The Bakers then began efforts to transfer some of the Park’s 

attractions to other Rekab, Inc., properties and to sell the remainder of the rides and attractions. The Dentzel carousel was one of the first to be sold, but a fundraising drive organized by Glen Echo Town councilwoman Nancy Long, provided money to buy back the Park’s beloved carousel. Glen Echo Park Becomes the People’s Park The National Park Service assumed management of the park in 1970. It hosted a series of public meetings to allow the community to help forge a new direction for the park. In 1971, the National Park Service opened the park to the public for the first of a series of summer events. The park’s Creative Education Program began in 1972 offering a wide variety of classes. Everything from auto-mechanics for women to environmental education and photography classes were taught. Over time the program developed a focus on the arts. It became clear that this new park offered an exciting opportunity to develop a new kind of arts program, where artists and students could work together. Glen Echo Park would be more than a place to sit and be entertained. It would become a multi-interest cultural center with programs in the arts and humanities for children and adults. Renovation and Rebirth During many years as a park for the arts with classes, dances, festivals and theater performances, the condition of the park’s buildings deteriorated. Money was not available to renovate, stabilize, or adequately maintain the buildings. There was only enough to modify them to satisfy the park’s need for classroom, studio, theater, and gallery space. This lack of funding made the park’s future uncertain. 

Finally in 1999 the federal, state and county governments jointly funded an eighteen million dollar renovation of the Spanish Ballroom and Arcade buildings as well as many other major improvements to the park. In 2000, the National Park Service entered into a cooperative agreement with Montgomery County government to manage the park’s programs. Montgomery County set up a non-profit organization called the Glen Echo Park Partnership for Arts and Culture, Inc. The Partnership is charged with managing and maintaining Park facilities, managing the artist-inresidence, education and social dance programs, fundraising and marketing. The National Park Service is responsible for historical interpretation, safety, security, resource protection and grounds maintenance.Glen Echo Park Today Glen Echo Park retains many of its old treasures. The Chautauqua Tower, the Yellow Barn, the Dentzel Carousel, the Bumper Car Pavilion, the Spanish Ballroom, the Arcade complex, the Cuddle Up, the remnants of the Crystal Pool, and the Picnic Grove are the nine elements making up the Glen Echo Park historic district. But the Park is more than a static collection of buildings. It’s a kaleidoscope of neighbors and tourists at work and play. Artists and students create works of art together; audiences laugh at the antics of the puppets and their masters at the Puppet Co. Visitors of all ages have fun as they learn dance steps at the Spanish Ballroom, explore nature at Discovery Creek Children’s Museum, ride the Carousel, attend Adventure Theatre plays, or picnic as in the olden days, in the oak-shaded grove, and participate in the summer festivals. Half a million visitors come to Glen Echo Park annually. Classes, workshops, and theater performances are offered all year long. The Carousel runs from May through September. The Ballroom is filled with dancers and dance students yearround. To find out more about arts programs at Glen Echo Park visit the Glen Echo Park Partnership for Arts and Culture website at www.glenechopark.org or call 301-634-2222. To learn about National Park Service interpretive programs visit www.nps.gov/glec or call 301-320-1400. Visit the Clara Barton National Historic Site at www.nps.gov/clba.

Glen Echo: Summer Resort and Glen Echo Park started with two beater one of them had invented. Baltzley had a vision: They werfrom the Edwin Baltzley’s egg beadevelopment and a nationally recog1888 they purchased 516 acres anEcho on the Potomac. They founand began to sell building sites. brothers published Glen-EcWashington Rhine (an illustrated were able to offer evidence of Gleother suburban sites. 

For well over one hundred 

special charms. Let’s stroll th

Glen Ec

Produced in cooperation with the National Park Service, 

Glen Echo Park Partnership for Arts and Culture, Inc., and 

Montgomery County, MD. 

2005 

We wish to thank Richard Cook, Bruce Douglas and the William J. 

Moore Collection for contributing photographs to this publication. 
By May 1891 Glen Echo had 900 men on its payroll, and 

on June 16, 1891, it opened to the public for the first time. Despite the fact that the Glen Echo Electric Railroad was unfinished, over 1,000 spectators managed to attend the opening ceremonies. During the first week of the assembly, a partially completed tent hotel housed 100 people while three to four hundred more people settled into smaller tents on the grounds to participate in the Chautauqua experience; many determined to stay for the season. Attendance was so good that the assembly, originally planned to end on July 4, was extended to August 1. An End and a Beginning Despite the success of the summer programs there were some difficulties with the season. Hot and rainy weather limited the activity and crowds. The cost of constructing the grounds and buildings as well as producing the Chautauqua programs was enormous. The second season proved more difficult than the first with continued bad weather and an economic depression. The Baltzleys had over-extended themselves; they fell into debt and were forced to discontinue Chautauqua programs at Glen Echo. In the years that followed, a wide variety of entertainments were hosted. There was a day-long “fete” of the Potomac Commandery of the Grand Army of the Republic, the annual encampment of the United Daughters of the Confederacy of Maryland and Virginia, plus numerous vaudeville shows and operas. By 1899 Glen-Echo Park featured several amusement park rides. In those years it also offered baseball, bowling, boating, picnic space, and a dance pavilion. Glen Echo: Trolley Park In 1903 the ownership of the property was transferred to the Washington Railway and Electric Company which maintained the subsidiary Glen Echo Park Company to operate the Park. This was the era of the “trolley-park”. Before the Great Depression, “trolley-parks” were found on the outskirts of many cities. Owned and operated by the transit companies, they provided a destination for trolley riders. It was a national phenomenon: Kansas City had Electric Park, Chicago had Riverside, and Philadelphia had Willow Grove. Admission was free; profits came from trolley fares as well as the park’s rides, games and concessions. 

The Glen Echo Park Company hired Leonard B. Schloss, an experienced amusement park manager and promoter, as general manager. He held that position until 1950. The Park was advertised as an ideal family resort, fashioned after Atlantic City and Coney Island. Attractions for the Park’s 1911 amusement park season included a 10,000 square foot dance pavilion, a human roulette wheel, a miniature railway, a children’s playground and many others. In the three seasons following, attendance at Glen Echo Park averaged 400,000 per season. Mr. Schloss’s policy was to offer one new ride each year. Thousands of Washington area residents were thrilled by riding the Gravity Railway (1912), the Gyroplane (1913), the Derby Racer (1916) and the Whip (1918). Nineteen twenty-one saw the addition of the Coaster Dip and the Dentzel Carousel. In 1923 the Bumper Car ride was installed at Glen Echo Park. The Crystal Pool was added in 1931 accommodating 3,000 swimmers plus an adjacent sand beach.In 1933 the Spanish Ballroom was opened, with 7,500 square feet of dance area to accommodate 1,800 dancers. Its stage was graced by many of the era’s great bands. Nationallyknown bands like the Dorsey Brothers, Woody Herman, Stan Kenton and local groups like the Jack Corey Orchestra performed at the park. Even the early rock and roll band, Bill Haley and the Comets, played in the ballroom. 

By 1935 the park employed 21horticulturalist to care for the parkpark also had its own carpenblacksmith shops. Annual “clean uthe grounds, buildings, and other anew. Glen Echo during World WGlen Echo’s popularity peaked iWorld War II, crowds of Washingtstationed in the area flocked to the the major holiday weekends (Memoand Labor Day) was estimated at However, wartime restrictions weoperations. In 1943 the boat ride the gas shortage and the shootammunition was impossible to oemployees left to join the armed serAt the War’s end, the Park’s facilitwere added, and walkways were had to be closed when the formecondemned in 1949. Attendance figures tell their own people attended opening day; in 1the crowds were reduced to 3,000. Segregation and the TurbulDuring the 1950s, Glen Echo Parkseveral transitions. In 1954 title Enterprises, Inc., a subsidiary of They sold the park in 1955 to Rekbrothers, long-time amusement powned the Park for the next 15 yearThe harsh reality of the story of Gnot always open to everyone. Fosegregated. To many, Glen Echo fun. But to African-Americans, thPark made the realities of their time