (КатальнаяГорка) or "sliding mountain" in Russian. Many were built to a height of 70 to 80 feet (21 to 24 m) with a 50-degree drop, and were reinforced by wooden supports covered in ice. The slides became popular with the Russian upper class. Catherine the Great of Russia constructed a summer version of the ride at her estate in 1784, which relied on wheeled carts instead of sleds that rode along grooved tracks.[3][4]
Russian soldiers occupying Paris from 1815 to 1816, after the defeat of Napoleon at Waterloo, may have introduced the Russian amusement of sledding down steep hills.[5] In July 1817, a French banker named Nicolas Beaujon opened the Parc Beaujon, an amusement park on the Champs Elysees. Its most famous feature was the Promenades Aériennes or "Aerial Strolls."[6] It featured wheeled cars securely locked to the track, guide rails to keep them on course, and higher speeds.[3] The three-wheel carts were towed to the top of a tower, and then released to descend two curving tracks on either side. King Louis XVIII of France came to see the park, but it is not recorded if he tried the ride. Before long there were seven similar rides in Paris: Les Montagnes françaises (The French Mountains), le Delta, les Montagnes de Belleville (The Mountains of Belleville), les Montagnes américaines (the American Mountains), Les Montages lilliputiennes, (The miniature mountains), Les Montagnes suisses (The Swiss mountains), and Les Montagnes égyptiennes (The Egyptian mountains).[5]
In the beginning, these attractions were primarily for the upper classes. In 1845 a new amusement park opened in Copenhagen, Tivoli, which was designed for the middle class. These new parks featured roller coasters as permanent attractions. The first permanent loop track was probably also built in Paris from an English design in 1846, with a single-person wheeled sled running through a 13-foot (4 m) diameter vertical loop. These early single loop designs were called Centrifugal Railways. In 1887, a French entrepreneur, Joseph Oller, the owner of the Moulin Rouge music hall, built Les Montagnes Russes à Belleville (The Russian Mountains of Belleville) a permanent roller coaster with a length of two hundred meters in the form of a double-eight, later enlarged to four figure-eight-shaped loops.[5]
In the 1850s, a mining company in Summit Hill, Pennsylvania, constructed the Mauch Chunkgravity railroad, a brakeman-controlled, 8.7-mile (14 km) downhill track used to deliver coal to Mauch Chunk (now known as Jim Thorpe), Pennsylvania.[7] By 1872, the "Gravity Road" (as it became known) was selling rides to thrill seekers. Railway companies used similar tracks to provide amusement on days when ridership was low.
Using this idea as a basis, LaMarcus Adna Thompson began work on a gravity Switchback Railway that opened at Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York in 1884.[8] Passengers climbed to the top of a platform and rode a bench-like car down the 600 ft (180 m) track up to the top of another tower where the vehicle was switched to a return track and the passengers took the return trip.[9] This track design was soon replaced with an oval complete circuit.[10] In 1885, Phillip Hinkle introduced the first complete-circuit coaster with a lift hill, the Gravity Pleasure Road, which became the most popular attraction at Coney Island.[10] Not to be outdone, in 1886 LaMarcus Adna Thompson patented his design for a roller coaster that included dark tunnels with painted scenery. "Scenic Railways" were soon found in amusement parks across the county,[10] with Frederick Ingersoll's construction company building many of them in the first two decades of the 20th century.
As it grew in popularity, experimentation in coaster dynamics took off. In the 1880s the concept of a vertical loop was again explored by Lina Beecher, and in 1895 the concept came into fruition with the Flip Flap Railway, located at Sea Lion Park in Brooklyn, and shortly afterward with Loop the Loop at Olentangy Park near Columbus, Ohio as well as similar coasters in Atlantic City and Coney Island. The rides were incredibly dangerous, and many passengers suffered whiplash. Both were soon dismantled, and looping coasters had to wait for over a half century before making a reappearance.
By 1919, the first underfriction roller coaster had been developed by John Miller.[11] Soon, roller coasters spread to amusement parks all around the world. Perhaps the best known historical roller coaster, The Cyclone, was opened at Coney Island in 1927. Like The Cyclone, all early roller coasters were made of wood. Many old wooden roller coasters are still operational, at parks such as Kennywood near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Pleasure Beach Blackpool. The oldest operating roller coaster is Leap-The-Dips at Lakemont Park in Pennsylvania, a side friction roller coaster built in 1902. The oldest wooden roller coaster in the United Kingdom is the Scenic Railway at Dreamland Amusement Park in Margate, Kent and features a system where the brakeman rides the car with wheels. It was severely damaged by fire on April 7, 2008, but was subsequently restored and reopened to the public in 2015.[12]Scenic Railway at Melbourne's Luna Park built in 1912, is the world's oldest continually-operating roller coaster, and it also still features a system where the brakeman rides the car with wheels. One of only 13 remaining examples of John Miller's work worldwide is the wooden roller coaster at Lagoon in Utah. The coaster opened in 1921 and is the 6th oldest coaster in the world.[13]
The Great Depression marked the end of the golden age of roller coasters, as amusement parks generally went into a decline that resulted in less demand for new coasters. This lasted until 1972, when The Racer opened at Kings Island amusement park located in what was then a part of Deerfield Township in Warren County, Ohio. Designed by John C. Allen, the instant success of The Racer helped to ignite a renaissance for roller coasters, reviving worldwide interest throughout the industry.
In 1959, the Disneyland theme park introduced a new design breakthrough in roller coasters with the Matterhorn Bobsleds. This was the first roller coaster to use a tubular steel track. Unlike conventional wooden rails, which are generally formed using steel strips mounted on laminated wood, tubular steel can be bent in any direction, which allows designers to incorporate loops, corkscrews, and many other maneuvers into their designs. Most modern roller coasters are made of steel, although wooden roller coasters are still being built along with hybrids of steel and wood.
Bartolomeo Francesco Rastrelli builds a sophisticated summer and winter roller coaster palace, Riding Mountain, for Russian Empress Catherine the Great in Tsarskoye Selo. It featured two coasters: one trail was laid out along a straight line with five "hills" and one was with a spiral trail. In summer time they used cars on wheels locked in tracks. The ride was engineered by Andrey Nartov.[14][15]
Catherine the Great builds a summer version of the "Russian mountain" slide, featuring sleds with wheels, at her estate in Oranienbaum, Russia near St. Petersburg.[3]
Cannon Coaster opens at Coney Island. The designer first attempts to "leap-the-gap" and create a roller coaster which has its cars jump over a gap in the track. Safety testing fails, and the idea is scrapped.[10]
For a long time, people assumed that the first tubular steel roller coaster was the Matterhorn at Disneyland. Only in 1956 there was already one at the fair in Paris, the R2000.
The Beast: opened as the tallest, fastest and longest wooden roller coaster. Today it's still the longest wooden roller coaster in the world.Carolina Cyclone
First roller coaster with a 90° vertical drop* and fastest roller coaster acceleration: Dodonpa, Fuji-Q Highland, Fujiyoshida, Yamanashi, Japan. (*Note: it was changed for a vertical loop in 2017)
First roller coaster to use pneumatic propulsion system: Hypersonic XLC, Kings Dominion.
^ abcBennett, David (1998). Roller Coaster: Wooden and Steel Coasters, Twisters and Corkscrews. Edison, New Jersey: Chartwell Books. 9. ISBN0-7865-0885-X
^Sheedy, Chris (7 January 2007). "Icons — In the Beginning... Roller-Coaster". Sunday Life (weekly supplemental magazine included in The Sun-Herald). John Fairfax Publications Pty Ltd. p. 10.
^Rutherford, Scott (2000) The American Roller Coaster, MBI Publishing Company, Wisconsin, ISBN0760306893.
^ abcdefghSteven J. Urbanowicz (2002). The Roller Coaster Lover's Companion. Kensington, New York: Citadel Press. 4. ISBN0-8065-2309-3.
^John Glen King, A Letter to the Right Reverend the Lord Bishop of Durham: Containing Some Observations on the Climate of Russia and the Northern Countries, with a View of the Flying Mountains at Zarsko Sello Near St. Petersbourg, pp. 18,19
^Cartmell, Robert (1987). The Incredible Scream Machine: A History of the Roller Coaster. Fairview Park, OH and Bowling Green, OH: Amusement Park Books, Inc. and Bowling Green State University Popular Press. ISBN0879723416.
^Tieteen kuvalehti Historia 11/2014, p.74 (in Finnish)
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