After seven years idle, the carousel at downtown Newark’s Military Park is turning again, with free rides through the end of 2026. The 16-horse attraction, in the six-acre park, reopened at a public celebration on Oct. 23. Its return brings a new operating arrangement, but what rides will cost and how expenses will be covered after the free period remain unresolved.
The carousel had been shut down after a dispute over who would pay to keep it running, according to NJ.com. The Newark City Parks Foundation has now taken on its revival. Riders welcomed the return, the outlet reported.
The free-ride period, sponsored by the Newark City Parks Foundation, runs through the end of 2026. The carousel operates Thursdays and Fridays from 3 to 8 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays from noon to 8 p.m., with an attendant on duty, according to Patch. The Oct. 23 celebration ran from 2 to 6 p.m. at 51 Park Place, Patch reported. Operators told NJ.com the ride would remain open indefinitely, including through the fall and winter.
A New Funding Model, With Questions Beyond 2026
The carousel first opened to the public in 2016 as part of Military Park's broader revitalization, built with a $450,000 gift from Newark native and philanthropist Ray Chambers, the article notes. At the time, the Military Park Partnership led a redevelopment of the downtown green space and maintained both the park and the new ride. But a few years after that initial installation, the city regained control of Military Park, and carousel operation was suspended amid an annual six-figure cost, according to NJ.com.
The Newark City Parks Foundation, established in 2021 to care for Military Park and other downtown parks, organized the carousel’s return. Executive director Marcy DePina told NJ.com that no public funds are being spent on the ride; an anonymous donor is covering labor, insurance, cleaning and maintenance. The foundation had not yet set prices for rides after the free period or detailed how ongoing operating costs would be paid, Public Square reported.
Other Newark Park Arrangements
Other local park examples illustrate different approaches, but do not establish a connection to the carousel’s funding. The Advisory Council on Historic Preservation says Branch Brook Park is administered through a public/private partnership between Essex County and the nonprofit Branch Brook Park Alliance. Separately, NJ.com reported that more than $4.8 million in improvements had been completed at Independence Park in Newark’s Ironbound neighborhood. Those improvements are separate park investment, not evidence of a citywide trend or a funding plan for Military Park’s carousel.
Sixteen Horses, Sixteen Pieces of Newark History
The 16 hand-carved wooden horses, coated in protective fiberglass, depict aspects of Newark’s equestrian history, according to NJ.com. They include Blueskin, recalling George Washington’s six-day encampment near Military Park during the Revolutionary War, and a horse styled after Borden, a reminder of the company’s local bottling plant and horse-drawn milk carts.
Other horses represent Newark’s fire and police departments and enlistees in the 5th United States Colored Cavalry, a Civil War unit comprised of freed and enslaved men, NJ.com reported. The ride also has a bench for visitors who cannot or prefer not to ride a horse.
Former Newark Mayor Ras J. Baraka said the restoration would create childhood memories and shared experiences among residents, according to NJ.com. The City of Newark’s City Hall page also celebrated the reopening, calling the carousel “one of downtown Newark's most beloved landmarks.”
Young Riders and Longtime Newarkers Weigh In
The reopening drew young riders and longtime Newarkers to the park, NJ.com reported. A Halloween celebration later paired free candy with carousel rides, making the attraction part of the park’s community events.
A Halloween celebration at the park paired free candy with carousel rides, folding the attraction into the neighborhood's calendar of community events, according to the same report.
Built by a Company Steeped in Carousel History
The ride itself was built by Carousels and Carvings of Marion, Ohio, with engineering donated pro bono by Newark-based Thornton Tomasetti, Patch reported. Carousels and Carvings was founded by Todd Goings, a Heritage Fellow of the National Endowment for the Arts, whose company produces roughly one new carousel every two years and has worked on many of the roughly 150 surviving examples of America's golden-age carousels built between 1880 and the Great Depression, per NJ.com. The firm's past projects include the Central Park Carousel in Manhattan and the carousel on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., along with an overhaul of the 116-year-old Dr. Floyd L. Moreland Carousel in Seaside Heights, which reopened to the public on July 3, 2024, in a new building at the north end of the boardwalk, according to app.com. Seaside Heights Mayor Anthony Vaz attended that carousel's ribbon cutting, the outlet noted.
Goings told NJ.com he learned on a Friday that the Military Park Carousel was running again. The National Endowment for the Arts describes carousels as participatory folk-art environments that bring together carved animals, music, movement and custom-built mechanical frames. Goings said the attractions connect past and present, urban and suburban, and young and old.
