Casino Dance Hall Opens

Saturday, April 21, 1906

On this day in Rock Springs Park history, the Casino Dance Hall opened at a cost of $30,000. It replaced the original Main Pavilion constructed by J.E. McDonald in 1897. The first floor featured a six-alley bowling court, billiard hall, Japanese tea gardens, shooting gallery, toilets, barber shop, and park offices.   The second floor was devoted entirely to dancing. The 18,000 square-foot white maple dance floor could accommodate 750 couples.  The onetime Chester icon would be featured on the cover of the first book about the park nearly one hundred years later. Read the details at http://rockspringspark.blogspot.com/2011/05/cover-me.html.

A Walk Through the Park in 1906

What features and attractions greeted excursionists to Rock Springs Park in the early C.A. Smith Years? The Transit Journal of 1906 gives us a nice tour of the grounds and provides details not previously known about a public kitchen and a few other surprises.Entrance to Rock Springs Park is through an artistic gateway which opens directly on to the main walk. The first building is the aquarama, or old mill, at the side of which is a check room where packages, lunch baskets and wraps are cared for. Opposite the check room on the right of the main walk are located the public dining room and kitchen for use of excursionists and picnic parties. Here are seats and tables, and hot and cold water for making tea and coffee are supplied free. Another public dining room has lately been added to accommodate those who cannot find room elsewhere. In addition to these dining rooms for the use of basket parties, there is a well-equipped restaurant where meals are served for the convenience of those who do not care to carry their own lunches.Following up the main walk the visitor comes to the theater, which has a seating capacity for 1400 people. Here high-class vaudeville entertainments are given every afternoon and evening.
Near the theater are the lake and swimming pool. The grounds around the lake have been left in their natural state except that walks have been laid out, trees trimmed, and the grounds improved to make the hillside attractive and easy to access without destroying the natural scenery. In the midst of this wooded landscape has been erected the band stand where free band concerts are given by celebrated musical organizations. The ground near the crest of the hill has been given over to the best of the usual park attractions, including merry-go-round, mysterious house, penny arcade, roller coaster, photograph gallery, shoot the chutes, pantograph or moving pictures, cafe, souvenir stand, rest houses, baseball grounds and casino. The last-named building has lately been constructed at a cost of $30,000. The ground floor is occupied with Japanese tea house, shooting gallery, bowling alleys and refreshment booths. The second floor is devoted to dancing and is 120 ft. x 150 ft. This building commands a wide outlook over the Ohio Valley.The grounds and a portion of the buildings are owned by the East Liverpool Traction & Light Company, which has lately been purchased by the Ohio Valley Finance Company. The park is leased to C.A. Smith for a term of years, and is managed by J.H. Maxwell, acting for the lessee.

Cover Me

Because of the importance of the book’s cover for both marketing and sales, Arcadia Publishing reserves the right to make all final decisions regarding the book's cover. The author can submit between 5 to 10 photographs, but it is ultimately the publisher's decision.

I sent 10 images for consideration as potential cover art for Images of America: Rock Springs Park, including the carousel, the Cyclone roller coaster, and Virginia Gardens, but only one image fit the list of specifications – the Casino dance pavilion circa 1910.


The Casino should be fairly recognizable to area residents as it has been featured on dozens of postcards, newspaper articles and calendars. I have to admit, however, that I was a little disappointed when I gave my first book talk at Fox’s Nursing Home in November 2009, before the book came out, and the very first question from the group was “What’s that building?” in reference to the cover art. At that time it was too late to make any changes and besides the picture had started to really grow on me. I liked it!

Certain milestones in having a book published legitimize all the effort that goes into it. One is seeing the book on a shelf at a chain bookstore. Then there’s the thrill of seeing that first, albeit modest, royalty check. I even got a kick out of seeing my book in a stack of reading material in someone’s bathroom. Of course holding the book in your hands for the first time is very exciting as well, but for me, receiving a pdf of the cover proof was by far the most thrilling moment in the whole experience. I was so excited to see the cover proof that I didn’t notice one small problem with it, but my then seventeen-year old son did.

If you look closely at the two cover proofs below, you will see a slight difference between the first one and the second.

Here’s how I explained it:

Is it possible to move the picture over to the right a bit so that the three women in the foreground are completely on the front cover? It looks like it cuts off at an awkward place. It would look better if it could go just a little more to the right, because the part of the picture which ends up on the front cover looks cut off the way it is cropped now. I don’t think we would want to move it too much to the right, because I like how the trees frame the title art, just a little to the right to bring the woman on the left of the group of three onto the front cover.



It is highly unlikely that any of the folks shown on the book cover in 1910 are alive today, although just this week the last known soldier who served in WWI passed away at the age of 110, so I guess anything is possible, but the woman on the left owes my son, Christian, a thank you for saving her face from a book spine crease for the rest of history.

ACCEPTABLE COVER IMAGES
• sharp, clear, and of high quality
• wider than they are tall, with neutral space toward the top for your title
• vintage original prints, OR professional-quality photographic reprints, OR scans that meet specifications
• clearly historic

Dancing in the Park

One of the comments I received after the first two of my book talks, was that older people who remember the park wished to see and hear more about dancing, especially with regards to the beautiful ballroom, "Virginia Gardens". Included in this blog post are some of the facts and images I plan to add to my next event in order to boost the conversation about dance platforms and halls enjoyed by park guests in the nearly 117 year history of the area known as Rock Springs.

This image from the very early years shows an outdoor covered dancing platform at the end of a tree-lined path used before any dance halls were constructed. According to Roy C. Cashdollar, the very first structure built on the site of Rock Springs Grove was “a sixteen foot square platform used for dancing.” (Courtesy of Richard L. Bowker)

The original dance hall in Rock Springs Park faced Carolina Avenue. Before the trolley loop lower entrance was added during C.A. Smith’s years, people would get off the street car and go right up the steps into the dance hall. (See Images of America: Rock Springs Park, p. 15) This side view of the original dance hall, constructed in 1897 by J.E. MacDonald was removed from the Images book in place of one from Doug Arner and Arner Funeral Chapel. Also a side view, Arner’s photograph (p. 16 top) shows pleasure-seekers filling the awning covered porch and walking the grounds. (Courtesy of Richard L. Bowker)

The second floor of the Casino Dance Hall (1906) had an 18,000 square foot hard white maple dance floor, which was larger than 4 high school-size basketball courts put together. Not only did people dance in the dance halls in the evening, but they also danced aboard steamships which carried them from Wheeling and Pittsburgh. (See a series of photographs of the Homer Smith in my book, pp. 56-57)

The Virginia Gardens Dance Hall (1927 – 1974) was used for proms and school dances, as well as, for skating. This article from Youngstown Vindicator – Jul 28, 1957, tells of the Golden Jubilee of Chester Celebration held in Virginia Gardens. (See p. 71 of my book for a photograph of the Jubilee Court)



In his History of Chester: The Gateway to the West (Part II), Roy C. Cashdollar notes some of the rules for couples dancing the tango in 1914: Do not, (1) wiggle shoulders, (2) shake hips, (3) twist the body, (4) hop, (5) flounce elbows, or (6) clasp your partner in a death grip.

(What? No "hopping?" Look out Easter Bunny!)