How They Built the Empire State Building in Record Time

In the summer of 1930, a building in New York grew by four and a half floors every week. No round-the-clock shifts, no secret machine. Just red-hot rivets thrown through the air and caught in a can, a crane that lifted itself up the building two floors at a time, and a plan where every beam, rivet and truck had its place. From March 17, 1930 to May 1, 1931: how the Empire State Building went up in 410 days, told with real 1930 film footage, Lewis Hine's photographs from the steel, and 3D diagrams of how a hot rivet actually holds. How many floors a week do you think could be built today? Tell us in the comments. Chapters: 0:00 Intro — 4½ floors a week 0:40 The Race 2:05 Why a Skeleton 2:54 Designing While Digging 4:00 Steel Made to Measure 5:04 An Assembly Line in the Sky 6:36 The Rivet Gang 8:15 The Men on the Steel 9:50 The Mast That Never Worked 10:42 Four Hundred and Ten Days Sources: • Empire State Building — history and fact sheet: https://www.esbnyc.com/about/history • Landmarks Preservation Commission designation report (1981): http://s-media.nyc.gov/agencies/lpc/l... • W. A. Starrett, Skyscrapers and the Men Who Build Them (1928): https://archive.org/details/skyscrape... • Construction Physics — Building fast and slow: the Empire State: https://www.construction-physics.com/... • ENR — The race into the sky: https://www.enr.com/articles/60722-th... • Rivets in U.S. structures (Old Structures Engineering): https://oldstructures.com/2017/12/08/... • RCSC guide to high-strength bolted joints: https://www.boltcouncil.org/files/2nd... • Kahnawake ironworkers (Canada's History): https://www.canadashistory.ca/explore... • Lewis Hine — NYPL Digital Collections: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/c... Archive film: "Making a Skyscraper (Steel) — Empire State Bldg." (1930) and London Terrace home movie (1929), Prelinger Archives / Internet Archive; "Bridging San Francisco Bay" (1937); "Steel: A Symphony of Industry" (1936). Photographs: Lewis W. Hine — The New York Public Library, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, U.S. National Archives, LACMA, Library of Congress, Nationaal Archief (via Wikimedia Commons). Modern footage: Pexels and Pixabay (free licences). 3D diagrams: original. Music: YouTube Audio Library. Narration is AI-generated. Short clips used for commentary and education from: Tension Control Bolts. #engineering #history #newyork