Cables and Girders

“A cordon of police reserves was posted in and near Times Square to protect the spectators of a giant feat,” The Times wrote in 1926. “A modern Hercules, steam in his nostrils and steel in his muscles, was lifting an unprecedented height and an unprecedented weight, so far as building operations go. A truss 144 tons heavy was being hosted with groans and snots to its place over the auditorium of the new Paramount Building at Forty-third Street and Broadway.”

The silhouette of cranes, pulleys and cables lifting the 144-ton steel girder creates a beauty of its own against the background of buildings in Times Square. The Times photo was published with the article, “Superb Building Feats in New Skyscrapers; Unusual Construction and Great Weights Test the Skill of Engineers,” on February 28, 1926.

To the left is the Hotel Astor, in operation from 1904-1967, located on Broadway at between West 44th and 45th streets. Just like in 1926, the landscape and skyscape of New York is ever changing; now the Hotel Astor space is occupied by the high-rise 54-story office tower One Astor Plaza. And the Paramount Theatre? It played host to the biggest entertainers — Frank Sinatra, Benny Goodman, Billy Eckstine, Perry Como, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis — before closing in 1964 and being converted into office and retail space.