Who made the first skyscraper

The first skyscrapers—tall commercial buildings with iron or steel frameworks—came about in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The first skyscraper is generally considered to be the Home Insurance Building in Chicago, though it was only 10 stories high. Later, taller and taller buildings were made possible through a series of architectural and engineering innovations, including the invention of the first process to mass-produce steel. Today, the tallest skyscrapers in the world are more than 100 stories and approach—and even exceed—heights of 2,000 feet.

• A skyscraper is a tall commercial building with an iron or steel framework. 
• They were made possible as a result of the Bessemer process of mass production of steel beams. 
• The first modern skyscraper was created in 1885—the 10-story Home Insurance Building in Chicago.
• Early extant skyscrapers include the 1891 Wainwright Building in St. Louis and the 1902 Flatiron Building in New York City. 

The first building that could be considered a skyscraper was the Home Insurance Building in Chicago, which was finished in 1885. The building was 10 stories tall and reached a height of 138 feet. Two additional stories were added in 1891, bringing the height to 180 feet. The building was demolished in 1931 and replaced with the Field Building, an even taller skyscraper with 45 stories.

Although the first skyscrapers were relatively small by today's standards, they marked an important turn in urban construction and development. Some of the most notable structures in the early history of skyscrapers were:

• Tacoma Building (Chicago): Constructed using a riveted iron and steel frame, the Tacoma Building was designed by the major architectural firm Holabird & Root.
• Rand McNally Building (Chicago): The Rand McNally Building, completed in 1889, was the first skyscraper built with an all-steel frame.
• The Masonic Temple Building (Chicago): Featuring commercial, office, and meeting spaces, the Masonic Temple was completed in 1892. For a time it was the tallest building in Chicago.
• Tower Building (New York City): The Tower Building, completed in 1889, was the first skyscraper in New York City.
• American Surety Building (New York City): At 300 feet tall, this 20-story building broke Chicago's height record when it was completed in 1896.
• New York World Building (New York City): This building was home to the New York World newspaper.
• Wainwright Building (St. Louis): This skyscraper, designed by Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan, is famous for its terracotta facade and ornamentation.
• Flatiron Building (New York City): The Flatiron Building is a triangular, steel-frame marvel that still stands in Manhattan today. In 1989, it was made a National Historic Landmark.

Construction of skyscrapers was made possible thanks to Englishman Henry Bessemer, who invented the first process to mass-produce steel inexpensively. An American, William Kelly, had held a patent for "a system of air blowing the carbon out of pig iron," but bankruptcy forced Kelly to sell his patent to Bessemer, who had been working on a similar process for making steel. In 1855, Bessemer patented his own "decarbonization process, utilizing a blast of air." This breakthrough in the production of steel opened the door for builders to start making taller and taller structures. Modern steel today is still made using technology based on Bessemer's process.

While “the Bessemer process” kept Bessemer’s name well-known long after his death, lesser-known today is the man who actually employed that process to create the first skyscraper: George A. Fuller. Throughout the 19th century, construction techniques had called for outside walls to carry the load of a building’s weight. Fuller, however, had a different idea.

He realized that buildings could bear more weight—and therefore soar higher—if he used Bessemer steel beams to give buildings a load-bearing skeleton on the inside of the building. In 1889, Fuller erected the Tacoma Building, a successor to the Home Insurance Building that became the first structure ever built where the outside walls did not carry the weight of the building. Using Bessemer steel beams, Fuller developed a technique for creating steel cages that would be used in subsequent skyscrapers.

Taller buildings were also made possible through the invention of the electric elevator in 1883, which reduced the amount of time it took to travel between floors. Also impactful was the invention of electric lighting, which made it easier to illuminate larger spaces.

Many of the earliest skyscrapers were built in an architectural style that came to be known as the Chicago School. These steel-frame structures often featured terra cotta exteriors, plate glass windows, and detailed cornices. Architects associated with the Chicago School include Dankmar Adler and Louis Sullivan (who designed the old Chicago Stock Exchange Building), Henry Hobson Richardson, and John Wellborn Root. Contrary to its name, the Chicago style reached far beyond the American midwest—buildings in the Chicago style were built in places as far away as Florida, Canada, and New Zealand.

Advertisements

The world’s first skyscraper was the Home Insurance Building in Chicago, erected in 1884-1885. The so-called “Father of the Skyscraper” towered all of 10 stories with its peak at 138 feet, miniature by today’s standards but gargantuan at that time. The architect, Major William LeBaron Jenney, incorporated a steel frame that supported not only the walls but the great weight of the entire building. The exterior, however, was made of brick. This technique spawned a new type of construction referred to as the “Chicago Skeleton.” The landmark building did not last…it was demolished in 1931 which was ironically, the year that The Empire State Building in New York was completed.Advertisements

All records listed on our website are current and up-to-date. For a full list of record titles, please use our Record Application Search. (You will need to register / login for access)

Comments below may relate to previous holders of this record.