Throughout the 20th century, roller skating took the nation over by storm. With it’s rise to popularity in the 1930s, roller skating brought a new spin to recreational lives for teenagers and all ages. But the rise to popularity can overshadow it’s 200 plus year history of an invention that has an interesting backstory. In 1735, the first skate was invented by a Belgian inventor named John Joseph Merlin. Merlin came up with the idea as an alternative to ice skating for the summer. While presenting his idea at a masquerade party, he crashed into a mirror, proving that the initial version of his skates to be faulty. 58 years later, roller skating was viewed as “roller ballet” as an alternative for figure skating. A year after it was patented in France with the traditional four-wheel alignment. During the 17th century, the rollerskate would have many different iterations and purposes, including for sports, to serve at restaurants, and eventually for public recreation. At the beginning of the 20th century, the Chicago Coliseum opened as a public roller rink, and gained large popularity, setting a precedent for the nation and the rest of the century. Following the Coliseum, New York’s famous Madison Square Gardens became a rollerskating rink and became an international spectacle for the activity.
When the 1970s rolled around, skating was the hottest recreational activity. Disco was the newest trend, and when paired with roller skating, birthed roller disco. Rollerskates became more efficient with the use of plastic wheels. Because of this, the skates were easier to dance with, and added to the fun of the roller discos. The disco rinks became a popular destination for teenagers to meet on Friday nights or for families to go over the weekend. Their popularity was also heavily televised in shows like Charlie’s Angels. It was also marketed with records that would play soundtracks from the different rinks.
50 years later, roller rinks still exist, however with the significant decrease in recreational activities since the rise of technology, they are no longer a weekly spot. The 90’s introduced rollerblading, which was popular throughout the decade but faded away from the limelight with the turn of the century. Next time you see the occasional person rollerblading or roller skates think back the history or simply refer back to Joseph Merlin crashing into a mirror.
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It pretty crazy that it took those 200 years for roller skating to really become a hit, and then die back down after 20th century. The concept of roller skating has evolved though, as we see many different forms of competition using roller skates. Although roller derbys have been around since the 1930s, other competition like speed skating and roller hockey have made their names more recently and were considered in the some previous Olympic Games.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USA_Roller_Sports
I like how your post outlines the chronology of how roller skates became popular and how their purposes changed. I decided to research further into the variations of roller skating. I found that, in the 1970s, different cities had their own styles of roller skating. For example, Chicago took on the "JB style" that incorporates hip-hop, jazz, and breakdancing.
ReplyDeletehttps://c7skates.com/blogs/c7-blog/7-weird-facts-about-roller-skating-you-may-not-have-known