Wonderland largely forgotten, but wonderful

By Connie Zeigler

May is park season in Indianapolis. Pools open (those that haven’t been closed for good, that

Connie Zeigler is a resident of Fountain Square who holds a master’s degree in history. She is an architectural historian who operates a green preservation consulting business. C Resources, Inc. offers a variety of writing services as well as historic research, national register nominations and preservation planning.

is) and residents hit the golf links and playgrounds.

In 1906, “park season” had a different meaning. May brought a host of new amusements to the citizens of Indianapolis that year – a vast array of recreation activities that were both fun and fantastical. Three new mechanized amusement parks opened in the city.

Most Indianapolis residents have heard of Riverside Amusement Park (which actually opened with a toboggan railway in 1903 and didn’t close until the 1970s) and of Broad Ripple Amusement Park with its Olympic-sized swimming pool (constructed in 1908 just before Broad Ripple’s predecessor, White City Amusement Park, burned down). Johnny Weissmuller, of Tarzan fame, won swimming trials at the Broad Ripple Pool. But most people don’t know about Wonderland Amusement Park.

Located at the southwest corner of East Washington Street and Gray streets, (later the location of the P. R. Mallory factory, which is also now closed), Wonderland was the only one of the three amusement parks to open in 1906 that had no natural body of water as part of its enticement. But, it had much to offer.

Like the other parks Wonderland was purposely sited next to the electric street railway line. In Wonderland’s case, it sat beside the line to Irvington. Even before the gates on Washington Street opened to reveal all of Wonderland’s wonders, two of its top attractions, the Shoot-the-Shoots flume ride and the 125-foot tall Electric Tower, were visible above the outer fence to those on the Irvington line. The Indianapolis Star claimed the Electric Tower was decorated with enough incandescent light bulbs “to illuminate a city of 10,000”

On a chilly May 19, 1906, the opening day crowd of 8,000 could finally experience all that Wonderland had to offer.

Inside the gates there was a reenactment of the 1889 Johnstown, Pa,, Flood, a spectacle attraction and one of many found in amusement parks across the nation. The fires and floods that were usually the focus of these spectacles were thrilling to amusement park-goers.

Wonderland also offered “mysteries galore” at the “Third Degree,” a magical ride through “Hale’s Tour of the World;” the fun factory; a circle swing; and the “Mystic Maze.” And an elephant bathing in the pool at the base of the Electric Tower.

This postcard shows visitors strolling around the lagoon which served Wonderland’s Shoot-the-Shoots flume ride.

Adults and children could slide down the “Bump-the-Bumps” a bumpy adult-sized slide that provided entertainment for on-lookers as well as riders. Dare Devil Dash performed thrilling motorcycle tricks. Patrons could also ogle an authentic imported tribe of Iggorrotes from the Philippines in their recreated village.

Indianapolis’s own Carl Fisher, soon to be a founder of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, built the engine for the Kann War Air Machine, a dirigible as big as two streetcars. The Air Machine plied the sky over Wonderland twice a day powered by hydrogen gas. The hydrogen was also locally produced by Ansel Moffatt, an inventor who created the needed gas out of 18 tons of material, including 4,500 pounds of sulphuric acid and 2,000 pounds of nails.

And all this mechanized fantastical entertainment was placed in a setting of beautified nature. Americans best appreciated their machinery juxtaposed with natural-looking green spaces. Wonderland attempted to recreate a pastoral landscape with brimming pots of flowers, newly planted trees, and green lawn in the spaces between the amusement machines.

Like the other amusement parks in the city, and across the nation, Wonderland’s “natural” beauty was just as crafted as its mechanized rides. Amusement parks were a topsy-turvy world where spectacles of natural disasters were amusements, clanking machines became scary rides and people of all classes and both sexes brushed elbows and bumped bodies in a society just a few years out of the Victorian age. u

u For a while, Indianapolis was thrilled with its amusement parks. Weekly newspaper articles touted the ever-changing array of traveling acts in the parks. Albino acrobats, performing bulls and Wild West shows were but a few of the offerings. Professor Wormwood and his cigarette-smoking monkeys, Ingram’s ostrich farm and alligator ranch, and Thompson’s herd of elephants all made appearances at Wonderland.

In 1907, The Star estimated that city residents paid one million visits each summer to the three amusement parks. Twenty percent of the amusement park business was “shooting-the-chutes,” according to The Star. The newspaper noted that patrons spent almost $200,000 to enjoy these amusements.

That was a lot of money in 1907, but Wonderland’s owners had spent $28,000 just to construct its scenic railway, one of many attractions. Splitting $200,000 among the three amusement parks meant that none of them was being very successful.

Despite its promise, Wonderland Amusement Park was a money-losing business. Too much competition, especially when the two other parks could also offer swimming and boating on White River as part of their enticements, made it impossible for Wonderland to succeed.

Even after Broad Ripple’s White City burned to the ground in 1908, just a week before its new swimming pool was scheduled to open, Wonderland just couldn’t make enough money. Eventually, the park only opened for special occasions.

In 1911, Wonderland opened its doors for the first time to an African-American group. None of the city’s amusement parks had allowed black patronage before this, and it was probably a sign of Wonderland’s financial crisis that the park owners made this exception. The “Colored Knights of Pythias” rented the park for exclusive use during the week of its biennial gathering in the city.

On Aug. 27, 1911, the Pythians held their closing dance at the park.

On Aug. 28, 1911, at 1:10 a.m., hours after the Pythians had left the park, R. C. Buchanan, the night watchman, raised the alarm about a fire. By the time the first fire trucks arrived flames had already swept around the complex of wooden buildings.

By 3 a.m. the shoot-the-shoots had carried the conflagration into the night sky.

After years of flagging attendance, Wonderland’s last fire spectacle, its own burning, drew the biggest crowd it had seen in years. In the early morning light all that remained of Wonderland was a soaked smoldering ruin.

Indianapolis, which only five years earlier could boast three Coney-Island style amusement parks, had only one left on Aug. 28 – Riverside. Although it would carry on for decades, and Broad Ripple Amusement Park would open for a few years at the prior location of White City, the remarkable time of three mechanized amusement parks was over.

Nowadays Indianapolis “park season” means swimming, golfing and frolicking on playgrounds. Once, for a brief time, it meant so much more.

Connie Zeigler is president and owner of C. Resources, Inc. Connie is a writer and a historic preservationist who consults on preservation and greening of historic buildings. She lives in Fountain Square and blogs at INArchitecture on cresourcesinc.blogspot. com.