1931, THE EMPIRE STATE BUILDING IS DEDICATED IN NYC

Today, The Grandma wants to commemorate a wonderful event, the 92nd anniversary of the officially opening of the Empire State Building in Manhattan, New York City.

 

This construction was opening on a day like today in 1931.

The Empire State Building is a 102-story Art Deco skyscraper in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. It was designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon and built from 1930 to 1931.

Its name is derived from Empire State, the nickname of the state of New York. The building has a roof height of 380 m and stands a total of 443.2 m tall, including its antenna.

The Empire State Building stood as the world's tallest building until the construction of the World Trade Center in 1970; following its collapse in 2001, the Empire State Building was again the city's tallest skyscraper until 2012.

As of 2020, the building is the seventh-tallest building in New York City, the ninth-tallest completed skyscraper in the United States, the 49th-tallest in the world, and the sixth-tallest free-standing structure in the Americas.

The site of the Empire State Building, in Midtown South on the west side of Fifth Avenue between West 33rd and 34th Streets, was developed in 1893 as the Waldorf–Astoria Hotel.

In 1929, Empire State Inc. acquired the site and devised plans for a skyscraper there. The design for the Empire State Building was changed fifteen times until it was ensured to be the world's tallest building.

Construction started on March 17, 1930, and the building opened thirteen and a half months afterward on May 1, 1931. Despite favourable publicity related to the building's construction, because of the Great Depression and World War II, its owners did not make a profit until the early 1950s.

The building's Art Deco architecture, height, and observation decks have made it a popular attraction. Around four million tourists from around the world annually visit the building's 86th- and 102nd-floor observatories; an additional indoor observatory on the 80th floor opened in 2019.

More information: ESBNYC

The Empire State Building is an American cultural icon: it has been featured in more than 250 TV shows and movies since the film King Kong was released in 1933. The building's size has become the global standard of reference to describe the height and length of other structures.

A symbol of New York City, the building has been named as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World by the American Society of Civil Engineers. It was ranked first on the American Institute of Architects' List of America's Favourite Architecture in 2007.

Additionally, the Empire State Building and its ground-floor interior were designated city landmarks by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1980, and were added to the National Register of Historic Places as a National Historic Landmark in 1986.

The Empire State Building is located on the west side of Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, between 33rd Street to the south and 34th Street to the north.

Tenants enter the building through the Art Deco lobby located at 350 Fifth Avenue. Visitors to the observatories use an entrance at 20 West 34th Street; prior to August 2018, visitors entered through the Fifth Avenue lobby.

Although physically located in South Midtown, a mixed residential and commercial area, the building is so large that it was assigned its own Postcode, as of 2012, it is one of 43 buildings in New York City that have their own Postcodes.

The areas surrounding the Empire State Building are home to other major points of interest, including Macy's at Herald Square on Sixth Avenue and 34th Street, Koreatown on 32nd Street between Madison and Sixth Avenues, Penn Station and Madison Square Garden on Seventh Avenue between 32nd and 34th Streets, and the Flower District on 28th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues. The nearest New York City Subway stations are 34th Street-Penn Station at Seventh Avenue, two blocks west; 34th Street-Herald Square, one block west; and 33rd Street at Park Avenue, two blocks east. There is also a PATH station at 33rd Street and Sixth Avenue.

To the east of the Empire State Building is Murray Hill, a neighbourhood with a mix of residential, commercial, and entertainment activity. The block directly to the northeast contains the B. Altman and Company Building, which houses the City University of New York's Graduate Center, while the Demarest Building is directly across Fifth Avenue to the east.

The site was previously owned by John Jacob Astor of the prominent Astor family, who had owned the site since the mid-1820s.

In 1893, John Jacob Astor Sr.'s grandson William Waldorf Astor opened the Waldorf Hotel on the site; four years later, his cousin, John Jacob Astor IV, opened the 16-story Astoria Hotel on an adjacent site. The two portions of the Waldorf-Astoria hotel had 1,300 bedrooms, making it the largest hotel in the world at the time. After the death of its founding proprietor, George Boldt, in early 1918, the hotel lease was purchased by Thomas Coleman du Pont.

By the 1920s, the old Waldorf-Astoria was becoming dated and the elegant social life of New York had moved much farther north than 34th Street. The Astor family decided to build a replacement hotel further uptown, and sold the hotel to Bethlehem Engineering Corporation in 1928 for $14–16 million. The hotel closed shortly thereafter, on May 3, 1929.

More information: History

The Empire State Building officially opened on May 1, 1931, forty-five days ahead of its projected opening date, and eighteen months from the start of construction. The opening was marked with an event featuring United States President Herbert Hoover, who turned on the building's lights with the ceremonial button push from Washington, D.C.

Over 350 guests attended the opening ceremony, and following luncheon, at the 86th floor including Jimmy Walker, Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Al Smith. An account from that day stated that the view from the luncheon was obscured by a fog, with other landmarks such as the Statue of Liberty being lost in the mist enveloping New York City.

The Empire State Building officially opened the next day. Advertisements for the building's observatories were placed in local newspapers, while nearby hotels also capitalized on the events by releasing advertisements that lauded their proximity to the newly opened building.

According to The New York Times, builders and real estate speculators predicted that the 380 m Empire State Building would be the world's tallest building for many years, thus ending the great New York City skyscraper rivalry.

At the time, most engineers agreed that it would be difficult to build a building taller than 370 m, even with the hardy Manhattan bedrock as a foundation. Technically, it was believed possible to build a tower of up to 610 m, but it was deemed uneconomical to do so, especially during the Great Depression.

As the tallest building in the world, at that time, and the first one to exceed 100 floors, the Empire State Building became an icon of the city and, ultimately, of the nation.

More information: Time

 

 That New York energy,
when you've got the benefit of great weather,
it really is terrific.
You look up at that skyline,
and the Empire State Building is literally in your eyesight
-there's nothing like that.

Justin Hartley