Idlewood Amusement Park
The photos come from VCU Library’s digital collection and show an amusement park adjacent to what appears to be Fountain Lake. We’ve been able to find very few references to Idlewood Park except for these photos, which seem to show it on the east side of the lake where the condominiums now stand. Does anyone have more information?
Perhaps the Virginia Historical Society will have some records on the park. I haven’t been in awhile but I’d be happy to do a quick search next time I’m in there.
One of the local history books has a section on it but I forget which one…I am sensing a good excuse to go to a bookstore tonight.
Anne: Did you dig up anything? The second picture appears to show a merry-go-round. Pretty elaborate!
there was a casino, merry go rounds, i think a wooden rollercoaster too? i’ve got a bunch of old Richmond books, and between all of them, i still can’t find a whole puzzle. I think the book Rails In Richmond had a pretty elaborate piece because of its connection to the early trolley system. I’ll have to check when i get home
[...] Park, later to be named Idlewood Amusement Park and written about in the Times-Dispatch in 1907 (see previous post) but nothing about the development of our neighborhood, which would seem to have been [...]
Yes, Idlewood Amusement Park was just east of what was then called Reservoir Park but now is called Byrd Park. The Library of Virginia has a map of Richmond c. 1907 that shows this. Idlewood opened in May 1906, under the management of Jake Wells and several associates, including Andrew Pizzini, Jr. I discuss this in a book I am writing.
The beginning of movie theaters: There are records of an exhibition of “moving pictures” presented at The Academy at 103-05 N. 8th St. in 1897. In 1906 the Idlewood Amusement Park began offering regular screenings of “photo dramas.”
I bet this was full of private vendors doing business in a public park. Sounds like a Byrd Park tradition.