IAAPA has inducted four members into its prestigious Hall of Fame (HOF), with Eugenius Birch, Roland Callingham, Carl Hagenbeck and Dr Peter Rosner entering the class of 2018 at the European Attractions Show (EAS) 2018 in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Established in 1990, the IAAPA Hall of Fame celebrates outstanding achievement and contributions to the growth and development of the amusement park and attractions industry. In honour of IAAPA's centenary, special inductions have taken place during each IAAPA expo this year, with the EAS class the latest to be added.
Eugenius Birch, a pioneer of seaside pier amusement parks, is the first of the four inductees.
Prior to Birch's innovations in the 1800s, piers would be constantly ripped down and rebuilt as they were not durable enough to handle adverse weather conditions. But Birch’s work in 1853 on Margate Pier in the UK changed all of that. Fitting screw blades to the bottom of the pier’s iron support pilings meant he could screw those pilings into the ground. Birch’s Margate Pier survived 125 years until 1978, when it was torn down. He designed 14 piers in total in the UK, transforming them from sea viewing decks into full-blown entertainment destinations.
The second inductee, Roland Callingham, was a pioneer of model villages.
His Bekonscot Model Village, which opened in 1927, is widely recognised as the earliest example of a model village worldwide. His real trick was in scaling and the one-twelfth scale he used at Bekonscot has become the universally accepted size for model villages and even dollhouses.
Carl Hagenbeck, the third to be inducted this year, is known as the father of the modern zoo.
Hagenbeck’s zoo design approach had a more humane outlook than that of his peers. Animals had been caged behind bars in the 1800s, however, with the 1907 opening of Tierpark Hagenbeck in Hamburg, Germany, the general consensus shifted. Creating open geographic enclosures for animals, Hagenback eschewed the tradition of caging and, as a result, both zoo attendances increased and animal welfare improved. His Tierpark Hagenbeck design is still mimicked today in modern zoos.
Finally, the fourth inductee, Dr Peter Rosner, was the creator of magnetic braking and motorised launch systems in launch rollercoasters.
Rides could not do before Rosner’s inventions what they can do now. Intamin debuted the Hellevator drop tower at Kentucky Kingdom in 1996, which was the first ride to use his magnetic braking system. As a result of that ride, creators now design rides that are more thrilling and more fail-safe. That same year, his linear motor launch system was used for the first time on Superman: The Escape at Six Flags Magic Mountain. The electromagnetic propulsion system has now become an industry standard for launched rollercoasters the world over.
This year’s inductees enter the 28-year-long lineage of industry legends, that includes names such as Philippe de Villiers, Masatomo Takahashi and Kelly Tarlton.
