Page:Popular Mechanics 1928 01.pdf/63

 name of Frederic Thompson. had won it. He took his wealth and went into partnership with an amusement man and put up an attraction at the exhibition. He made money, and then went to other fairs and exhibitions. Sometimes he won, and sometimes...

Once he rented an old coal mine at the edge of a fair grounds, lined it with red cotton flannel, put in some weird lights, called it the "Cafe de la Mort," and heard the pleasant tinkle of money coming his way. Next he went to Buffalo, where he put on "A Trip to the Moon," which made the Ferris wheel look like a peanut stand. And then, with banners flying, he marched to Coney island, the Mecca of amusement men. He put on "A Trip to the Moon" again and money still continued to roll in. And while the world was still dazzled by his brilliance, he conceived and built Luna park. He made money with both hands and spent it with a shovel. Money meant nothing to him and he died a comparatively poor man.



Where do the invention ideas come from that make the money—sometimes—at the amusement parks? Where do the fairies come from?—from the sky, from the clouds, from the flowers. Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? But there is history to fall back on. During the years of the Queen's jubilee, a tired inventor went over to England to get a rest. On the way back he came up on deck one day and lay gazing idly into the sky and letting his mind wander pleasantly among the clouds. Overhead, seagulls floated.

"If I could give people the idea they were flying, they would like it," he thought.

The circling of the seagulls gave him the idea of working out a device which would fly in a circle. How? With some sort of a center pole supporting the cars. He took the idea to R. S. Uzzell, an old hand in the game; there were discussions, blueprints, promotions and the airplane swing, to be found in almost every amusement park, was born. There are now about 1,500 of them in the world.

A man in Portland, Oreg., sat on the floor one evening watching his son spin a top: The lad wound it up, pushed it out of the holder and set it going. The man pondered on the fun the boy was having.

"If I could invent a top that grown-ups could play with, I'd make a fortune," he thought.

