From afar, she heard
the music,
A slow waltz from
another time.
And the horses danced
to a tune
They could not hear.
The carousel spun
round and round,
Painted horses
galloped freely.
And magic wove a
wondrous spell
Through the silvery
night.
Proud heads held
high, the horses pranced,
Chasing mystic sounds
to the past.
Seeking a world of
fantasy,
They lured her
through time.
Yet when the music
ended,
And the horses
finally stopped.
The magic still
coursed through her,
Love had found her
heart.*
Who doesn’t love a carousel? Beautifully painted horses and a menagerie of exotic animals, gaily circling ‘round to the sounds of a Wurlitzer organ. It is childhood and knightly fantasies; a secret rendezvous and a race to freedom.
I have a collection of musical carousel horses, some of which go up and down as the music plays. Others are stationary, just as early carousels had been. Today, carousels are often at the hub of shopping malls and county fairs. I’ve visited the 1901 Parker carousel in Abilene, Kansas, the Central Park Carousel New York City, and the historic Flying Horses on Martha’s Vineyard, among others. I even had the opportunity to see a carousel factory where they made carousel-like horses which at one time decorated a famous national restaurant chain. The carousels are all different and unique and we are fortunate this piece of our history has been preserved.
It was at the Flying Horses where I learned some of a carousel’s forgotten history. The horses on this particular carousel do not move up and down as the platform circles. The uniqueness of this carousel is that at one point there is a metal armature sticking out containing brass rings. As riders “gallop” by, they can grab for the rings, collecting them during the ride. The history of this particular activity dates back to medieval years and the jousts that were held. Besides trying to knock each other off horses, a knight would gallop down the course and try to snare a large ring onto his lance. Sometimes the rings were held by pages, other times they were thrown in the air as the knights rode near. Some believe this is also where the expression “catching the brass ring” came from.
Not all carousels were horses or animals attached through a center pole to a moving platform. Swing rides, the earliest form of carousel, were made with ropes and baskets that carried people and spun in circles around a center pole. There are still swing rides today at fairgrounds that have chairs suspended by chains from the top of the carousel instead of seats shaped like animals.
Long before motorized
platforms (as early as 1873) it
has been noted that a live mule or a horse was hidden beneath the Carousel
platform to power the amusement ride. The animals were taught to start and stop
when the operator tapped on the floor.
And then there is the restored Dentzel carousel found at State Fair Park in Dallas, Texas. Gustav Dentzel, a German furniture maker, lived in Philadelphia in the 1870s and turned to carousel horse making when they became all the rage.
With all this history;
the beauty and romance and my love of carousels, how could I help but write a
story involving them?
My story involves professional
photographer Jaci Eastman who photographs the Dentzel carousel for a magazine
spread and finds a blurred image of a man in old fashioned dress behind one of
the horses. She only believes reality can be photographed. So how can she
photograph a man who doesn’t exist in her time beside a carousel horse that didn’t
exist in his?
Follow the romance and mystery of a carousel horse in “Spinning Through Time”, available through Books We Love or wherever you like to find your romance.
--”Gorgeous story, it was lovely from beginning to end. A keeper. One of the best time travel romances I've read!” SS, Amazon review
*Opening of “Spinning Through Time”
