Higher
Subtitle: A Historic Race to the Sky and the Making of a City
Publisher: Doubleday
Published: October 21, 2003
Place of publication: New York
Language: eng
Number of pages: 352
ISBN-13: 9780385506601
First sentence: The lobster shift returned home from a long night of pouring drinks, driving taxis, scrubbing floors, or walking the beat on the mad city streets.
Description: A history of the competitive constructions of the Chrysler Building, the Manhattan Company Building, and the Empire State Building describes the fierce rivalries of their architects and the individuals who supported or thwarted their efforts.
Table of contents: title: Prologue : The soaring Twenties; title: Part one.; title: A hunch, then a demand; title: The architect-artist; title: A proud and soaring thing; title: The organization man; title: Make the land pay; title: An American invention; title: The poet in overalls; title: To scrape the sky; title: Equivalent to war; title: A three-way race; title: Interlude : Oxygen to the fire; title: Part two.; title: Call it a "Vertex"; title: A monument to the future; title: The prize of the race; title: The butterfly and its cocoon; title: Crash; title: Pharaoh against Pharaoh; title: Aladdin's Genii and paper fights; title: The chase into the sky; title: Excelsior; title: Epilogue : Spirit--not steel and stone