Just before the turn of the 20th century, Montgomery, Ala., was on the cutting edge of technology when it established an electric streetcar system in 1886, the first of its kind in the world. To celebrate that accomplishment and get more people riding the new transportation system, the Montgomery Railway Co., opened an amusement facility called Electric Park in 1904.

Click through the gallery at the top of the page to see vintage photos of one of Alabama’s earliest amusement parks.

Montgomery wasn’t the only city with an “Electric Park.” The facilities offering amusement rides and carnival games were popular around the country as cities began electrification.

READ: Alabama was home to world’s first electric trolley system

“Some historians credit traction [electric trolley] companies or the utility companies that usually owned them with the development of the amusement park as an American institution,” Dale Samuelson wrote in the 2001 book “The American Amusement Park.”

The parks would be located outside of town so people would need to use the electric trolleys to get there. Admission to the parks was often free.

The parks were bathed in electric light, leading to the name, but they weren’t the only marvel. The park in Montgomery featured a theatre for vaudeville shows, a huge slide, a carousel with wooden animals, a miniature train and boat rides across a lake that sparkled with lights.

Electric Park was located on Atlanta Highway in an area now known as Forest Hills, according to the Montgomery County Historical Society. “What is now Forest Hills Shopping Center was once a large lake offering row boats, a boat house … and pier,” the society wrote in a Facebook post.

A September 1904 article in the Montgomery Advertiser about the opening of the park said: “From the heights of the ‘Toboggan Slide’ last night came the shouts of the coasters, the wooden animals of the merry-go-round continuously made their circular journey with scores of children on their backs, the miniature railroad was crowded with passengers, while boats and launches filled with other pleasure-seekers cleft the quiet waters of the lake.”

The Montgomery County Historical Society listed other features at the park, including “a penny arcade, a mirror maze, shooting gallery, bowling alley” and “skating rink.”

The penny arcade included newfangled objects such as a weighing machine, colored picture machines, strength test devices and candy machines.

The Montgomery Advertiser described the first day: “The opening yesterday of Electric Park, Montgomery’s new pleasure resort, was a notable event. All day and until far into the night the cars of the Montgomery Street Railway were busy carrying passengers to and from the resort.” Management estimated 15,000 people visited on opening day.

The facility was built on the site of a previous park called Bloemfontaine, according to the article. The newly constructed buildings were arranged in a circle. “At the center of this circle is a snowy white band stand studded with electric lights,” the article said. “The whole place is brilliantly illuminated with thousands of electric lights.

The park also featured a “casino,” which at the time could have referred to a place for gambling or to a building used for meetings and dancing. Some types of gambling were allowed in Alabama then but “lotteries,” including slot machines, were prohibited. In fact, in August 1905, the Montgomery Railway Company and the park’s manager, J.C. Smith, was found guilty of installing slot machines on the property, according to The Montgomery Advertiser. Smith was fined, the machines were removed and the park soon had a new manager.

The theatre, which opened in May 1905, hosted entertainers like Buster Keaton, Louise Dresser, and Harry Houdini.

Montgomery’s park survived for only five years, closing in 1909. The buildings were demolished in 1916.