U.S. Census Bureau Daily Feature for August 9

WASHINGTON, Aug. 9, 2014 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Following is the daily "Profile America" feature from the U.S. Census Bureau:

MOVING EXPERIENCE

Profile America — Saturday, August 9th. With so much modern infrastructure featuring soaring atriums and deep subterranean transit systems, it's not easy to imagine getting by without escalators. However, this efficient people mover was conceived in a far simpler, down to earth time. The first patent for a moving stairway was obtained on this date in 1859 by Nathan Ames. However, it was never built. The first practical escalator was built by Jesse Reno in 1896 at Coney Island, New York. Reno called his device an "inclined elevator." The longest escalator in the western hemisphere is 230 feet long, at the Wheaton, Maryland station of the Washington Metro System. Manufacturing escalators and elevators in the U.S. is a nearly $1.6 billion a year business. You can find more facts about America from the U.S. Census Bureau, online at www.census.gov.

Sources: Kane's Famous First Facts, 2106
http://www.lehigh.edu/engineering/about/alumni/bio_reno_j.html 
http://www.wmata.com/about_metro/docs/metrofacts.pdf 
http://factfinder2.census.gov/faces/tableservices/jsf/pages/productview.xhtml?pid=ASM_2011_31VS201&prodType=table NAICS 333921

Profile America is produced by the Center for New Media and Promotions of the U.S. Census Bureau. These daily features are available as produced segments, ready to air, on the Internet at http://www.census.gov (look for "Multimedia Gallery" by the "Newsroom" button). 

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SOURCE U.S. Census Bureau

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