Jazz Railway
Jazz Railway was an early model line of wooden [roller coaster|wood] roller coasters incorporating a steel-frame structure. These operated at various amusement parks and fairgrounds during the mid to late 1920s. The coaster model is considered to be the first of the Wild Mouse style roller coaster.
History and design
While they ran on track constructed of laminated wood and steel—defining the coasters as wooden by modern standards—Jazz Railways were marketed by the Traver Engineering Company as being all steel. The supporting structure of the track was indeed all-steel, and this was hailed as a new innovation in roller coaster design. Advantages of the prefabricated steel support structure included reduced cost, imperviousness to rot and fire, and a quicker set-up and take-down process—which would allow the coaster to be moved from location to location. The name "Jazz Railway" itself was reported by Traver to be a way to distance the design from the wooden-framed roller coasters of the past.Jazz Railways were important in its demonstration of all-steel roller coaster construction. This presaged Traver's later Giant Cyclone Safety Coasters, which utilized the same building technique as Jazz Railway, but on a grander scale. Jazz Railways were also important as a forerunner of the modern Wild Mouse coaster design.