Fairground organs, a brief summary

Wellershaus fairground organ in childrens ride. One of the few organs left to serve their original purpose.

While most street organs in the Netherlands were of French or Belgian origin, most of the fairground organs in the Netherlands were built in Germany: in Mülheim by Wellershaus, in Düsseldorf by the Richter brs., en particularly in Waldkirch in the Black Forest, where two, and later, three Bruder firms (Wilhelm Bruder Söhne, Gebrüder Bruder and later Alfred Bruder) and, last but not least, A. Ruth u. Sohn were domiciled. Only a relatively small amount of French organs was playing on the fairgrounds, mainly the big 89-key Gaviolis.
Between 1900 and 1950 an organ was playing in almost all fairground rides; the smaller ones stood in small carousels, swings and giant's strides, but in the main attrctions of the twenties and thirties like shimmy palaces and dodgems one could hear the big Ruth and Gavioli organs playing the classical repertoire of those days. In this way these instuments added as much to the status of their owner as to the joy of the listeners.

Contrary to the street organs, the fair organs were used for their right purpose, so there was littele necessity to apply changes to these intruments. As a result, most fairground organs are still playing like they were delivered by the factory many decades ago. Sometimes changes had to be made to the prosceniums in order to fit them into the ride.

When the fairground organs were replaced gradually by sound installations after 1950, most showmen decided to keep the organs, then already family heirlooms, for their own pleasure. Most of these valuable instruments survived in this way. A number of old and original fairground organs can still be listened to and admired by the public when they play at organ rallies.