The World’s First Skyscraper
/The First Skyscraper
First Published Date: Oct 16, 2010
Skyscrapers dominate cities these days but there was a time when no building, apart from a church, were higher than five floors at most. That has changed immensely and its origin can be traced back to one building in Chicago, which started the dawn of the skyscraper age. It was the Home Insurance Building and it has the honour of being the world’s first skyscraper.
Built in 1885 in Chicago, Illinois, the Home Insurance Building was the first building to use a structural steel frame, although it should be noted that the majority of the building was composed of cast and wrought iron, making it extremely heavy. That being said, it is the first tall building to be supported, inside and out, with a fireproof metal frame. There was a previous building to use this method, the Ditherington Flax Mill, but it was only five stories tall, while the Home Insurance Building was 10 stories tall. The building stood 138 feet, and it had two additional floors installed in 1890 to make it 12 stories tall. It was also the first building to carry both floors and external walls on its metal frame. The architect of this legendary skyscraper was William Le Baron Jenney, who was an engineer that saw the potential for the power of steel. The building was so revolutionary that many worried about its safety and its construction was halted so that city officials could inspect it to see if it would fall over. It was not long before this idea was copied over and over. In 1888, an architect in Minneapolis named Leroy Buffington was given a patent to build a skeletal-frame tall building, which he proposed as a 28-story stratosphere-scraper. It was mocked at the time but within a few decades, that patent was used to create the dominant building form of the 20th century.
While the building may have been revolutionary, it only lasted to 1931 when it was demolished to make way for the Field Building. Today, the Bank of America Building now occupies the site where the first skyscraper once stood and in its lobby it has a plaque that reads:
This section of the Field Building is erected on the site of the Home Insurance Building which structure, designed and built in eighteen hundred and eighty four by the late William Le Baron Jenney, was the first high building to utilize as the basic principle of its design the method known as skeleton construction and, being a primal influence in the acceptance of this principle was the true father of the skyscraper, 1932
This skyscraper is the first of what would be many. Without the Home Insurance Building, we would not have New York as we know it. There would be no Empire State Building, no Sears Tower and no large skyscrapers of any type. This one building literally changed the world for all of us over 100 years ago in Chicago.
