World’s oldest standing Ferris wheel returns to Phoenixville to rise again

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Rebuilt from salvaged scraps, the amusement park Phoenix Wheel that once carried riders high above the shoreline at Asbury Park, New Jersey, now rises again in the Pennsylvania town where it was forged more than 130 years ago.

The 78-foot-tall Ferris wheel flamed red in the late morning sun Saturday, the center of attention for about 1,000 people who gathered to celebrate its return to Phoenixville. Manufactured in 1893, it is one of four Phoenix Wheels from the Phoenix Iron and Steel Company. Town officials say it is the oldest standing Ferris wheel in the world.

Phoenixville Mayor Peter Urscheler told the crowd Saturday that the wheel is “a symbol of craftsmanship, resilience and renewal.”

“There was once a sign that stood at the entrance of the Phoenix Steel Company, and that sign read, ‘At Phoenix, it’s the people that make the difference,’” Urscheler said. “That was very true then, and still even more true today. This wheel stands before us because people believed in what was possible and because they were willing to work together over many years to make that possibility real.”

A ‘magical’ ride at the Jersey Shore

The wheel was installed in Asbury Park in 1895. Known as the Asbury Park Wheel, it became a centerpiece of Palace Amusements.

“It was a grand view at that time,” Phoenixville historian Ryan Conroy told the crowd Saturday. He said the wheel was electrified and covered in at least 150 colored lights.

“It stood so high in the air, with this observation deck that it was originally built with, that it was referred to as one of the best viewpoints on the East Coast of the United States,” Conroy said.

A defining fixture of the shoreline, the wheel makes a cameo appearance in Bruce Springsteen’s 1987 “Tunnel of Love” music video, and it is visible in the background in photos of the homegrown superstar taken before the wheel was disassembled in 1989.

For Brian Maher, the last person to operate the wheel, seeing the structure rebuilt, albeit not as a functioning ride, “feels like going back in time,” he told WHYY News on Saturday.

“I was the one that locked the doors on the last time on Nov. 27, 1988, 6 p.m. And it was raining that night,” Maher recalled.

The wheel was “magical,” he said. “We knew it was special at the time.”

In his time operating the ride, Maher helped people stage proposals and anniversary celebrations at the top. Even his own romantic history connects to the wheel: Maher and his wife met as teenagers at the amusement park and would ride it together.

“It’s the oldest wheel on earth. It’s the last one. And there’s so many times it could have been just sold for scrap, and it wasn’t. And it’s now here in this beautiful town, and it’s just going to go on and on. Memories,” he said.

“We’ll see what happens, maybe years down the road we can get it turning again,” Maher said. “I would love to turn that crank one final time, and I wouldn’t even need to ride it. I would just like to start it up, do what I used to do, and that would just be a wonderful thing.”

How Phoenixville brought its wheel back home

After it was decommissioned in New Jersey in 1989, the wheel was shipped to an amusement park in Biloxi, Mississippi, where it stood for 10 years before it was sold to a retirement community in South Jersey, said Conroy, who is also a board member of the Schuylkill River Heritage Center, a nonprofit museum dedicated to the industrial legacy of the town and the river.

In 2008, Barbara Cohen, president emerita of the center, discovered that not only did one of four Phoenix Wheels still exist — but that it was just across state lines.

Borough officials and leaders of the center presented Cohen with an award Saturday for the pivotal role she played in the wheel’s return.

“She literally was like, ‘We’re going to bring that back to Phoenixville,’ and then immediately acquired it,” Conroy said.

The pieces were transported back home and stored there for nearly two more decades as Cohen, the center’s board members, elected officials and community supporters, worked to raise the more than $2 million it would take to complete the project.

That effort ultimately succeeded with a state grant of $750,000 from the Commonwealth Financing Authority, contributions from foundations, businesses and community members, and the backing of a private funder. Fundraising efforts are continuing to support the wheel’s ongoing maintenance.

For the enormous task of restoring, reassembling and installing the wheel’s parts, Gern Jaeger, owner of Specialty Metals Welding & Fabrication, worked with engineer Tom Zeigler.

Zeigler said Saturday that when he first saw the wheel disassembled in a field at the University of Valley Forge, a casual observer would see it as “a pile of junk.”

“But Barbara had a vision, and for some unknown reason, she placed her trust in me,” Zeigler said.

They visited Hagley Museum in Delaware, where Phoenix Iron and Steel Company’s records were stored, in search of documents showing how the wheel had been manufactured and assembled.

“As we were going through the records, we found a heartbreaking entry that said ‘Drawings destroyed,’ so at that point we knew we were starting from scratch,” Zeigler said.

To reassemble the wheel, Jaeger, Zeigler and their team painstakingly measured thousands of unmarked pieces, crafting replacements for parts that were damaged or missing.

Jaeger said the reassembled wheel is a tribute to the skill and craftsmanship of the men and women of Phoenix Iron and Steel Company who first made the wheel.

“They’re certainly not here to see it, but maybe somebody in their lineage can see this and be proud of them,” he said.

Chester County Commissioner Marian Moskowitz said many of Phoenixville’s current residents are descended from the steelworkers who played a vital role in the town’s industrial past.

“I will bet you there are many people in this community … whose great-great-grandparents worked on this, and it’s just so amazing to me that it comes back home,” she said.