First hotel Elevator

August 23, 2009

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Profile America — Sunday, August 23rd. Big city hotels as we know them would not be possible without elevators — guests simply would not walk up countless flights of stairs with their luggage. On this date in 1859, the first hotel with an elevator opened in New York City. It was the Fifth Avenue Hotel, six stories high. Its elevator did not use cables, but cars carried guests to upper floors atop a screw-like mechanism. The first modern electric elevator built by Elisha Otis did not come along for another 30 years, also in New York City. Today, making the elevators and escalators that move millions of people a day in the U.S. generates almost $2 billion a year in revenue. Profile America is a public service of the U.S. Census Bureau, now preparing for the 2010 Census.

Sources: Kane's Famous First Facts, 2107, 2109
2002 Economic Census, NAICS 333921
http://www.census.gov/econ/census02/data/industry/E333921.HTM