The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-07-01
Convey ISLAND IN FIGURES.
lts Present. Past and Future Considered
Ivy n Mathematician.


Ivy o Niathematician.
sIf,' said q man Of mathematical turn Of
mind, I'VE should put the attendance at
Coney Island at 2Oo,o 900 on Sundays. and a.
an average Of $4,000 on weekdays, We should
AVE q weekly attendance there OF 100000,
which seems like, and really ig, o vast num-
Der Of people; and II might seem that this
enormous number Of vistors would soon
exhaust tho possible supply Of visitors, that
such an attendance couldn't begin to con-
tinue throughthe season, Of -four months.
II we were to do a little figuring or this
We should find that half q million q week
Ia not 50 extraordinary after all; the won
der might be that there are not more.
aThere are 4 100000 people in New York,
and II every one Of this population should
be included among the Coney Island goers,
IL would take, ever at half q million q week,
eight weeks Of time TO accommodate them
all with q single visit each, and II would
take the entire season. from end to end, to
accommodate them all twice. But there
are many thousands Of visitors that 60 to
Coney Island many times in a season, and
II all these should continue TO 60 In the
same manner and all the rest should try to
20 twice, why Coney wouldn't begin to
hold the visitors that would want TO 60
there, and the half million q weekwouldseem
small by comparison with the number then
actually going.
As a matter OF fact, however; there are
great numbers Of city people who never 60
to Coney, people who are always going to 60,
but never do go. Probably only a small
percentage Of the visitors to New York 60
away without having been to Coney; there
are plenty Of city jewellers who have never
seen It: and all these, TO say nothing Of the
constantly growing population, yet remain
to be drawn upon.
"Coney, I know, 10 not the only pebble
on the beach; there are other outdoor
amusement attractions. and plenty Of them
all around New York; but even when we
take all these, too, in account, it is still nc
wonder that 90 many people are found at
the beaches, for there are so many people
to draw upon.
Suppose we put all the other places
beside Coney down as drawing the same
number Of visitors, say half a million a
week. That would bring the total number
permit of only four Visits In a season by
each Of the oity's population; and again we
are confronted by the fact that great num-
bers actually 60 many times.
And h Q consider the people living In
the Immediately surrounding territory,
to say nothing OF the visitors from more
distant points. Why, really, We haven't
begun to draw yet on the visible sources
OF supply for furnishing visitors for seashore
and other like amusement places in New
Y YSrt a oomi iss G IN shs future To say nothing OF
II can remember a time whom pretty
much everybody that went to Coney Island
from old New York, Manhattan Island,
went down on steamboats, that landed at
Norton's Point. at the western end OF the
island, and a few thousands q day oon.
stituted their greatest number. You walked
a quarter or half a mile up the beach
and there you came on an unpeopled shore
with the ocean beating on one side and
sand dunes rising.o o the other, all suoh as
you might have found somewhere a thou
4Down at the middle Of the island there
were some places where people came to
the beao CHI from Brooklyn, and, to be sure
some from New York, but there wasn't
amy Coney Island as it is to-day, and such
this, say, a soant thirty-ive years ago
Then came the time when they began
to build up the middle section Of the Islam
and plant attractions there, and when witt
used to go there in numbers, until there
came a time when on fair Sundays there
went to Coney Island visitors to the phenom'
email number Of SO 1000. Count EN-, $4,000
They used to print the numbers in the news
Tt would be only q slim Sunday OF
which Coney had but that number now
and the q~uadrupled number now to bt
seen there is not a marker to the numbel
that will be seen there in years in the neal
future. We are q great and growing coun
try, and we all know that; but / don't thinl
we realize, even now, that as yet we have
scarcely begun to unfold.S