Google Doodle celebrates Valentine's Day and George Ferris

Inventor of the ferris wheel was born on Valentine's Day 1859

Screenshot from the Valentine's Day/George Ferris Google Doodle Photograph: Google

Google is celebrating Valentine's Day and George Ferris's birthday with a two-in-one doodle.

Ferris, born on 14 February 1859 in Illinois, is most famous for designing and building the original ferris wheel for an exposition in Chicago in 1893. The directors of the World's Columbian Exposition wanted an exhibit that would rival or even surpass the Eiffel Tower, which had been built in Paris in 1889, and Ferris's wheel was chosen.

The interactive doodle features two ferris wheels with a fairground backdrop. Pushing a heart button on the doodle spins the wheels and brings up pictures of animals, who then appear going on dates.

In recent years ferris wheels have moved out of amusement parks and into city centres and they are getting bigger too. The tallest is the Singapore Flyer in Singapore, which reaches a height of 165 metres – 30 metres higher than the London Eye.