The roller coasteror roller coasterare one of the biggest attractions of the amusement parkscharacterized by fast descents and spectacular curves on rails. But why are they called that? What do the mountains of Russia? To find out, we have to go back in time about two centuries. The name in fact derives from a pastime born in Russia atearly 19th century. During the winter holidays, especially in St. Petersburglarge ones were built wooden structures up to 20 metres high, covered in compact snow and ice. These ramps had some steep descentsfrom which people slid down leaning on sleds or wooden boards at high speed. The “ice mountains”, as they were called then, were a rudimentary prototype of today’s roller coasters. This pastime became extremely popular, so much so that it attracted attention even beyond Russia’s borders.
In the mid-1800s, the idea of ice skiing reached Western Europe, where it evolved thanks to technology. We are in FranceIn the 1817and here the first mechanical version of the roller coaster was built: the Promenades Aériennes. This first roller coaster (the “eight” from the shape of the circuit) was made of wooden rails and the carriages were no longer free to slide on snow or ice, but were fixed to rails, to ensure both safety and greater speed. From then on, the attraction became increasingly popular, and further technical developments led to the birth of the roller coaster as we know it today.
Despite their Russian and French origins, they were the Americans to give the greatest contribution, perfecting them and making them iconic. In 1884the inventor and businessman LaMarcus Adna Thompson built the first real modern roller coaster, called the Switchback Railwaybased on steel rails, and was an immediate success, pushing the United States to become a leader in the development of roller coasters. For a few cents, we are talking about 5 cents, it was possible to take a ride on this new surprising attraction made up of two towers, whose speed did not exceed 10 km per hour and its purpose was mainly panoramic. The first tower was the highest: customers would climb into a carriage and from there descend along a bumpy path, reaching a second tower. At this point the carriage would be turned around and the path would be repeated in reverse.
In Italyroller coasters first appeared at the end of the century, in Genoa In the 1892on the occasion of the Italian-American Exposition. However, they entered our country definitively shortly before the First World War, perhaps thanks to a German named EightAccording to this version of the story, the attraction would have been only ten meters high and would have been called Eight Monorazzofrom which the term would have derived Rollercoaster. Another, more widespread, explanation for the origin of the word “ottovolante” would be the figure-8 shape of the first roller coaster tracks.
Finally, you should know that, curiously, while in Italy and in many other countries the term “roller coaster” is used, in Russia the same attractions are called “American Mountains”which reflects recognition of the role that Americans played in perfecting and modernizing the machine, transforming it into the adrenaline-pumping attraction we know today.
