The American themed amusement park industry – begun in July 1955 by Mickey Mouse, the famous Disney character – has evolved into a multibillion-dollar travel and entertainment segment that draws visitors from around the world and has spawned many imitations. In this chapter, the economic outlines of amusement/theme park operations are sketched.

Gardens and Groves

The roots of this business extend back to medieval church-sponsored fairs and to seventeenth-century France, whose concept of pleasure gardens with fountains and flowers gradually spread throughout Europe. London's Vauxhall Gardens, for example, were established in 1661. By the eighteenth century, as Kyriazi (1976) has noted, entertainment and circus acts, including trapeze and tightrope scenes, ascension balloons, and music were added. In England, meanwhile, affiliations with nearby taverns or inns also became common.

It was not until the 1873 Vienna World’s Fair, held at the Prater, though, that mechanical rides and fun houses were introduced. As Mangels (1952, p. 4) describes it,