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Overview

This amusement park operated on the edge of Los Angeles proper from about 1899 until its demolition in 1914. Occupying about 35 acres, Chutes Park, also known to contemporaries as "Washington Gardens," was surrounded by Grand Avenue (on the west), Main Street (east), Washington Boulevard (north) and 21st Street (south). New lessees of the amusement park in 1899, the Los Angeles Improvement Company, added many new attractions, some inspired by those seen at Paul Boyton's Sea Lion Park on Coney Island, opened in the summer of 1895; they commissioned a version of Boyton's Shoot the Chutes Ride, naming the park for this popular attraction. After years of dwindling admissions, new owners rechristened the property "Luna Park" in 1912, but this effort at revitalizing it flopped, and another owner tore down all of the attractions, save for its zoo, in about 1914. Again, the name of Los Angeles's "Luna Park" derived from a large and heavily publicized amusement park that opened on Coney Island on 05/16/1903. In many ways, this amusement park, like many others of the time, made permanent many of the attractions popularized at World's Fairs and other large-scale exhibitions (like state or county fairs) of the period. Amusement park owners had to constantly refresh the originality of their parks by adding spectacular new rides or exhibits; novelty was a critical ingredient of their appeal. Additionally, amusement parks needed to balance an appropriate line between the outrageous and bizarre and conventional standards of middle-class taste and propriety.

Building History

The land on which Chutes Park would be built was first developed by John Lang, who in 1873, opened his Sulphur Springs Hotel. New owner David Waldron bought the hotel and its surrounding park land in 1887, and collaborated with financiers I.W. Hellman and John G. Downey to build a horse-drawn trolley line to connect his hotel with Downtown Los Angeles. Waldron added attractions to the park surrounding his hotel, known as Washington Park, during the late-1880s and early-to-mid-1890s. These included a 40-by-120-foot entertainment pavilion with its own bar, an ostrich farm, and a picturesque orange grove. The pavilion/bar burned in 03/1887, but was rebuilt. Unofrtunately for Waldron, these additions did not increase revenue, so Waldron sought a lessee to generate further improvments.

In 1899, a syndicate known as the Los Angeles Improvement Company, headed by Joseph Frederick Maier (1876-1909) of the city's Maier Brewery, negotiated a lease and began the construction of a modern amusement park. This group built a roller coaster, added the Shoot the Chutes ride, a fishing pond, Japanese village, circus, monkey house, hot-air balloon rides, snake house, and a miniature railroad for park guests. They also added a new electric merry-go-round, 1400-seat theatre for vaudeville acts and a baseball/football stadium completed in 12/1900, also called "Chutes Park." The baseball venue, home to the Los Angeles Angels of the California League (1901-1902) and later of the Pacific Coast League (1903-1910), would be the park's most successful element.

PCAD id: 9825