Carousels reached a height of artistry in America that was not achieved elsewhere.
This was due, in part, to the talents and diverse visual repertories contributed by a generation of immigrant carvers, including Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe.
The establishment of fixed-site as opposed to traveling carousels enabled these artists
to create figures that were larger, heavier, and more extravagantly embellished than their knockdown antecedents. As the carousels grew in size, they acquired their own platforms in ornamental pavilions, offering new opportunities for the carvers’ and operators’ imaginations. And, as the carvers often moved from shop to shop within a city or locale, they incorporated elements of their colleagues’ work into their own carvings, giving rise
to regional styles.
The carousel industry in America flourished in the large urban centers of Philadelphia and New York—areas that experienced mass immigration from countries and regions with strong carving traditions: Italy, Germany, and Eastern Europe. Many of the newly arrived carvers found employment in cabinetmaking and in woodworking shops throughout the cities. The carousel workshops of Coney Island, New York, in particular, attracted many creative artists, some of whose Jewish heritage can be identified through existing documents or signed carvings.
Charles I.D. Looff, a non-Jewish immigrant artisan from Schleswig-Holstein, Germany,
had carved his first carousel by 1876 and set it up in what was to become the greatest amusement park in America—Coney Island. Looff first installed an overhead crank action
in 1905, and his carousels were soon populated with jumpers that seemed almost alive because of their animated movements and realistic presentation with wild manes and increasingly imaginative decoration. It is believed that this new style of carousel horse, which quickly became a signature of the dynamic and flamboyant Coney Island Style,
was introduced by Marcus Charles Illions, a young Lithuanian-born Jewish carver who
was either working in the Looff shop or supplying horses from his own shop, and
brought to full expression through the artistry of other Jewish carvers such as
Solomon Stein, Harry Goldstein, and Charles Carmel.
Marcus Charles Illions
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Chafatino’s carousel, by M.C. Illions Carousell Works, Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York, 1923 / photo courtesy Barney Illions and Flying Horses, Rolling Hills, California |
There are conflicting accounts about Illions’s place and year of birth—Vilna, Lithuania (which was then a part of Russia), 1865, or Moscow, 1874. What is certain is that Illions’s father was a dealer in horses, and Illions’s early years were spent surrounded by these magnificent creatures. Around the age of 14, fearing lengthy conscription in the Russian army, he fled his homeland and found his way to England, where he perfected his carving skills, possibly at the works of Frederick Savage, an inventor and manufacturer of carousels, circus wagons, and fairground machinery. Illions made the passage to the United States in 1888 and found employment in Charles I.D. Looff’s Brooklyn, New York, shop. By 1892, he had established his own shop in Brooklyn. His brochure advertised “Circus Wagons,” “Hand Sculptured Horses,” “Highest Class Carrousels,” and “Show Fronts.” The famous chariot ticket booth at the entrance to Coney Island’s Luna Park
was produced in the Illions shop.
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STANDING HORSE WITH JEWELED TRAPPINGS / Marcus Charles Illions (1865/1874–1949) / Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York / c. 1911–1927 / paint on wood with jewels and glass eyes / 59 1/2 x 70 x 19" / The Charlotte Dinger Collection (I1-B) / photo by August Bandal, New York |
In 1909, Illions founded M.C. Illions and Sons, where six types of carousels were produced:
The Supreme was a 54-foot platform that carried seventy-four horses, four abreast, and two chariots “sculptured by hand in the Louis
XV Rococo style.” The Superior was a 52-foot platform that carried sixty-six horses and two dragon chariots. The Superb and the Monarch
I, II, and III were smaller carousels, some portable enough for traveling shows.
Illions created some of the most animated carousel animals ever made. His horses seem exhausted from their eternal gallop–tongues hanging out, wild eyes protruding, disheveled manes cascading or flying in the air–and
one can almost feel the lather on their skin.
He took great pride in his achievements and
was one of the few carvers to sign his name,
even carving self-portraits on the horses he
most admired.
Solomon Stein and Harry Goldstein
Stein and Goldstein were both Yiddish-speaking Jewish immigrants from Russia who met after they had answered advertisements placed by William F. Mangels, the inventor of various amusement-park machinery and owner of a successful carousel factory, and joined his shop in 1905. Harry Goldstein, born in Russia in 1867 as Harry Mandel, came
to the United States in 1902. Solomon Stein was 23 years old when he arrived in New York in 1904. After having honed their skills at Mangels’s shop, Stein and Goldstein branched off with the ambition of carving, owning, and operating the most beautiful carousels ever made. To this end they named their enterprise the Artistic Caroussel Manufacturers. Over time, Stein and Goldstein produced seventeen complete carousels, of which they owned and operated eleven. The carousel they carved for installation in New York’s Central Park is still in use today.
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ARMOURED HORSE / Solomon Stein (1882–1937) and Harry Goldstein (1867–1945) / Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York / c. 1912–1917 / paint on wood with glass eyes, leather bridle, and horsehair tail / |
Stein and Goldstein produced the largest carousels ever made: sixty feet across, with up to
six rows of horses, and able to accommodate more than a hundred people. Each horse was elaborately conceived and beautifully executed—their inner-row horses would have merited placement on outside rows in any other carousel. Stein and Goldstein are also credited with having carved the largest carousel horses. Many are massive, life-size creatures with aggressive and muscular bodies. Their snarling, spirited, and animated heads and tightly arched necks contrast strongly with the deeply carved, delicate flower-garlanded trappings. Other types of trappings—fish scales, chain mail, large buckles, and carved exotic pelts with the heads of the animals still attached—became hallmarks of
these superb carvers. With the decline of the carousel industry in the 1920s, Stein and Goldstein started to carve small horses for a firm in Chicago, to be used for children’s barber chairs. They also carved circus wagons and fronts, logical extensions of the chariots, and intricate mirror frames and other decorations found on their assembled carousels.
Charles Carmel
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CAROUSEL HORSE WITH RAISED HEAD / Charles Carmel (1865–1931) / Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York / c. 1914 / paint on wood with jewels, glass eyes, |
Carmel, born in Russia in 1865, was trained as a carver in Russia before he arrived in America in 1883. He initially worked alongside Marcus Charles Illions at Charles I.D. Looff’s shop in Coney Island. Later the two men worked together again when they, along with Solomon Stein and Harry Goldstein, carved for William F. Mangels. Carmel opened his own shop around 1905 on Brooklyn’s Ocean Parkway near the Prospect Park stables. His one venture as an entrepreneur-investor ended tragically when the beautiful new carousel he had created for Coney Island’s lavish architectural wonder, Dreamland Park, burned to the ground, along with the rest of the park, the day before it was scheduled to open, on May 24, 1911. After that, he preferred to sell his work to other major carousel manufacturers, including the Philadelphia Toboggan Company, William F. Mangels, Stein and Goldstein, and others.
Carmel’s horses are spirited creatures with
realistic expressions, some even with bad teeth. What distinguishes his horses is the exquisite combination of classic proportions, grace, and aggressive stance with a sense of fantasy and sweetness of expression. The heads of Carmel’s horses are usually slightly larger than accurate proportions would demand; this was purposely done to focus on the exaggerated expressions Carmel loved to carve. One of his patrons was the carousel owner and operator M.D. Borelli, who took great delight in painting Carmel’s horses and embellishing them with glass jewels.
One figure was covered with more than three hundred jewels. When lights shine on
these creatures, they literally sparkle and glitter. Many of Carmel’s larger lead horses have feathers and flowers as adornments, another way of taming the spirited gestures of these magnificent creatures. Over the years, Carmel became one of the most prolific carvers in the field. In fact, a classic Carmel horse was once used to promote Stein and Goldstein’s Artistic Caroussel Manufacturers.
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JUMPER WITH PATRIOTIC TRAPPINGS AND AMERICAN EAGLE / Charles Carmel (1865–1931) / Coney Island, Brooklyn, New York / c. 1910 / paint on wood with jewels, glass eyes, and horsehair tail /
54 1/2 x 60 x 13" / The Charlotte Dinger Collection (C-13) / |
Carousel band organ music courtesy National Carousel Association
