Trump Buys Steeplechase Park

July 1, 1965 - Famed Steeplechase Park, the delight of millions of Coney Island amusement seekers for 68 years, was sold today to Fred C. Trump (right), a prominent Brooklyn builder and real estate investor, for $2½ million.

Most informed sources feel that Steeplechase Park will end up as a massive oceanfront housing development, such as Trump Village, a complex of seven apartment buildings in Coney Island, which stands where Luna Park once stood.

The property was sold to Trump by Marie Tilyou (left), daughter of George Tilyou, the park’s founder who parlayed a $1,000 investment in 1897 into a multi-million dollar amusement empire.

Negotiations for the sale have been going on for months. The fabled park failed to open this season for the first time within memory of Coney Island veterans.

Trump said today that an amusement park operator from the West was coming in next week to survey the outlay and study the feasibility of reopening it as an amusement park. Trump said he is willing to sell the park to him, but if the deal falls through, Trump will consider other uses for the land, probably as a housing development.

The boundaries of Steeplechase Park are the Boardwalk, W. 16th St., Surf Ave. and W. 19th St. The amusement park got its name from its first and most famous ride — the wooden steeplechase horses that caromed up and down a track that encircled the Pavilion of Fun. The ride was installed in 1897, when there were three nearby racetracks, Sheepshead Bay, Gravesend, and Brighton.

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