Providing hard-working families with a taste of Americana is what Burlingame wants local residents to get from his carnival company. Burlingame and his wife, Betty, co-own Pride Amusements, Joplin, Mo. The carnival, which sets up Wednesday and will run through Sunday, is expected to have 17 rides.
There will also be a circus feel to it with pony rides, panthers, white tigers and zebras and a kangaroos.
“It’s all part of a nice show,” Ed Burlingame said. “We also bring nice rides.”
He has more than $1 million in carnival equipment. Next year he expects to have $2 million in equipment for rides here. This year Pride Amusements has another operation set up in a county fair in eastern Kansas. Next year he has committed to bringing a larger show to the Central Kansas Free Fair and Wild Bill Hickok Rodeo.
Burlingame said his interest in carnivals goes back many years.
“I first worked at age 7 at the Missouri State Fair,” said Burlingame, a Sedalia, Mo. native. “I helped friends of my dad. At age 14 I went out to fairs for summers.”
After a stint in the Navy, including serving in Vietnam, Burlingame moved to Texas and has spent 37 years connected with the carnival industry.
“I had a guy who took me under his wing and he was more like a dad,” Burlingame said, adding that’s how he got his start in the carnival business, then deadpanned with a smile, “and I had a few bankers who could not say no.”
Having been involved in the carnival industry, he tries to bring people with a fun experience, but also takes pride in the community he is taking his carnival to and wants his employees to reflect that pride. Employees are subject to hair length codes and they wear uniforms.
“This is a business and has to be run like a business,” Burlingame said. “I want people to see my employees downtown and when they see them I want them to think they are mechanics.”
The pride shown is shared with the community the carnival visits, he said. Burlingame says a good carnival renews a sense of Americana and that is fitting for Abilene and Dickinson County.
“This (Pride Amusements) will be impressive,” Burlingame said. “I like carnivals, too. With our carnival, kids get to see what you would get to see at the state fair.”
Pride Amusements is one of the highlight items at the Central Kansas Free Fair and Wild Bill Hickok Rodeo, which starts Wednesday night and goes through Aug. 10.