Five Questions with Alexander Wood, author of “Building the Metropolis”
Between the 1880s and the 1930s, New York City experienced explosive growth as nearly a million buildings, dozens of bridges and tunnels, hundreds of miles of subway lines, and thousands of miles of streets were erected to meet the needs of an ever-swelling population. In his book Building the Metropolis, Alexander Wood offers a revelatory look at this era of urban development by asking, “Who built New York, and how?” Focusing on the work of architects, builders, and construction workers, Wood chronicles the physical process of the city’s rapid expansion. New York’s towering buildings and busy thoroughfares aren’t just stylish or structural marvels, he shows, but the direct result of the many colorful personalities who worked in one of the city’s largest industries. This development boom drew on the resources of the whole community and required money, political will, creative vision, entrepreneurial drive, skilled workmanship, and hard physical labor.
Read on for an interview with the author about Building the Metropolis.
Your book looks at some of New York City’s famous buildings, construction projects, transit and asks, “Who built this?” So, who built New York?
It’s important to understand that construction was one of the city’s largest industries and so I would say that a truly enormous number of people were involved in building the city. By 1930 there were more than three hundred thousand people working in the industry! While the city had a large number of architects, builders, and contractors, skilled building craftsmen formed the bulk of the workforce. In my book, I particularly focus on these workers and the world of the trades. Most workers were union members and many had followed their fathers and relatives into the trades. A large percentage of construction workers were the children of immigrants or first-generation immigrants. Irish, Italian, and Jewish workers were particularly prominent in the trades, but the workforce was quite diverse overall.
How did the City of New York shape the building industry between 1880 and 1935?
At the time New York City politics was strongly pro-growth and all the major political factions were eager to use government to boost urban development. If we look at this period as a whole, I would say the city shaped the building industry in three main ways. First, it became a prodigious builder of public buildings, bridges, and other infrastructure which generated a lot of contracts and jobs. Second, it facilitated the creation of a huge rapid transit system which opened up new areas for development. Third, the city overhauled all the laws that governed building activity which improved the quality of construction throughout the five boroughs, especially the quality of housing.
What role did the building trades unions play in city politics?
In the long run New York political system became rather accommodating to the building trades unions but it wasn’t always that way. In the 1880s, mayors publicly attacked the unions and the major political parties mostly ignored them. But by the 1920s, candidates for office eagerly sought the support of the unions and their members. There are a few ways that we can explain this change of fortune, but I would highlight the role of the building trades leadership. From the beginning of the revival of the labor movement in the late nineteenth century, labor leaders in the trades were extremely active in city politics. While the type of politics they supported changed over time, they were always seeking to win more influence in local government and were quite aggressive in lobbying to secure favorable legislation.
How did new immigrant groups make their way into the building industry?
When building was booming in New York, it was quite easy for new immigrants to start up a small construction business, pick up a trade, or get work as a laborer on a local city job. People usually got started in the industry by finding opportunities in their neighborhoods. Construction has a low barrier of entry and so it has proved quite attractive to new immigrant groups.
The Great Depression was a turning point in the city’s urban development. Why?
The fantastic physical growth of New York between the 1880s and the 1930s was driven by private real-estate development which was boosted by public infrastructure spending. During the Great Depression, private spending on new construction collapsed and for several years public spending also ran dry. When the New Deal got going in the mid-1930s, the character of the city-building process changed dramatically. The La Guardia administration embraced city planning, built public housing with federal funds, and called for the elimination of the “slums.” In many ways the building industry came to rely on public spending and it is no surprise that builders and the trades unions became ardent supporters of the ambitious urban redevelopment schemes of the postwar era.
Alexander Wood is a historian of American architecture and urbanism. He was the Helen and Robert Appel Fellow in History and Technology at the New-York Historical Society in 2021–22.
Building the Metropolis is available now from our website or your favorite bookseller.