From wkyc.com: Cedar Point: Midway Carousel turns 100…
SANDUSKY — Cedar Point has reached many milestones throughout its history with record-breaking roller coasters and sky-scraping rides. This week, the Sandusky scream park celebrated another achievement as the Midway Carousel turned 100 years old.
When you first step inside Cedar Point’s main gate, the spinning, glimmering, musical ride is the first attraction to greet you.
The Midway Carousel, which was created by Daniel and Alfred Muller, features 60 jumping horses, four chariots and a Wurlitzer 153-band organ. The duo, who carved carousels from 1903-1917, built the ride in 1912 for John J. Hurley, who operated it as Hurley’s Hurdlers in Revere Beach, Mass.
The carousel made its first revolution at Cedar Point in 1946 after a Sandusky family purchased the ride and operated it at the park. In 1963, the carousel became the property of Cedar Point. It was recently repainted in 2010.
It is currently the oldest operating ride at Cedar Point.
Veronica Vanden Bout, executive director of the Museum of Carousel Art and History in Sandusky, presented Cedar Point with a plaque to commemorate the Midway Carousel as one of only three of its kind still in operation today.
“The National Carousel Association is pleased to present a Centennial Award to this marvelous merry-go-round,” Vanden Bout said. “Daniel Muller was an amazing artist and sculptor responsible for creating some of the best horses to ride a carousel. To see this artistry still enjoyed after all these years is heartwarming. So many carousels were lost to us and honoring one of the fewer than 250 historic machines surviving is one of my favorite pastimes.”
In addition to the Midway Carousel, Cedar Point owns and operates two other carousels — the Kiddy Kingdom Carousel and Cedar Downs Racing Derby, which is one of only two racing carousels in the United States.
Some stories have swirled that the Midway Carousel is haunted, but park officials say more ghost stories surround the old Frontiertown Carousel, which closed in 1994 and was relocated at Dorney Park in Allentown, Pa.
