{"id":101909,"date":"2025-02-14T13:01:25","date_gmt":"2025-02-14T18:01:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.genealogybank.com\/?p=101909"},"modified":"2025-02-14T13:01:46","modified_gmt":"2025-02-14T18:01:46","slug":"it-happened-on-st-valentines-day-birthday-of-ferris-wheel-inventor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/it-happened-on-st-valentines-day-birthday-of-ferris-wheel-inventor.html","title":{"rendered":"It Happened on St. Valentine\u2019s Day: Birthday of Ferris Wheel Inventor"},"content":{"rendered":"

Introduction:<\/em><\/strong> In this article, Melissa Davenport Berry writes about an engineering marvel built to rival the Eiffel Tower \u2013 the Ferris Wheel, whose inventor was born on Valentine\u2019s Day in 1859. Melissa is a genealogist who has a website, americana-archives.com<\/a>, and a Facebook group, New England Family Genealogy and History<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

February 14 has been celebrated as Valentine\u2019s Day for centuries. However, for Ferris wheel enthusiasts, February 14 is special for a reason that has nothing to do with cards, flowers, or candy.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:
Photo: the original Ferris Wheel at the World Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois, 1893. Credit: The New York Times photo archive; Wikimedia Commons.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

American civil engineer and inventor of the Ferris wheel, George Washington Gale Ferris Jr. (1859-1896), was born on 14 February 1859 in Galesburg, Illinois, to George Washington Gale Ferris Sr. and Martha Edgerton (Hyde) Ferris.<\/p>\n

A feature article that appeared in the Las Vegas Review Journal<\/em> tells the story on how Ferris showed great ingenuity in creating his famous marvel the \u201cFerris Wheel,\u201d or \u201cPleasure Wheel\u201d as it was first known.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Las Vegas Review-Journal (Las Vegas, Nevada), 16 November 1980, page 121<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Here is the scoop:<\/p>\n

When Daniel H. Burnman, chief of construction for the World\u2019s Columbian Exposition scheduled to be held in Chicago in 1893, challenged the engineers of America to produce something to rival the Eiffel Tower of the Paris Exposition, Ferris\u2019 imagination was fired. Thinking back to his boyhood days, he remembered the large overshot water wheels which he once saw along the Carson River, and he used the water-wheel idea in designing the soon-to-be-famous Ferris wheel.<\/p>\n

Against the advice of friends and business associates, he undertook the construction of the huge machine, but experienced some money problems in the midst of the severe financial depression which hit the country in 1892. Many engineers looked upon the Ferris wheel as a fantastic scheme, but Ferris persevered, forming a stock corporation to finance it. He completed his project shortly after the exposition opened.<\/p>\n

The machine was far bigger than the imitations seen at carnivals today. Rising more than 250 feet above the midway, it carried 36 gondolas. Each gondola was 27 feet long, 13 feet wide, and nine feet high, and carried 40 passengers and a conductor to open doors and answer questions \u2013 1,440 passengers could ride at once.<\/p>\n

Harper\u2019s Young People magazine noted that \u201cto prevent accidents from panics, and also to deter insane persons from jumping out, the windows are covered with iron gratings.\u201d The wheel and its cars full of passengers weighed about 1,200 tons. It was so massive that it took 10 minutes to revolve once, and two revolutions was a ride. A 1,000-horsepower steam engine turned the wheel by sprockets which engaged cogs in the edge of the wheel, and Westinghouse air brakes were installed in case anything went wrong. Nothing did; the wheel revolved perfectly and was absolutely stable in the strong winds blowing off nearby Lake Michigan.<\/p>\n

The daring and accuracy involved in the design and the precision of the machine work won the admiration of Ferris\u2019 fellow engineers and the Ferris wheel became the most spectacular and profitable feature of the Exposition. Ferris\u2019 invention was patented and he began to receive royalty checks in September 1893, but did not recoup the $390,000 the company had expended.<\/p>\n

The Ferris family genealogy notes that his \u201clater days were saddened by seeing this spectacular child of his brain seized by a sheriff, and indeed this event is said to have hastened his death.\u201d He was still a young man of 37 in November 1896, when he contracted typhoid fever and died in Pittsburgh.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The article features a photo of both Ferris and his wife Margaret Ann (Beatty), whom he married on 18 September 1886 in Canton, Ohio.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Las Vegas Review-Journal (Las Vegas, Nevada), 16 November 1980, page 121<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The article notes the couple had no children, but Ferris\u2019 siblings left descendants. They include the following:<\/p>\n