03New York
New York — masonry to steel frame
An 1873 harbor lithograph, then cameras on steel-frame construction: Flatiron 1902, Woolworth ironwork 1912, the finished tower, the city seen from it. Singer Tower, photographed standing, was demolished in 1967–68 — that demolition is a separate documented event.
Before1873
Harbor lithograph
1873·New York
New York — Battery Park and the East River
George Schlegel, artist; George Degen, publisher.
Bird's-eye illustration / lithograph
What this plate shows
A colored lithograph looking north from the harbor: Battery Park in the foreground, Manhattan’s dense blocks, the East River, and a completed-looking Brooklyn Bridge at right. The bridge opened in 1883. Record the sheet as printed in 1873/74 — a drawn overview that includes a span the camera could not yet have as finished.
- Image type
- Bird's-eye illustration / lithograph
- Source
- Library of Congress Prints and Photographs, PGA. Restored scan on Wikimedia Commons.
- License
- Public domain (filed 1873; LOC also dates a state 1874).
Transition1902
Flatiron, completed, from the street
1902·New York
Flatiron Building, Fifth Avenue and Broadway
Detroit Photographic Co.
Street photograph · Surviving
What this plate shows
The completed Flatiron photographed from the street: the prow at Twenty-third, carriages, a clock, the new tower filling the view. A camera at ground level, 1902. Not the 1873 harbor lithograph. Early steel-frame construction as a physical object, not as a skyline argument.
- Image type
- Street photograph
- Structure
- Flatiron Building (Fuller Building)
- Region
- North America
- Documented completion
- 1902
- Architect
- Daniel Burnham; D. H. Burnham & Co.
- Present status
- Surviving — The building still stands. Steel frame, stone and terracotta skin.
- Source
- New York Public Library, Image ID 804860. Gelatin silver print issued 1902.
- License
- Public domain.
Transition1912
Woolworth frame going up
1912·New York
Woolworth Building — ironwork, 4 April 1912
Unidentified photographer. Dated on the negative 4 April 1912.
Street photograph · Surviving
What this plate shows
The Woolworth frame going up: steel, timber staging, neighboring masonry, a street of carts. Dated 4 April 1912. A camera on a building site. The finished tower is a later plate. Do not collapse construction and completion into one image.
- Image type
- Street photograph
- Structure
- Woolworth Building
- Region
- North America
- Documented completion
- 1913
- Architect
- Cass Gilbert
- Present status
- Surviving — The building still stands. This plate is construction, not the finished tower.
- Source
- Library of Congress Prints and Photographs, ppmsca.54252.
- License
- Public domain.
Afterc. 1913
Woolworth completed
c. 1913·New York
Woolworth Building
Period stereograph. Issued as the tower newly completed.
Street photograph · Surviving
What this plate shows
The completed Woolworth tower photographed from the street: Gothic cladding on a steel frame, the sidewalk, neighboring piles. A camera at the foot of a finished high-rise. Set it beside the 1873 harbor lithograph and beside the April 1912 ironwork plate. Three different kinds of record.
- Image type
- Street photograph
- Structure
- Woolworth Building
- Region
- North America
- Documented completion
- 1913
- Architect
- Cass Gilbert
- Present status
- Surviving — The building still stands at 233 Broadway.
- Source
- Library of Congress stereo collection (1s06999).
- License
- Public domain.
Afterc. 1913
The city from the new tower
c. 1913·New York
Looking down from the Woolworth tower
Period stereograph from the new tower.
Elevated photograph · Surviving
What this plate shows
New York photographed from the Woolworth tower shortly after it opened: roofs, streets, the harbor edge. An elevated photograph from a known high-rise, not a bird’s-eye lithograph and not a balloon plate. The camera is on steel-frame architecture looking at whatever still stood around it.
- Image type
- Elevated photograph
- Structure
- Woolworth Building (camera position)
- Region
- North America
- Documented completion
- 1913
- Architect
- Cass Gilbert
- Present status
- Surviving — The tower still stands. The city beneath it did not freeze in 1913.
- Source
- Library of Congress stereo collection (1s07820).
- License
- Public domain.
How to read this chain
Image type first. Then the date. Then what the plate actually shows. A later status — surviving, burned, demolished, replaced — is a documented fact about the structure, not a claim this photograph was asked to prove. The Living Realm sits downstream, in Synthesis.