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{Roller Coaster Research - 1 of 3}
A
Slippery Start
When you think of roller coasters,
do you think of ice? Well, you should because the roots of roller coasters
lie in Russia in the 1400s. They were huge blocks of ice that slid down
long, large ice tracks with straw in the seat to give some padding for
the riders. At the bottom was sand to slow the sled down and eventually
stop it. In order to get to the top, people had to climb a long set of
stairs. Although this form of entertainment is very different than the
roller coasters we know today, these giant slides were the beginning of
a very popular trend all over the world.
Russians create small sculpture ice slides,
which are popular with small children.
From
Runners to Wheels
Because of their popularity
in Russia, other countries began to build slides, but they could not use
ice because it would melt in the warmth. First runners were used, and
then wheels were developed on the sleds in 1784 in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Unfortunately, the wheels didn't always stay on and the cars sometimes
kept going when they should have stopped. In France, these huge sleds
and wheeled carts where called Les Montagnes Russe. The translation for
this name is the Russian Mountains.
The more adventuresome
Russian teens
experiment with slides on hills of ice 20 feet
long or more. Many do not even use a sled.
Technology
Coasts Along
So how'd they get the name roller coaster, anyway? In Paris, where they
used hundreds of little wheels and the riders sat in sleds, passengers
actually rolled and coasted, giving a fitting name for the popular ride.
Popularity for the roller coasters was too much for the technology, and
soon the rides
became more dangerous as the rides were designed to thrill. In
1846 the first loop was attempted in Paris. It was tested with
everything from monkeys to eggs to glasses of water to make sure it was
safe. Still, the force needed to get through the loop could never quite
be achieved, and the loop wasn't very popular, so it disappeared for a
while, waiting to resurface again when technology could support it.
America
Follows the Fad
Although Americans didn't get too excited about the giant slides called
Russian Mountains, they did develop a very calm coaster out of an old
gravity-powered mine train in Pennsylvania. This mine train, called the
Mauch Chunk Railway, was soon useless when a tunnel nearby was created,
and the owners charged riders one dollar to go the 18 miles of the railway.
This calm coaster proved that Americans liked to coast down hills as well,
and soon bigger and better coasters were being developed.