В Дубюке 144 года работает самый крутой лифт мира, управляемый одной семьей

DUBUQUE, Iowa (KCRG) - A landmark in Dubuque is drawing visitors from around the world — and it’s been in the same family for five generations. The Fenelon Place Elevator has been climbing the same Dubuque bluff for more than 140 years. Amy Schadle and her husband Steve, who now run it, aren’t shy about its reputation. “The world record, well, we claim to be the shortest and the steepest,” Steve said. It’s a claim that draws curious visitors from across the U.S. and around the world. “I had never seen anything like it, very unique,” Robin Carothers, visiting from Florida, said. A banker, a nap, and an idea Amy and Steve have told the story hundreds of times. It goes back to 1882. “The town behind me shut down for an hour and a half at noon so everyone could go home and have lunch,” Steve said. “There was a banker that lived up on top here and lived down below.” That banker’s daily commute wasn’t easy. “It took him half an hour on his horse and buggy to get down to his bank and then half an hour to come back,” Amy said. “So a half hour up, half hour down, half hour lunch, plenty of time right?” Steve said. “He liked to take a half hour nap.” There was just one problem. “No nap. Because it took him too long to get up and down,” Amy said. “When he was traveling to Austria, he saw cable car systems.” Amy said he brought that idea home, and hired a local engineer to help him build his own cable car right on the Dubuque bluff. The payoff was immediate. “He had his dinner, he got his nap, five minutes he was at work again,” Amy said. One man’s mealtime dilemma turned into an idea of ingenuity — and later, a business. “Well, neighbors noticed this and they started showing up and asking for rides,” Amy said. Fire, rebuilding, and a family business is born The free rides didn’t come without setbacks. A fire destroyed the elevator not once, but twice, and the banker couldn’t afford to rebuild a second time. So in 1893, his neighbors bought him out — and kept it running themselves. “They got together, they bought the rights of the hill from the banker and they created the Fenelon Place Elevator Company,” Steve said. More than 130 years later, it’s still climbing the same bluff. That rebuild made it stronger, too — swapping the rope that had burned through for steel cable that’s held ever since. That history is ingrained in Amy’s family, with four generations before her at the helm. “I remember having to mow the grass next door,” Amy said. “I don’t do that anymore. That’s what grandchildren are for.” The people who keep it running Over the years, Amy and Steve said it’s the people — and the pulse of the railway — that keeps them going. “My biggest passion is talking to tourists,” Steve said. “You never know who you meet and what stories you get from other people.” Amy and Steve said neighbors on the hill still use the elevator every day, the same way people did more than a century ago. They said running the railcar has been a labor of love, with family learning along the way. “There was no manuals,” Amy said. “My dad kept everything in his head. Didn’t write anything down.” Now, they’re preparing the next generation to take it on. “It feels good to know that all our hard work will be handed off to somebody who cares,” Amy said. “And they care.” 144 years later, people are still climbing the hill — and one family is still there to greet them.