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Who invented the Ferris wheel and when?

The earliest Ferris wheels, called "pleasure wheels," were described by English traveler Peter Mundy in 1620. In Turkey, he saw a ride for children consisting of two vertically oriented wheels, each 20 feet (6 meters) across, supported by a large post on each side. A similar ride, called an "up-and-down," was featured at the St. Bartholomew Fair of 1728 in England. In 1860, a hand-turned French pleasure wheel was developed that carried 16 passengers. By that time, Ferris wheels were also in use in the United States. One of the early models, in Walton Spring, Georgia, took the form of a large, wooden wheel.

The first "true" Ferris wheel was created in 1893 by American bridge builder George Washington Gale Ferris (1859-1896). Ferris entered the plans for his wheel in a competition sponsored by the directors of the 1893 Columbian Exposition (in Chicago, Illinois). The directors...

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