Escalators are common in many buildings today but they actually started life as an amusement park ride, for two weeks in the fall of 1896 around 75,000 people stepped on the inclined elevator at Coney Island's Old Iron Pier. The device was initially created by Jesse Reno for use in the New York City Subway and lacked steps at that time. Reno wasn't the first to have the idea of moving stairs, in 1859 Nathan Ames got a patent for his "revolving stairs" but never actually tried to build it. Thirty years after that another man patented a similar item but again it was never built so Reno got his patent in 1892 and installed 4 in a New York City department store. Along came another inventor who coined the term escalator and eventually teamed up with Otis of elevator fame who absorbed both men's patents and installed 350 escalators worldwide by 1920.
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