The Original Crazy Legs

[cleusk]

Lee U. Eyerly was born in Cuba, Illinois in 1892 and raised in Canton. In 1909, his family moved to Montana, where he work as a repairman. In 1919, he moved to Salem, Oregon and worked as a road construction worker. He then opened a gas station. He took three hours of flying instruction then went to Oregon Agriculture College to study engineering in 1921. For 4 years, he worked as a ferry operator and opened another gas station. With the help of the American Legion, a war veteran association of sorts, he built an airport at Salem, Oregon. In 1929, he founded a flying school and the first airplane service station on the west coast.

Eyerly devised a pilot training machine during the Great Depression and called it The Orientator. He tried to sell it to the military but failed miserably. He then introduced to fairs and amusement parks, and it became an instant hit during the 1950s. This new ride is the most common ride in parks today, the most famous one being Disneyland’s ride Dumbo’s Flying Elephants. After The Orientator became famous, Eyerly made other amusement rides, including the octopus ride.

The original Crazy Legs at Six Flags was an octopus ride. The Eyerly Aircraft Company, based in Portland, Oregon, introduced it to the park in 1973 at Good Time Square. The ride was painted black and had eight arm. As the central column rotated and moved the arms up and down, the cars spun around. Crazy Legs was removed from Six Flags in 1980.

[Alan Cochrum]

And boy, was it tough to drive, at least for me. One of the foreman tried to teach me on day when I was on a temp shift, and she had to relieve me because I couldn't align the pods correctly so the guests could disembark.

There's a story somewhere in the old Ride Operations files on this site from a contemporary of mine about Crazy Legs shedding big globs of grease, including one that plopped right onto him -- his head, I think.

[Twistedmister]

Originally Posted by Cowtown Rebel

Is it just my imagination, or did Crazy Legs have a face painted on it at one time? Maybe it just seems like it should have had one, but I seem to recall that at some point it had some eyes and a mouth with sharp teeth painted on it.

Yeah, it had a big monster octopus head with a giant eyeball.

[thecloak]

Safer? Probably not. Faster to load with just one operator, yes.