Break on the lake
Wright’s ‘floricycle,’ locally made carousel spring back to life in resurgent Buffalo
Too small for the big-kid rides, I wrap my arms around my horse’s muscular neck as he rises and falls like the waves of Lake Erie.
In another Kodachrome memory, I squint up at a hill of flowers as colorful and orderly as my Crayola 64-pack.I wonder: Are they real?
They are in the floral clock on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. But the horse with the carved, flowing mane and flaring nostrils was part of the carousel at Crystal Beach in nearby Ontario, Canada. The 1880s amusement park closed in 1989 and the carousel was sold along with its roller coasters and other rides.
Now the horses are back, along with lions, ostriches, giraffes and other carved wooden creatures, in a restored antique merry-go-round powered by the sun, the Buffalo Heritage Carousel. And the flowers? They still bloom on the floral clock’s 40-foot face on Canada’s side of the falls. Starting Monday, vaccinated U.S. residents can again visit Canada.
But why wait in line at the Peace Bridge? You can see Frank Lloyd Wright’s “floricyle” — a huge curving garden bed where flowers bloom in succession from March through November — at Buffalo’s Darwin Martin House. Both attractions are a little over three hours’ drive from Downtown Pittsburgh.
The 34 carousel animals that circle endlessly in a solar-powered pavilion by the Buffalo River started as blocks of wood carved by unknown artisans in suburban North Tonawanda, N.Y. Spillman Engineering Co. craftsmen — many of whom also carved for Spillman’s cross-town competitor, now the Herschell Carrousel Factory Museum — created this carousel in 1924 for Domenick DeAngelis, who operated it at various parks in Massachusetts. It’s known as a menagerie carousel because it has more than horses.
After DeAngelis died in 1952, his family kept the carousel in storage for 60 years, hoping to see it run once again. In 2016, the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corp. bought it for $250,000 to install at Canalside, an entertainment complex in downtown Buffalo near the western terminus of the Erie Canal. Then the fun really began.
“My friend recruited me,” said artist Linda Chaffee, 70, of Akron, N.Y. ‘“We’re going to paint this carousel. It will take a year.’ It took four years.”
The restorers, most of them volunteers like Chaffee, spent about 200 hours on each animal, heat-stripping and documenting each layer of paint, removing screws and nails, patching, sanding and applying five coats of paint and sealer.
Although the horses were ordered from a catalog, customers could add details that made them unique. DeAngelis, an Italian immigrant, asked Spillman to carve an American eagle and sword into horses’ flanks.
“Several of our horses are one of a kind. We’re the only one who has them,” said Carima El-Behairy, director of operations and development.
Chaffee, who often works the register, said 50,000 people have ridden the carousel since it opened in late May.
“What surprises me is it’s all ages,” she said. “We had two ladies who were 99 and 104 years old. They walk through the door and they’re kids again.”