"The Roller Coaster"

[mmcirvin]

 What determines whether or not a roller coaster's name is used with the article "The" before it? e.g. "The Thunderbolt" vs. "Batman".

It seems to me that old wooden rides with generic names like "Cyclone" or "Wildcat" or "Comet" are more likely to get the "The" treatment than modern steel coasters. "The Wildcat" sounds natural, but saying "The Shambhala" or "The Superman" would mark you as, at the very least, not an enthusiast of roller coasters. (But the current full name of the one at Six Flags New England is "Superman: The Ride.") I was thinking about this when looking back at my early LiveJournal posts about roller coasters--I repeatedly referred to Busch Gardens Williamsburg's infamous defunct coaster, Drachen Fire, as "The Drachen Fire" and this now makes me cringe.

On the other hand, "The Loch Ness Monster" sounds OK probably because that's how people commonly refer to the supposed monster--it would be reasonable to think of that article as part of its name.

Batman himself is often referred to in comics and movies as "The Batman" for an ominous/retro effect, but we don't call coasters named after Batman "The Batman", or if we did, it would probably be a specific affectation in that particular coaster's name, perhaps referring to the movie "The Batman". And then people probably wouldn't say "The The Batman" except to be annoying.

Comments

[ckd]

I wonder if The Avalon Hill Game Company preferred hiring alumni of The Ohio State University.

[mmcirvin]

Or The College of William and Mary in Virginia.

"The Roller Coaster" by any other name

[infrogmation]

Late 19th and early 20th century roller coasters in New Orleans were always called "Scenic Railway"s. Wikipedia article suggests that's a specific mechanism of roller coaster - I don't recall seeing vintage photos showing the mechanism. However as far as I can tell the term "roller coaster" seems to have not generally been known here at least with the pre-WWI generations, maybe another generation after that. Old insurance maps list them as "scenic railway"s. I recall some older locals still used the term for the Zephyr at Pontchartrain beach c late 1970s - early 1980s.

Here's an image of the "Scenic Railway" over the shallows of Lake Pontchartrain at West End Park, New Orleans, about 1901. A friend's mother recalled her hat blowing off into the lake while riding, and she was so embarrassed that she walked home on side streets rather than taking the streetcar where people she knew might see her.

Re: "The Roller Coaster" by any other name

[mmcirvin]

Usually "Scenic Railway" refers to a side-friction coaster with a brakeman riding (no upstop wheels, in most cases because they hadn't been invented yet), maybe with some gimmicks like themed tunnels, though this isn't necessary. That does look like one of them.

(There are a few of these types still operating in Europe and Australia and it's a bucket-list dream of mine to ride one. Probably the most celebrated is Rutschebanen at Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen--most of the remaining ones today are run very tamely but that one is supposedly kind of wild.)

There is a story that the phrase "roller coaster" comes not from roller coasters as we know them, but from year-round toboggan slides with rollers placed on the track. There was one of these in Haverhill, Massachusetts, in a downtown roller-skating rink at Essex and Locust Streets that is now a public parking lot, that is sometimes claimed to be the origin of the phrase. I haven't found a lot of evidence that this etymology is correct--what I see more of is the other way around, roller coasters referred to as toboggans--but the company that made the Haverhill one did go on to build more conventional roller coasters for a while.