{"nrhp_refnum":"79000342","name":"Flying Horses","other_names":["Oak Bluffs Carousel"],"category":"building","location":{"address":"33 Oak Bluffs Ave.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Oak Bluffs","county":"Dukes County","state":"MA","lat":41.457415089500046,"lon":-70.557127643345,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1979-08-27","is_nhl":true,"nhl_designated_date":"1987-02-27","areas_of_significance":["Entertainment/Recreation"],"significance_levels":["national"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A one-story shingled carousel building at 33 Oak Bluffs Avenue in the business district of Oak Bluffs, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, housing the Flying Horses carousel, installed in 1884 and moved to its present site in 1889.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the carousel is the oldest operating platform carousel in the United States. It keeps its hand-carved horses and chariots plus some folk-art painted rim, spreader and center panels. It is also a rare survivor of the mid-to-late nineteenth-century interest in amusements and summer resorts.","narrative":"Flying Horses is a carousel housed in a plain one-story building at the base of Circuit Avenue, the main street of Oak Bluffs on Martha's Vineyard. The building has red-painted wood shingles and a low gable roof. Inside, a thirty-six-foot platform carries twenty prancing horses and four chariots under an open canopy, driven by an electric motor in the basement. The carousel arrived in the town, then called Cottage City, in 1884 and was moved to its present site in 1889. Its figures follow designs in an 1878 Dare catalog, with horsehair tails and large oxide eyes. The horses have always been stationary rather than rising and falling. The property was listed as the oldest operating platform carousel in the United States. It also retains folk-art panels and reflects the late nineteenth-century growth of resort amusements such as skating and bicycling. At the time of nomination, the owner hoped to restore the original paint and panels.","period_of_significance":"1800-1899","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":null,"criteria":[],"status_note":"Occupied and operating as a carousel and museum use; the horses were unpainted and many original panels were off the machine awaiting restoration. About $10,000 was recently spent overhauling the machinery.","vacant_flag":false,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:54.474596-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/14/7946/63794614/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/79000342.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79000342/0a9473eb10-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79000342/0a9473eb10-1600.webp","licence":"Public domain","author":"Jared at en.wikipedia","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flying_horses_carousel.JPG\" rel=\"noopener\">Jared at en.wikipedia</a>, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Flying_horses_carousel.JPG"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63794614","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Horses_Carousel","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5463456"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/dukes-county/flying-horses-79000342/"}