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Article: The Birth of the Skyscraper
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- American Eras
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 Gale Research Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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The Birth of the Skyscraper
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An American Innovation.
The skyscraper dominates today
’
s city skyline. The most distinctive American contribution to world architecture, the skyscraper epitomizes the idealistic and material essence of the Modern metropolis. Today
’
s tallest building in the world rises some 1,535 feet above Shanghai, China. Other structures top 900 feet in Hong Kong, Japan, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Seattle, and Toronto. The high-rise has become such a visual commonplace that it is easy to forget that, prior to 1883, the word
skyscraper
did not even exist. During the 1890s American ...