On this day in history...

The Empire State Building was opened.

On this day, exactly 81 years ago, President Herbert Hoover opened the Empire State Building to the public by symbolically turning on its lights from a switch in the White House. Constuction had started on 17 March 1930 as part of a competition between Walter Chrysler and John Jakob Raskob to see who could build the highest tower. The project was extremely important to the American economy after the Wall Street crash in 1929 had left huge numbers of people unemployed. At its peak, the project employed 3000 people per day and due to this vast workforce, the structure could rise by an amazing 4 1/2 stories every week!


Health and safety was clearly more relaxed then today's mind blowing standards, however, only five people died during the construction, and only one from falling from the scaffolding, lets hope it was none of these luchtime daredevils.

 

Of the other four who died, one was hit by a truck, one fell down an elevator shaft, another was hit by a hoist and the last was in a blast area and was killed by an explosion. So maybe less health and safety would have evolutionary benefits by weeding the unlucky and those devoid of common sense from the gene pool.

The Empire State Building did win the competion, measuring in at 1454 feet compared to the Crysler Building which was 1047 feet tall. It has a staggering 102 floors and if you took complete leave of your senses and decided that you were going to walk all the way up there, you would be taking on a mammoth 1860 steps.

Since it has been built the Empire State Building has been a cultural icon, featuring in over 250 films, possibly the most famous being King Kong. It is clearly a much loved building, being voted 'Americas Favorite Architecture' by the American Institute of Architects in 2007 and I think that it represents to people the great things that can be achieved through inspirational thinking, hard work and brining people together.