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Lunch atop a Skyscraper

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Lunch atop a Skyscraper, 1932

Lunch Atop a Skyscraper is an iconic photograph taken on September 30, 1932, of eleven ironworkers sitting on a steel beam 840 feet above the ground on the sixty-ninth floor of the RCA Building in Manhattan, New York City. It was a publicity stunt as part of a campaign promoting the skyscraper. First published a few weeks later, the photograph was later acquired by Corbis Images in 1995. Often misattributed to Lewis Hine, the true identity of the photographer is unknown, although many speculate it to be Charles C. Ebbets. There have been numerous claims regarding the identities of the men in the image, though only a few ironworkers have been identified. Ken Johnston, manager of` the historic collections of Corbi, referred to the image as "a piece of American history."[1] The film Men at Lunch is based on the photograph.

Overview

The photograph depicts eleven men eating lunch and chatting, sitting on a steel beam 840 feet (260 meters) above on the sixty-ninth floor of the near-completed RCA Building in Manhattan, New York City, on September 20, 1932. These men were immigrant ironworkers employed in the construction of the RCA Building in the Rockefeller Center. They were accustomed to walking along the girders. The photograph was taken as part of a campaign promoting the skyscraper. Other photographs taken depict the workers throwing a football and pretending to sleep on the girder. Central Park is visible in the background. [2][3][4] The photograph was first published in the Sunday supplement of the New York Herald Tribune on October 2, 1932, with the caption: "Lunch Atop a Skyscraper".[5]

History

Photograph

In 1995, Corbis Images, a company that provides archived images to professional photographers, bought a collection of over eleven million images called the Bettmann Archive. The Lunch atop a Skyscraper photograph was in the Acme Newspictures archive, a part of the Bettmann Archive collection, although it was uncredited. According to Ken Johnston, manager of the historic collections of Corbis, the image was initially received in a Manila paper envelope. The original negative of the photograph was made of glass, which had broken into five pieces. It is stored in a humidity and temperature-controlled preservation facility in Iron Mountain storage facility, Pennsylvania.[6][7][4]

Photographer

The identity of the photographer is unknown. It was often misattributed to Lewis Hine, a Works Progress Administration photographer, from the wrong assumption that the structure is Empire State Building.[4][6] In 1998, Tami Ebbets Hahn, a resident of Wilmington, noticed a poster of the image and speculated it to be one of her father's photographs. In 2003, she contacted Johnston. It was also the hundredth birth anniversary of Otto Bettmann, founder of the Bettmann Archive. Corbis hired Marksmen Inc., a private investigation firm, to find the photographer. An investigator discovered an article from The Washington Post, which credited the image to Hamilton Wright. The Wright family, however, was not familiar with the photograph. It was common for Wright to receive credit for photographs taken by those working for him, and Charles C. Ebbets[6] (1905–1978), Hahn's father, had worked in the Hamilton Wright Features syndicate.[8] In 1932, Ebbets had been appointed the photographic director of the Rockefeller Center, responsible to publicize the new sky-scraper. Hahn found her father's $1.5 per hour (equivalent to $33 in 2023) paycheque, the ironworkers's photograph, as well as an image of her father with a camera which appeared to be of the same place and time. Analyzing the evidence, Johnston said: "As far as I'm concerned, he's the photographer".[6] Corbis later acknowledged Ebbets' authorship.[9]

It was later speculated that photographers Thomas Kelley, William Leftwich, and Ebbets were present there on that day.[2] Due to the uncertain identity of the photographer, the image is again without credit.[7]

Ironworkers

There have been numerous claims regarding the identities of the men in the image.[10] The film Men at Lunch, based on the photograph, traces some of the men of possible Irish origin, and the director reported in 2013 that he planned to follow up on other claims from Swedish relatives. The film confirms the identities of two men: Joseph Eckner, third from the left, and Joe Curtis, third from the right, by cross-referencing with other pictures taken the same day, on which they were named at the time.[4][11] The first man from the right, holding a bottle, has been identified as Slovak worker Gustáv (Gusti) Popovič. In 1932 he sent his wife Mária (Mariška) a postcard with this photograph on which he wrote, "Don't you worry, my dear Mariška, as you can see I'm still with bottle."[12] The second worker from the left has been identified as Natxo Ibargüen Moneta, a native of Spain.[13]

Legacy

The photograph has been referred to as the "most famous picture of a lunch break in New York history" by Ashley Cross, a correspondent of the New York Post.[10] It has been colorized and a 40 feet (1,200 centimeters) long statue of the photograph has been created by Sergio Furnari.[4][14][15] The image has been a best seller for Corbis.[9][16] Although archivists have referred to the photograph as a publicity stunt, Johnston referred it to as "a piece of American history."[1] Taken during the Great Depression, the photograph became an iconic emblem of New York City[2] and is often re-created by construction workers.[15] Discussing the significance of the image in 2012, Johnston said:

There's the incongruity between the action – lunch – and the place – 800 feet in the air – and that these guys are so casual about it. It's visceral: I've had people tell me they have trouble looking at it out of fear of heights. And these men – you feel you get a very strong sense of their characters through their expressions, clothes and poses.[7]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b The Telegraph 2012.
  2. ^ a b c Time Inc. 2016, p. 26.
  3. ^ Smithsonian 2012.
  4. ^ a b c d e The New York Times 2012 (a).
  5. ^ Time 2016, 01:08.
  6. ^ a b c d Star-News 2003.
  7. ^ a b c Reuters 2012.
  8. ^ The New York Times 2012 (b).
  9. ^ a b The Daytona Beach News-Journal 2012.
  10. ^ a b New York Post 2003.
  11. ^ Hallandsposten 2013.
  12. ^ iDNES.cz 2013.
  13. ^ EITB 2021.
  14. ^ The New York Times 2007.
  15. ^ a b The Washington Post 2019.
  16. ^ Transatlantica 2013, p. 1.

Works cited

English sources

Non-English sources

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