JOHN WARREN
Contributing Writer
This week’s subject matter involves something that may not qualify as a mystery, but is at least a curiosity.
The early days of the Chautauqua Assembly were about Sunday school training classes, lectures on matters biblical and sociopolitical, all things related to temperance/abstinence and choral music. For recreation, well, there was no dancing, no drinking and no card playing. But one could partake in a leisurely lakeside stroll or take in a game of croquet. The closest thing to an amusement park would have been Palestine Park, the “living map” of the Holy Land along the shores of Chautauqua Lake.
That is, unless you believe the historical accounts that there was a roller coaster on the grounds. If you have trouble imagining John Heyl Vincent and Lewis Miller careening down a coaster, beards askew, arms in the air, you’re in good company.
But incongruous as it may seem, accounts in the Oliver Archives Center maintain there was indeed a roller coaster on the grounds from 1885 to 1888.
According to notes in a related folder, the gravity roller coaster was in the area surrounding the ravine above Norton Hall, bordered by Palestine, Scott and Root Avenues. Farther south are present-day Elizabeth S. Lenna Hall and the music practice shacks.
The coaster was called the Royal Scooter, the records maintain. Groups of 10 would travel around a 500-foot circular track, reaching speeds of 80 mph, for a total ride length of 13 seconds. People sat facing toward the center; centrifugal force helped to keep them in their seats — which had no straps. The cost was 25 cents, which would buy 10 rides.
A skeptic might also note the facts in that folder do not include source attribution.
1885 editions of The Chautauquan Assembly Herald — the Daily’s pre-1906 incarnation — include short mentions throughout the season.
Under the headline of “Fun at Chautauqua,” an Assembly-Herald ad reads: “The authorities have availed our Messers. Weaver and Kimball to erect one of the largest and best roller coasters in existence, giving all a chance to ride down hill without snow. Physicians of a high standing recommend it; so do all who ride. If you ride once you will ride again; if you don’t ride at all you will miss a novel experience. A fine view of the lake and a cool breeze always await you at the Chautauqua Circular Gravity Railway, or Roller Coaster.”
“Weaver” was “P.H. Weaver,” who is identified as the concessionaire (not the builder or proprietor). Kimball is an important historical name to Chautauquans, though never in any context akin to a roller coaster.
More hyperbole in the Assembly-Herald:
“The Roller Coast(er) is the new attraction this year… and furnishes those desiring excitement with just what they want.”
“The roller coast(er) near the gymnasium is in operation during the day and evening. This exhilarating sport is being enjoyed by more people this year than ever before, and those who desire some real, genuine sport should try this novel machine. The Royal Scooter is in the care of a man experienced in such matters, and he takes particular pains in looking after the comfort of his guests.”
The gymnasium mentioned would not have been the Seaver Gym by Chautauqua Lake, which wasn’t built until the 1890s.
The Assembly-Herald maintained later in 1885: “Enthusiasm over the roller coaster continues unabated. The infection seems to have even attacked some of the older boys and girls who nightly make excuses to seek the high grounds in the vicinity of ‘The Royal Scooter,’ presumably to hear the chimes from
a distance.”
Chimes? The Miller Bell Tower was not built until 1911.
Other local newspaper accounts effuse, variously:
“That noise which sounds like the roaring of a passing train of cars, is the roller coaster…”
And: “It’s a grand thing for the inside visceral. Just the oppose of seasickness, it makes you strong inside instead of weak,” an assertion attributed to a “distinguished professor of one of the Chautauqua schools.”
A skeptic may also note there is nothing tying the roller coaster specifically to the grounds of the Chautauqua Institution.
Perhaps the best evidence it was on the grounds is contained in a short article in the July 2, 1885 Dunkirk Evening Observer, which holds:
“There will be a new device for giving amusement to the patrons of Chautauqua this season. P.H. Weaver, of Jamestown, will have a roller coaster on the grounds, which is a circular railway, built upon stilts, one edge touching the ground and that opposite elevated high in the air; the runway having a track on which a car is placed. Starting from the highest point the car, loaded with people, speeds down the incline and gains nearly sufficient momentum to reach the summit or starting point. It is coasting without any walking up hill.”
“Chautauqua” was then, as now, often used as shorthand for the Chautauqua Assembly, or Chautauqua Institution. And “the grounds” lends credence to this being in the Institution.
In her 1940s-era history of Chautauqua, Rebecca Richmond’s briefly references the coaster, writing, “… for many years a roller coaster had remained on the fringe of the grounds…”
Did it remain in place, long after it stopped operating?
In a Daily column in the 1970s, the artist and journalist Maritza Morgan briefly references it, writing: “The roller coaster is gone, as are the horse and buggy shelters and the train tracks and railroad station which sat at the bottom of the incline in front (sic) my house at the bottom of Forest Avenue.”
Again, neither record notes the location or other specifics that might tie it more concretely to the Institution.
Oral history holds that the coaster was sold to Celeron Amusement Park at the south end of Chautauqua Lake. Other records maintain that coaster didn’t operate until decades later.
The location of the roller coaster becomes murky when you consult other records, including for a roller coaster database, which refers to the location of P.H. Weaver’s Royal Scooter as “Lake Chautauqua Park,” a generic name assigned to the predecessor of the Celeron Amusement Park, which survived well into the 20th century. Instead of 500 feet, the Royal Scooter at Lake Chautauqua Park is identified as being 2,500 feet in length.
Looking down from Palestine Avenue toward Norton Hall, one can imagine the incline — with the aid of stilts — could be sufficient for a roller coaster. There is seemingly no remnant of a roller coaster, until one pokes into a weedy area behind Norton Hall. There are three rotting 8-inch-by-8-inch posts, about 4 feet tall and spaced 8 feet apart. They are not arranged in a straight line like a fence would be, but rather in a triangle, straddling the trickle of water running down the ravine as it meets a culvert. Short lengths of rusted chain attached to the posts include irregularly sized wrought-iron links, consistent with pre-1920s vintage, before standardized
production techniques.
It’s a tantalizing clue, but given Western New York’s harsh winter climate, it’s unlikely the posts — deteriorated though they are — could be 140 years old.
Records, including in the roller coaster database, put the roller coaster’s end as 1888. Nowhere in the Assembly-Herald, nor in other local newspapers or the Oliver Archives Center, is the end referenced.
But a short, lonely blurb in The Westfield Republication on Wednesday, Aug. 29, 1888 may hold the answer. The article reads: “The car of a roller coaster in Chautauqua jumped the track Saturday and several coasters were injured.”
