Idora Park

Idora Park was a 17.5-acre (71,000 m²) Victorian era trolley park in north Oakland, California constructed in 1904 on the site of an informal park setting called Ayala Park on the north banks of Temescal Creek. It was leased by the Ingersoll Pleasure and Amusement Park Company that ran several Eastern pleasure parks. What began as a pleasure ground in a rural setting for Sunday picnics evolved into a complete amusement park visited by many residents of the San Francisco Bay Area. Its popularity declined after the advent of the automobile, and it was closed and demolished in 1929.

The Realty Syndicate constructed the park in 1903 on the north banks of Temescal Creek in North Oakland (on a site of present-day Ayala Park). The main gate of the park was located on Telegraph Avenue above 56th Street; and the park was located on the block bounded by Telegraph Avenue, Shattuck Avenue, 56th and 58th streets. When the park opened in 1903, Rodney Ingersoll had erected the first figure-eight "sky railway" on the site. A wall surrounded the park. Admission was 10 cents, and it was open 30 or more weeks per year.

Idora Park was leased by the Ingersoll Pleasure and Amusement Park Company that ran several Eastern pleasure parks. Originally its name was to be Kennywood Park (after an amusement park in Pennsylvania). Mr. Ingersoll may have decided to name it after his daughter, Idora. The Realty Syndicate also owned and operated the Key System transit company, the Claremont Hotel and the Key Route Inn. The company's major partners were Frank C. Havens; and Francis M. "Borax" Smith, who earned his fortune in borax mining, subsequently investing it in transit and commercial and housing properties in the East Bay area. Bertrand York managed the park from 1911 until its razing in 1929.

Idora Park was famous for its opera house. In the aftermath of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, as many as 2,500 displaced people found shelter in Idora Park. Food and relief supplies were provided by the Realty Syndicate, purchased from Capwell's Department Store. In the period that followed the 1906 earthquake, comic stars from the Tivoli Theater of San Francisco relocated to Oakland and renamed themselves the Idora Park Opera Company. Shows like The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance and The Wizard of the Nile were performed under the theater direction of Ferris Hartman, with music direction by Paul Stiendorff in a wooden opera house called the Wigwam Theater.

In 1908, the company changed names to the Dollar Grand Opera Company and later to the San Carlos Opera Company, which toured nationally.

Idora Park rides cost 5 cents. Many were advertised as being the "largest" or "first." Rides were renamed regularly. In published descriptions of the park, one finds titles such as Dodge 'em, The Whip, Over the Top, Race Through the Clouds, and the Magic Carpet.

The park has five traditional roller coasters during its history:

In the early 1900s, Idora Park was also the site of public demonstrations with lighter-than-air and heavier-than-air flying machines, including a balloon-launched glider flight by David Wilkie in a glider designed by John J. Montgomery on February 22, 1906. It was also the location for the final construction of The California Arrow, a dirigible built by Thomas Baldwin in 1904. On August 3, 1904, the first successful round-trip difficult flight in the United States was made by Baldwin with The California Arrow at Idora Park.