Mother, son share fond memories
By JAMES HARRIS Special to the Daily Press
Editors note: This article appeared in the Santa Monica Pier Restoration Corporation’s newsletter.
SM PIER Joyce Lensch first rode the Santa Monica Pier Carousel at age 7. Unbeknownst to her, the circling menagerie of horses was as new to the pier as she was.
The year was 1947, and Walter Newcomb had just moved his merry-go-round from the defunct Venice Pier to its new location in Santa Monica. That same merry-go-round still graces the pier today, and Joyce still comes to visit. So does her son Dan.
Dan Lensch last rode the carousel about a month ago.While it may not seem to be such a stretch of time, consider the fact that he visits it two days every week. Dan works at the carousel on the weekends supervising children’s birthday parties. You could call it fate, or destiny, or kismet. You could even call it love — a love that began with Joyce’s mother.
Marguerite Winklmeier brought her family on vacation from St. Louis, Mo. often. Joyce remembers each visit well, noting the consistent destination for family vacations.
“My mother loved Santa Monica,” Joyce remembers. “She visited here in 1922. She was twenty-two years old and she loved it, so she brought us out here in 1947. Then we came again in 1948.”
Two years later the family made Santa Monica their permanent home. Marguerite was thrilled.
“Santa Monica and the pier and the carousel were like the end of the rainbow,” Joyce remembers her mom saying.
Joyce spent the rest of her youth in Santa Monica. She remembers visiting the pier often, riding the carousel on occasion and spending a lot of time on the beach. When she entered the work force she stayed local as well, taking a job at Rand Corp. The company’s tall office building just south of the pier’s entrance ramp offered extraordinary views of the pier.
“Every day in my wanderings about the halls, I had the opportunity to look out one of the windows and see the pier, including the carousel building,” she said. “From 1982 until 1987 I actually worked on the fifth floor and the windows looked almost directly out over the pier.”
That the merry-go-round is the same machine that has been on the pier since her first visit is something of a marvel to Joyce. As she reflected upon it, though, it’s not really a surprise.
“The carousel seems much the same, however the pier is much improved,”she noted.“It is cleaner and the restaurants are wonderful and the shops are far nicer.”
Dan has been working the carousel parties for the past three years. He found out about the position through one of Joyce’s colleagues, and has been pleased to be a part of the enjoyable atmosphere that the carousel brings to the children. He’s quick to point out, though, that the children are not the only ones enthralled with the circling horses.
“A lot of parents and grandparents tell me that they rode the merry-go-round when they were kids,” he said. “This brings back a lot of memories for them.”
The significance of his employment at a place that Marguerite loved so much is not lost on either Dan or Joyce.
“I know how much this all meant to my mother,” Joyce said, “and I’m sure she’s looking down and that she’s so happy, because this was just the end-all to her. The beach, Santa Monica. Her grandson is right here, working. That’s really special.”
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on April 22, 2008. Read the original PDF.