A trip down the midway is a trip through over 105 years of Portland family fun! Ride a pig, cat, or even a dragon on the 1911 Herschell-Spilman Carousel. Twist and twirl on carnival classics like the “Tilt-A-Whirl” and “Rock-o-Plane,” and fly 70 feet into the air on the ultra-modern Screamin’ Eagle. We forever hear that there is no such thing as a free ride, well I beg to differ. Here at Oaks Park there is a free ride for your little ones. There is no admission fee for the “kiddie” rides where big adventures await them. 
Survivors of an earlier era. before Disneyland and Six Flags, before steel coasters went 50 mph, and rides were named for cartoons, movies, and superheroes, there were trolley parks. The parks were built by trolley companies at the end of the line in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a way to get workers and their families to ride streetcars and railways on weekends. They had carousels, picnic grounds, and live entertainment, and they were often located by lakes, rivers, or beaches where visitors could take a boat ride or swim. 
By 1919, just after World War I, there were 1,000 amusement parks around the country, and most of them were trolley parks. But as cars replaced trolleys, the streetcars and the parks faded away. Even if you do not have a thing for bobby socks and malted milkshakes, it is hard not to be charmed by the attractions at Southeast Portland’s Oaks Amusement Park. For starters, it is one of the oldest continually operating amusement parks in the United States, and its quaint scale means that little legs will not get tired walking from one attraction to another. Moreover, its riverside location highlights the city’s natural beauty.
Today, only 11 trolley parks remain in operation, one of them Portland’s Oaks Amusement Park, which dates 1905. With a couple of exceptions, most of the surviving trolley parks are smaller, more family oriented, and substantially cheaper than big modern theme parks with high speed 20-story roller coasters. Some still let you pay by the ride, rather than charging hefty gate admissions than can add up to hundreds of dollars for a family. Many of them encourage you to bring picnics rather than banning outside food like some big parks do. Portland’s Oaks Park is now run by a nonprofit organization that was established by the family that once owned the park, but the park was built by the Portland Traction Co. at the end of a rail line on the Willamette River, just before the 1905 centennial celebration of the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
Past exotic entertainment had included a roller-skating elephant and ostrich zoo, and John Philip Sousa performed at Oaks Park a dozen times. Then as now, a roller rink, one of the largest on the West Coast, was a park centerpiece, with live music from a Wurlitzer pipe organ. Oaks Park is thriving with 750,000 guests from spring to early October and 800 corporate picnics annually. It is also affordable: Parking is free, and you still pay by the ride. Yes, by some Oaks Park may be considered cheesy, but I considered it fun!
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