ADDENDUM: The following paragraph was cut by the editor for space...I'm reproducing it below. It belongs between "...but I wonder whether buyers are even interested anymore." and "A couple of years ago, the Perron family...".

"I suspect that Bertazzon phasing out rocking horses on their carousels may have more to do with eliminating a maintenance issue than anything else. You see, depending on how much riders rode those horses to a canter or gallop, those rubber spring bumpers beneath them did eventually wear out and needed replacing, something the owners often neglected to do, especially if most of the riders went for the up & down horses (which as I indicated above, may really still be rockers anyway). So if a horse's rubber springs wore out, then his gait would deteriorate to being just bumpy or even worse the horse became completely lame."