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Fantastic old coaster footage/pics

I've seen that footage before (Pathe has some great footage of old rides if you hunt around) - brilliant stuff, shows the kind of thing we've lost over the years.

Anyway, have a picture of King George VI on a Helter Skelter to cheer you up :)

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Jordanovichy said:
He's not enjoying it is he?

He's as happy as the social decorum at the time allowed him to be :)

rtotheizzo17 said:
^^You mean some old royal is responsible for creation of heavy metal???


P.S, I know helter skelter is a slide.

Actually, it's probably a "Lighthouse Slip" rather than a Helter Skelter, but I didn't want to confuse people ;)
 
I always knew that New Brighton had a Figure 8, but never until now knew about the Scenic Railway they had also until the 60's. A couple of photo's below. On the second one you can make out the double dip. Does anyone else know of any better quality images of this coaster as looks like quite a decent layout for a scenic, and fairly tall!:

390540786_30cbbaea7a_m.jpg

EPW004047.jpg
 
Edit: Thought I'd found something, but hadn't.

That website (Britain from above) shows the coaster there before the tower's construction. It must have been quite a lively place back in the day - a big difference to what it's become today.
 
That Britain from Above site really does have some gems on it. I'd never seen the full layout of the Scenic Railway and Velvet Coaster at Blackpool Pleasure Beach before, but here it is in all it's glory, along with the Switchback (being dismantled) which sits roughly where the Big Dipper is now. Watson Road would run straight through the round building in the middle of the image. On the actual site you can zoom in on the image and see it more clearly. Velvet Coaster is to the right of the round building, and the Scenic Railway is just above that (below the Water Chute) - This pic is from 1920:

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And again from 1929 with the Big Dipper!

EPW029208.jpg
 
I just remembered that I've been meaning to post this.

A little while back I bought this awesome postcard dated 1907.
The rollercoaster in the photo is named the Topsy Turvy Railway and was apparently in Crystal Palace according to the back.

I couldn't find mention of it on RCDB but thought someone on here might find it interesting.

I'm pretty sure the card is actually a photo even thought it looks like a painting - colour photography was pretty basic back then and it looks tad better in real

(Does anyone know how to get the photo to show without having to be logged in? Sorry!)
 

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The first looping coasters appeared in the late 1900's as portable exhibition pieces. Coney Island had one called the Flic-Flac (or something).

People only used to ride them once, then spend weeks in traction laughing at other idiots who tried them.

I used to know loads about the obscure early coasters, but it's all a bit vague now.

Anyway, chances are that's from an exhibition. I don't know if you've noticed, but it's some kind of shuttle. I've no idea how they managed to get the cars back. I think the Flic-Flac had a circuit.

I saw a show last week and in the background was a picture of the Flic-Flac, can't remember for the life of me what it was. Something like Arrow, or Star Trek or something rubbish I caught for ten minutes while channel hopping.

ashtonrick said:
That Britain from Above site really does have some gems on it. I'd never seen the full layout of the Scenic Railway and Velvet Coaster at Blackpool Pleasure Beach before, but here it is in all it's glory, along with the Switchback (being dismantled) which sits roughly where the Big Dipper is now. Watson Road would run straight through the round building in the middle of the image. On the actual site you can zoom in on the image and see it more clearly. Velvet Coaster is to the right of the round building, and the Scenic Railway is just above that (below the Water Chute) - This pic is from 1920:

EPW002058.jpg


And again from 1929 with the Big Dipper!

EPW029208.jpg

Those images are priceless. I've seen a lot of decent old photos of seaside parks and I find them beyond fascinating. There was a great one of Folkestone's Switchback on the beach and one of Matlock's. I've also seen some glorious images down on the ground at Blackpool in the 1930's with the ghost train and stuff looming over crowded paths. I just can't get enough of them, but these are sublime.

When you look at the whole area and compare it to today. Hell, compare it to my earliest memories in the 1970's. The entire beach, front, railway line - the whole lot is utterly unrecognisable to what it is today. You can just make out the shape, but in terms of infrastructure and everything, it's just a load of stuff dumped on a beach on the edge of the middle of nowhere. I love it!

Here's the Folkestone Switchback:
switchback_folkstone1.jpg


switchback_folkstone3.jpg


The Matlock Bath Switchback was in the pleasure gardens mentioned in last week's "Our Zoo" where they got the bears from (if anyone watched it).

mb_dg_switchback_01b.jpg


mb_switchback01.jpg


I find the Matlock Switchback really compelling as Matlock Bath itself is now seen as a kind of posh, "part of area of outstanding natural beauty" place - but in fact it's got a hidden history of trying to be an inland Blackpool.
 
Ah okay - yeah being temporary makes sense - I was thinking it might be a bit better-known if it had remained for a while.

Without sounding too naive - what makes you say it's a shuttle?

That Folkestone photo is great - seeing the supports structure right above a beautiful beach is pretty strange, especially to see back then. I love the decorative wood-work to the track sides too.

The Switchbacks seem like a great idea - they're just a scenic ride really and I would love to see a replica incorporated into a park with decent natural surroundings.
 
vaugc002 said:
Ah okay - yeah being temporary makes sense - I was thinking it might be a bit better-known if it had remained for a while.

Without sounding too naive - what makes you say it's a shuttle?

Sorry, shuttle in the most basic sense :lol:

It's a one way trip. I assume that after the ride, they took the corpse and car off the track and carried them off (to the morgue and back to the top depending ;) ). I think the Coney Island one was the first to have a circular return track, but it was a lot later.

Just found a postcard with a decent description. It looks like it was a "permanent attraction", but by all accounts, these things were crippling and never lasted long in any one place. Look here:
http://www.lookandlearn.com/history-ima ... ool=phrase

It says the train was raised to the top by chain at an angle of 28 degrees, then dropped at 45 degrees. 48 feet high and 350 yards end to end.

vaugc002 said:
That Folkestone photo is great - seeing the supports structure right above a beautiful beach is pretty strange, especially to see back then. I love the decorative wood-work to the track sides too.

I think that's part of what I love. I just find the contrast of a sandy beach with a wooden coaster on it really cool. It's so "right, today we'll just dump a 20 ton wooden coaster here, by the sea!" I love it :)

vaugc002 said:
The Switchbacks seem like a great idea - they're just a scenic ride really and I would love to see a replica incorporated into a park with decent natural surroundings.

I suspect that they'd contravene H&S as the cars had to be pushed up to the switch back section at the top of each side. Plus a lot of the original cars were completely open with just wooden benches. They'd be ruined today - which is sad. I replica at Dreamland would be stunning though :)

On the Blackpool photos, did anyone notice that the Velvet Coaster was substantially retracked between the 1920 and 1929 photos? It's got a much steeper dip. The original was more like a traditional Scenic, but the 1929 is much more like a "second era" wooden coaster.

Also, on the 1920 photo, past the water chute (to the right of where the Virginia Reel appears in the 1929 photo), there's another tracked ride. It looks like a very simple drop with bumps. Anyone any ideas on that one?
 
Excellent Switchback photos there!

Didn't notice how different Velvet Coaster was between the two pictures, and totally agree in 1920 very 'Scenic Railway' - strangely, the first dip on the 1929 photo really reminds me of Rollercoaster (or Nick Streak if you wish to call it it's current name) which rose from the ashes of this very ride!

Well spotted Furie on that other tracked ride - hadn't noticed myself, and haven't a clue what that is at all. Maybe someone in the know from the Pleasure Beach could help us out? ;-)

Also, on this photo from 1948 between the Funhouse and the Nash lifthill there is another seemingly tracked ride - at first I thought it was an early circular chute type ride but the run off is too short, and I am sure the first circular chute was the old Water Chute / Vikingar (which ended up not far from there) which came from Belle Vue?

EAW020134.jpg


http://www.britainfromabove.org.uk/image/eaw020134?search=blackpool pleasure beach&ref=4
 
Okay, I think I have the answers :)

The early tracked ride is "The Canadian Toboggan". I can't find any photos of it (it left in the 20's) so I don't know if it was a slide type of ride or if you would have sat in a wheeled carriage.

The ride you picked up on next to the Fun House, was "The Jack and Jill Slide". A very popular ride type of that era. You sat in a kind of boat thing and went down a twisting, bumpy slide:

Couple of examples of travelling ones here - nothing the size of Blackpool's with the twisting drop though:
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Look at the queues for it!
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I remember now why I stay out of this topic. I keep on finding and finding and re-finding and losing myself all over again.

Major coaster on the sea front at Cleethorpes? Yes there was, as with dozens of seaside towns where you'd never think there was once any kind of rides (obviously Cleethorpes does :lol: )

Linc080.jpg


Then I found the first looping coasters to go with the Crystal Palace one.

I'm always happy to acknowledge when I'm wrong (either directly or sarcastically :p ) and I was.

It was Flic-Flac and it wasn't at Coney Island. It was "Flip-Flap" at Sea Lion Park in 1895:
Flip_Flap_Railway_Sea_Lion_Park by elyse.shirebooks, on Flickr

The Coney Island one was simply "Loop the Loop" from 1901:
Loop_the_Loop,_Luna_Park,_Coney_Island by elyse.shirebooks, on Flickr

I'm getting away from Google before I die of nostalgia :lol:
 
So it is a Jack n Jill slide! Always wanted to see what one properly looked like as believe they used to have one at Belle Vue too but the photo's I'd seen never showed the ride properly.

Also - more amazing pics there Mr Furie! You certainly have some hidden gems.
 
The overhead photos of the Please Beach are fascinating...
You know, I never realised it was actually built on the beach! :lol:
 
Here are a number of good tourist videos of Cedar Point through the years.

1993

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twRkHOJAcZU[/youtube]

1989

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rYceoXbRBjg&feature=share[/youtube]

1979 and 1976

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoRmPyuU5oQ[/youtube]

Great video footage of the original Shoot the Rapids, Frontier Lift, and the mysterious Jumbo Jets that stood where Gatekeeper now stands.

1976

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1fQTMZml-s[/youtube]

Get to see where the Western Cruise was once located, good shots of Corkscrew in its debut, and the old Bayern Kurves ride.
 
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