As a U.S. Marine in Vietnam, Scott Harrison found respite in recurring dreams of bright lights, carnival music and fanciful horses that went round and round.
Between firefights, while his buddies clung to photographs of their girlfriends, the machine gunner held to his ear a small music box playing Chopin that his sister had mailed overseas.
“It’s about survival. One wants to go to a simpler, quieter place in one’s head, and I was having dreams of carousels,” he says. “I would be thinking about a carousel in a mountain meadow, and it would kind of give me back my bearings.”
Fast-forward to present-day America, and Harrison, who lives in the mountain town of Nederland, is close to making his dreams real, having nearly finished the monumental task of bringing a historic carousel back to life. He has restored most of the original parts circa 1910, including its frame, iron center pole, gears and bearings, and he’s re-created the heart of any merry-go-round — its magical, hand-carved wooden animals. And it has a catchy name: the Carousel of Happiness.
Reviving antique carousels has gained popularity since the mid- 1990s, says Bette Largent, president of the National Carousel Association in Spokane, Wash. The trend is a reverse from the 1970s, when carousels were stripped down for exquisite horses fetching six figures at auction. Only a few hundred of the classics are around today, compared with thousands carved during the late 1880s to 1940s, the golden age of carousels.
Carousel No. 7
Colorado has six of these in operation, including one at Lakeside Amusement Park, which celebrates its 100th anniversary this year. No. 7 is sure to be a standout, Largent says, because it came from the hand of Charles Looff, the Danish immigrant also responsible for our nation’s first and most famous merry-go-round at Coney Island, N.Y., in 1876.
“I just love the Carousel of Happiness,” Largent says. “As Scott says, it is the carousel that just wouldn’t die.”
The Nederland project began in 1986, when Harrison heard about this skeleton of a carousel in Saltair Park, Utah, that survived two fires but not bankruptcy, its animals parted out and sold. Harrison paid a few bucks for what was left and hauled it home.
“It was in terrible shape, but I was able to use quite a bit of the infrastructure, including the electric motor and switch,” he says, pointing out that these parts are similar to what you find powering trolley cars.
At the time, Harrison was working for Amnesty International as director of its Urgent Action Network. He would spend each day fielding horrific stories of torture and political prisoners, and when the stress got to be too much, he would go carve, says longtime friend, George Blevins.
Blevins, a cartoonist for the local Mountain Ear newspaper, was happy to help when asked to help bring animals to life.
“Scott would say, ‘Draw me a pig, its ears flapping, tongue hanging out’ . . . and then he’d get to gluing and whittling it out.” Then came a snaggletooth dragon and the gorilla sitting on a throne, its arm wrapped around the rider — designed for someone in a wheelchair.
Animals to ride include a winking kangaroo, lynx with a mouse under its saddle, St. Bernard dog, Texas longhorn steer with confetti tail, frog, ostrich, zebra, moose, donkey with two monkeys riding in side baskets, alpaca in ballet slippers, camel, peacock and sheep with ears like wings.
The menagerie of 36 is in storage, poised for takeoff the day the Wurlitzer band organ makes its debut.
The goal is to offer public rides by next summer in an energy-efficient building made of solar panels and recycled plastic carpet, built next to historic railroad cars on land donated by Will Guercio, one of the largest landowners in the county.
“It was my honor to give him a piece of land,” Guercio says. He hopes the community center will attract tourists to his small town. “It’s such an amazing project, I can’t wait.”
But first the Carousel of Happiness, now a nonprofit, has to find donors. It has raised $390,000 toward a $588,000 goal. All proceeds — $35,000 annually — will go to children with special needs.
The National Amusement Park Historical Association in Lombard, Ill., recently donated $1,000. “Given that (Scott) worked full time and had no formal training in carving, that is truly remarkable,” says the association’s Jim Hillman, who visited the workshop last week. “Most of the great carousel carvers had many assistants.”
Some storied wood
Harrison’s dedication is outstanding, he adds. To replace the carousel’s rotten floor, Harrison trekked to Peoria, Ill., to find the proper Southern yellow pine cut from trees alive during the American Revolution. These planks came by way of a closed Seagrams whiskey factory.
“You might say this carousel is driven by compulsive behavior,” Blevins says. “There’s no reason in the world why anybody would build one when there are so many other things to do.
“But Scott has lived in the real world; he’s seen the worst things human beings can do, the awful reality . . . so you can see why he’d want to go to the other extreme.”
After his 22 years spent carving, “You might say he’s not right in the head, but in fact he’s very right in the head,” his friend says. “He sees the innocence, the joy that’s not in a lot of things. The carousel embodies all that.”
Harrison simply hopes people enjoy the ride.
“I’m intrigued trying to put together a machine that will transport them to a new place. Just an unexpected surprise,” he says. “Sometimes the simplest thing is the most meaningful.”
Conservator’s brush with the past
When The Carousel of Happiness goes round, glance upward, and you will see 18 large-scale oil paintings spinning along, adding a unique dimension.
Anyone interested in authentic American early-20th century folk art will enjoy these, says Denver artist and art conservator Edwin Friedman.
“This is the real deal; there is a charm unlike reproductions,” the art expert says. “And there is a cadre of people who will trip over themselves trying to get to it.”
The original artist is German immigrant August Wolfinger, known as the Michelangelo of the Midway because of his carnival work, including painted banners of Dora the Bearded Woman and the Crocodile Girl at Coney Island. He died in 1950 at age 71 after being struck by a car when crossing the street.
Nederland’s carousel was missing its original top features, called rounding boards, which were mirrors, says Scott Harrison, who is restoring the antique merry-go-round. He soon found replacements taken from a 1910 carousel in Michigan, which incidentally was built by the brother-in-law of Charles Looff, who crafted Nederland’s carousel.
“This artist was very highly skilled with a paint brush,” Friedman says, “but the subject matter is absolutely surreal, I have no idea what he had in mind.”
For instance, there is the odd black dog hovering over a girl lying on the ground, as well as a strange juxtaposition of topics. “You’ve got train trestles next to boats, next to a Vermont snowstorm. This cat had no limits, everything was done humorously and capriciously,” he says, noting it’s a perfect fit for something as whimsical as a carousel.
For six months, Friedman repaired scratches and holes, and strengthened faded colors in the 6-by-2-foot pieces Harrison hauled to his studio three at a time.
“I got a kick out of this project,” Friedman says. “I’m also very proud to be a part of it. Scott is putting some positive juju back on the planet.”
A photo exhibit of the hand-carved animals by photographer Jon Hatch will be on display Sept. 13 through Oct. 3 at the Gilpin County Public Library, 15131 Highway 119 in Golden. An opening reception will be held from 5 to 7 p.m. Sept. 13. Call 303-582-5777 or 303-258-9246 for more information.
