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Wildcat (Lake Compounce)
Wildcat is a wooden roller coaster located at Lake Compounce in Bristol, Connecticut. It was built in 1927 and is the 14th oldest operating roller coaster in the world. It greatly resembles the now-defunct Wildcat roller coaster at Elitch Gardens Theme Park in Denver. Wildcat has received the American Coaster Enthusiasts (ACE) Coaster Landmark Award for its historical significance. History Wildcat is a double out-and-back wooden coaster designed by Herbert Paul Schmeck and built by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company (PTC) in 1927. Before Wildcat was built, the Green Dragon coaster stood on the same land. In 1926, park owners Pierce and Norton contracted PTC for a new ride to replace the park's aging Green Dragon coaster. With the help of Schmeck, they created Wildcat. Wildcat features a twister-style layout including elements such as airtime and tunnels. Wildcat's original trains were built by PTC. The entire structure was rebuilt with new wood in 1985, and the last bunny hil ...
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Herbert Paul Schmeck
Herbert Paul Schmeck (born 1890 in Reading, Pennsylvania, died 1956) was an American roller coaster designer. From 1923 to 1955, Schmeck designed 84 coasters for the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. As a designer and president, the company became the most prominent manufacturer of roller coasters in the United States. Schmeck originally worked as a carpenter for the Reading Furniture Works, before he was hired to work on a construction crew for the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. He was offered more jobs when his work ethic impressed company owners. He served as a foreman at Paragon Park on Nantasket Beach in 1916. There he worked with designer John A. Miller on the construction of " The Giant Coaster." He continued to work with the Philadelphia Tobaggan Company assisting with the construction of coasters. Despite no formal training as an engineer, Schmeck learned to design rides by studying blueprints and with his construction knowledge. In 1923 Schmeck designed his first coaster, t ...
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American Coaster Enthusiasts
American Coaster Enthusiasts (ACE) is a non-profit organization focusing on the enjoyment, knowledge, and preservation of roller coasters as well as recognition of some as architectural and engineering landmarks. Dues-paying members receive the quarterly magazine ''RollerCoaster!'' and bi-monthly newsletter ''ACE News''. Amusement parks have also invited members to Exclusive ride time, exclusive ride events at amusement parks as well as sneak peek events at new roller coasters under construction. The organization maintains an online database of roller coasters including ride specifications and archives of published news articles. The club also recognizes historically significant roller coasters with the Coaster Classic and ACE Coaster Landmark statuses. History Organization founders Roy Brashears, Paul Greenwald and Richard Munch met at a roller coaster riding marathon event promoting the 1977 movie Rollercoaster (1977 film), ''Rollercoaster'' at the ''Rebel Yell'' roller co ...
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The Gravity Group
The Gravity Group is a wooden roller coaster design firm based in Cincinnati, Ohio. The firm was founded in July 2002 by several members of the engineering team of the defunct Custom Coasters International following the latter's bankruptcy. The core group of designers and engineers at The Gravity Group have backgrounds in civil, structural, and mechanical engineering. Their experience comes from work on over 40 different wooden roller coasters around the world. Many of The Gravity Group's projects have been well-received by the amusement industry, including The Voyage, Hades 360, and Ravine Flyer II. Roller coaster projects The first coaster designed by The Gravity Group opened in 2005 as Hades at Mt. Olympus Water & Theme Park Resort in Wisconsin Dells, Wisconsin. It won Best New Ride of 2005 in '' Amusement Today'''s Golden Ticket Awards. The Gravity Group also designed The Voyage at Holiday World & Splashin' Safari in Santa Claus, Indiana, which opened in May 2006 ...
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Great Coasters International
Great Coasters International, Inc. (GCI or GCII) is a Sunbury, Pennsylvania-based roller coaster manufacturer which has created several award-winning rides since its formation in 1994. Starting in 2006 with Thunderbird (PowerPark), Thunderbird at PowerPark in Finland, the company expanded beyond the United States and began building coasters in Europe and Asia. Günter Engelhardt GmbH handles the company's marketing rights in Europe. In addition to building new roller coasters, GCI also refurbishes and re-tracks existing roller coasters, regardless of manufacturer. Since its founding in 2014, American company Skyline Attractions has provided its design and engineering services to GCI and now designs and engineers all of GCI's roller coasters. The coasters are known for their often curved drops, twisted layouts, and perception of high speed. Exciting elements such as the station fly-by and station fly-through have been incorporated in many of their layouts. History GCI was founded ...
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Martin & Vleminckx
Martin & Vleminckx Ltd. (doing business as MV Rides) is a thrill ride and roller coaster manufacturing and construction company headquartered in Montreal, Québec, Canada with an affiliated office in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, a manufacturing facility in Orlando, Florida, United States, and two subsidiaries, including a warehouse in China. History Martin & Vleminckx, founded in 1984, is a world leader in the design, manufacture, fabrication and installation of traditional wooden roller coasters. In November 2022, Martin & Vleminckx acquired the patent portfolio of Bill Kitchen that includes products such as the Unicoaster®, the Unicoaster® 2.0, the SkyBlazer™, the Skyspire™, the Polercoaster™, the G-Storm™, the Vistawheel™ and the Thrillwheel™. The company offer an innovative and exciting attractions catalogue of products to serve the amusement park and recreational industry. Projects Since 1984, Martin & Vleminckx has erected over 100 roller coasters a ...
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Bunny Hill
A ski resort is a resort developed for skiing, snowboarding, and other winter sports. In Europe, most ski resorts are towns or villages in or adjacent to a ski area–a mountainous area with pistes (ski trails) and a ski lift system. In North America, it is more common for ski areas to exist well away from towns, so ski resorts usually are destination resorts, often purpose-built and self-contained, where skiing is the main activity. Ski resort Ski resorts are located in both hemispheres, on all continents except Antarctica. They typically are located on mountains, as they require a large slope. They also need to receive sufficient snow (at least in combination with artificial snowmaking, unless the resort uses dry ski slopes). High concentrations of ski resorts are located in the Alps, Scandinavia, western and eastern North America, and Japan. There are also ski resorts in the Andes, scattered across central Asia, and in Australia and New Zealand. Extreme locations of no ...
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Philadelphia Toboggan Company
Philadelphia Toboggan Coasters (PTC) is one of the oldest existing roller coaster manufacturing companies in the world. Based in Hatfield, Pennsylvania, it was established in 1904 by Henry B. Auchy and Chester Albright under the name Philadelphia Toboggan Company. The company manufactured carousels, wooden roller coasters, toboggans (roller coaster cars) and later, roller coaster trains. History The Philadelphia Toboggan Company was incorporated on January 20, 1904. It built and designed roller coasters until 1979. Notable designers included Joe McKee, John A. Miller, Herbert Schmeck, Frank Hoover, and John C. Allen. When Allen retired as president in 1976, the company stopped designing roller coasters but continued to work on coaster projects until 1979 when it exited the coaster-construction industry permanently. The company manufactured carousels known for their elaborate carvings and decorations. It expanded with the acquisition of the inventory of the Dentzel Carous ...
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Herbert Schmeck
Herbert Paul Schmeck (born 1890 in Reading, Pennsylvania, died 1956) was an American roller coaster designer. From 1923 to 1955, Schmeck designed 84 coasters for the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. As a designer and president, the company became the most prominent manufacturer of roller coasters in the United States. Schmeck originally worked as a carpenter for the Reading Furniture Works, before he was hired to work on a construction crew for the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. He was offered more jobs when his work ethic impressed company owners. He served as a foreman at Paragon Park on Nantasket Beach in 1916. There he worked with designer John A. Miller on the construction of " The Giant Coaster." He continued to work with the Philadelphia Tobaggan Company assisting with the construction of coasters. Despite no formal training as an engineer, Schmeck learned to design rides by studying blueprints and with his construction knowledge. In 1923 Schmeck designed his first coaster, ...
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Denver
Denver ( ) is a List of municipalities in Colorado#Consolidated city and county, consolidated city and county, the List of capitals in the United States, capital and List of municipalities in Colorado, most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. It is located in the Western United States, in the South Platte River, South Platte River Valley on the western edge of the High Plains (United States), High Plains east of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. With a population of 715,522 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010 United States census, 2010, Denver is the List of United States cities by population, 19th most populous city in the United States and the fifth most populous state capital. Denver is the principal city of the Denver metropolitan area, Denver Metropolitan area (which includes over 3 million people), as well as the economic and cultural center of the broader Front Range Urban Corridor, Front Range, home to more than ...
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Dinn Corporation
Dinn Corporation was a roller coaster designing and manufacturing company established in West Chester, Ohio, in 1983 by Charles Dinn. The company is noted for moving and rebuilding several existing wooden coasters and building ten new wooden roller coasters in the United States. History Charles Dinn served as Kings Island's Director of Construction, Maintenance and Engineering, where he oversaw the design and building of The Beast with a team including Al Collins, Jim Nickell, William Reed and Curtis D. Summers. In November 1983, Dinn left Kings Island and opened his own corporation in West Chester, Ohio. The corporation relocated three older wooden roller coasters from parks that had been closed to new parks One of the firm's first projects was rebuilding the San Antonio Playland Park Rocket as the Phoenix at Knoebels Amusement Resort. In 1985 Dinn contacted Curtis D. Summers, Inc., an engineering firm in Loveland, Ohio, to provide the design for the restoration of the helix ...
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Elitch Gardens Theme Park
Elitch Gardens Theme & Water Park, colloquially known as Elitch's (formerly known as Elitch Zoological Gardens, first and second incarnation of Elitch Gardens, Elitch Gardens - The Great Escape and Six Flags Elitch Gardens), is an amusement park in Denver, Colorado. It is owned by KSE Radio Ventures, LLC and operated by Premier Parks, LLC. Distinctive for being located in a downtown area, it is open April through October. History Gurtler era (1994–1995) As space was getting scarce at the original location of Elitch Gardens at 38th Avenue and Tennyson Street, the Gurtler family and their financial partners purchased a plot of land in the Platte River valley near downtown Denver for the price of $6.1 million in June 1994. $90 million was spent relocating some rides from the original park and construction of the new park. The money was from a mix of public and private dollars and various loans. On October 1, 1994—the end of the 1994 season—the original park closed perma ...
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Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of newspapers in the United States, sixth-largest newspaper in the U.S. and the largest in the Western United States with a print circulation of 118,760. It has 500,000 online subscribers, the fifth-largest among U.S. newspapers. Owned by Patrick Soon-Shiong and published by California Times, the paper has won over 40 Pulitzer Prizes since its founding. In the 19th century, the paper developed a reputation for civic boosterism and opposition to Trade union, labor unions, the latter of which led to the Los Angeles Times bombing, bombing of its headquarters in 1910. The paper's profile grew substantially in the 1960s under publisher Otis Chandler, who adopted a more national focus. As with other regional newspapers in California and the United Sta ...
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