Early Employment
As a child, Irving sold newspapers on the Lower East Side to aid his widowed mother. In 1905, he borrowed $50 as start-up funding in a venture to sell souvenir pails and shovels at Steeplechase Park. The venture reaped a $1,500 profit. Within a few years, he and his brother Jacob - who was later known as Jack - bought a second-hand merry-go-round which they operated at the Savin Rock Park in West Haven, Connecticut, which they claimed netted a profit of $11,000. In 1927, Irving and Jack Rosenthal built at a cost of $146,000 The Cyclone roller coaster at Coney Island. Irving also operated the Golden City Park Arena in Canarsie, Brooklyn, and featured the debut fights in the boxing careers of Canada Lee, Tony Canzoneri, and Izzy Grove.
Read more about this topic: Irving Rosenthal
Famous quotes containing the words early and/or employment:
“In the early forties and fifties almost everybody “had about enough to live on,” and young ladies dressed well on a hundred dollars a year. The daughters of the richest man in Boston were dressed with scrupulous plainness, and the wife and mother owned one brocade, which did service for several years. Display was considered vulgar. Now, alas! only Queen Victoria dares to go shabby.”
—M. E. W. Sherwood (1826–1903)
“The boatmen appeared to lead an easy and contented life, and we thought that we should prefer their employment ourselves to many professions which are much more sought after. They suggested how few circumstances are necessary to the well-being and serenity of man, how indifferent all employments are, and that any may seem noble and poetic to the eyes of men, if pursued with sufficient buoyancy and freedom.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)