Lunch break on a skyscraper

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Lunch atop a Skyscraper, 1932
Black and white photograph by
Corbis
Link to the picture
(Please note copyrights )

Lunch atop a skyscraper ( English Packed atop a skyscraper ) is an advertising photograph , 1932 during the formation of the Rockefeller Center was included in the construction of the building. The photo may have been created by Charles C. Ebbets . The building captured has been called the Comcast Building since 2015 . After a film about the genesis of photography was published in 2013, its title Men at Lunch is also used more often for the photo itself.

The photo shows eleven men taking their lunch break on a steel beam, their feet hanging freely on the streets of Manhattan , New York ; any backups of the individual persons, if any, are not recognizable. The picture was taken on September 29, 1932 and appeared a short time later in the New York Herald Tribune . It was taken from the 69th floor of the building more than 250 meters above the ground.

For a long time, the photo was erroneously attributed to Ebbet's colleague Lewis Hine , who was commissioned in 1930 to photograph the construction of the Empire State Building . In 2003, after research in the Bettmann archive, the picture was assigned to Charles C. Ebbets. However, this is again doubted.

The construction work under the direction of John D. Rockefeller lasted from 1931 to 1940; the Rockefeller Center now comprises 21 high-rise buildings.

People in the photo

Many of the steel workers who helped design New York's skyline - possibly including some in the photo - belonged to the North American Mohawk Indians . The Mohawks are very proud of their tradition as "Skywalkers", which now goes back six generations. Mohawk Indians built the Empire State Building , the RCA Building, the Daily News Building, and many others.

The identity of two workers is considered to be secure, as they can be recognized on other photographs from the same day and their names are noted there. According to a corresponding report in the New York Times in 2012, the third man from the left is Joseph Eckner, the third from the right (ninth from left) Joe Curtis. More men were identified in the documentary Men at Lunch (2013). According to this, the first man from the left with a cigarette is Matty O'Shaughnessy and the last in line with the bottle is Sonny Glynn, both from County Galway , Ireland . The fourth man from the left is also said to be an Irish named Michael Breheny, while the fifth, Albin Svensson, from Välasjö in Sweden and the sixth, the Mohawk Indian Peter Rice, from Kahnawake in Canada. The eighth and ninth men are said to be Irish Francis Michael Rafferty and Stretch Donahue. The eleventh worker could also be Gusti Popovič, a Slovak from what was then Czechoslovakia .

According to an older report in the Irish newspaper Galway Independent , the following identities of the men were given by their descendants or acquaintances. Starting from the left, the first steel worker would be Matty O'Shaughnessy from County Galway. The third man was identified as Austin Lawton from King's Cove , Newfoundland , but also as Sheldon London from New York and also as Ralph Rawding from New York. The fifth man is said to be Claude Stagg from Catalina , Newfoundland. The sixth man is, according to the husband of a niece John Johansson, from Okome in Sweden , which is near Albin Svensson's place of origin. According to other information, the man's name is John Patrick Madden. The seventh man was recognized by his daughter as John Doucette. A nephew recognized Francis Michael Rafferty in the eighth person, the ninth man is said to have been his best friend, Stretch Donahue, too. The tenth man Thomas Norton (born as Naughton) and Patrick "Sonny" Glynn, who is named here as the eleventh man, are said to come from County Galway like the other Irish.

Resting on a Girder (dt. Resting on a carrier ) is another photo that Ebbets made on the same day and the four of the eleven steel workers is lying on the same steel beams.

Image background

In the background of the picture you can see Manhattan with Central Park . The view goes from today's GE Building to the north. In the lower area of ​​the picture you can see some buildings, some of which are still standing today. Below the fourth man from the right rises the skyscraper of the Warwick New York Hotel, on the other side of Sixth Avenue is the Ziegfeld Theater , which was demolished in 1966. Behind it to the left is the domed building of the New York City Center , in front of which is today's Blakely New York Hotel. The buildings on the left are still preserved today. Behind the sixth man from the left is the writing of the Essex House , which opened in 1931.

reception

The motif has been quoted many times, e.g. B. through the minions in Despicable Me 2 .

literature

  • John Hively: The Rigged Game: Corporate America and a People Betrayed . Black Rose Books, 2006, ISBN 978-1-55164-281-9 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Sara Malm: The picture that proves why iconic photograph of workers eating their lunch on Rockefeller beam was all a publicity stunt. dailymail online, September 20, 2012, accessed on August 27, 2017 .
  2. ↑ a b The original: "Lunchtime atop a Skyscraper". Hamburger Abendblatt , February 27, 2007, accessed on December 21, 2013 .
  3. ^ Film Men at Lunch, according to a report in the New York Times dated September 19, 2013, accessed October 11, 2018
  4. ↑ Example of common mis-attribution of Lunch atop a Skyscraper to Lewis Hine . Retrieved May 25, 2012.
  5. ^ Icarus atop Empire State Building , New York, 1931. Estate of Lewis Hine . Retrieved May 25, 2012.
  6. ^ Mary F. Cory: The world through a monocle: the New Yorker at midcentury . Harvard University Press, 1999, p. 111.
  7. ↑ Identities according to an article in the New York Times on November 8, 2012, accessed October 11, 2018
  8. ↑ Irish Workers in Men at Lunch, according to irishcentral.com, March 31, 2017, accessed October 11, 2018
  9. ↑ Contents of Men at Lunch according to Yahhoo News from June 26, 2016, accessed October 11, 2018
  10. ↑ Dedo obletel svet ( Slovak ) Zivot. 2008. Retrieved May 25, 2012.
  11. ↑ a b Galway Independent, January 23, 2007 . Retrieved May 25, 2012.
  12. ↑ Utlandssvenskar - vad de kan lära oss ( Swedish ) Expressen. 2012. Archived from the original on January 11, 2012. Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved May 25, 2012. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / kvp.expressen.se
  13. ↑ Another example of common mis-attribution of 'Lunch atop a Skyscraper' to Lewis Hine . Retrieved May 25, 2012.
  14. ↑ listverse.com .
  15. ↑ Lunch Atop A Skyscraper. In: New York - History - History. Retrieved December 21, 2014 .
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