[Scenario Seed] Return to the Empire State.
Dec 17, 2023 15:38:20 GMT
tampahawke and lupercal like this
Post by Catsmate on Dec 17, 2023 15:38:20 GMT
This a more-or-less a few notes on a location for a Scenario. I do have a more detailed idea, involving a missing urban explorer phasing through time, a Sinister Experiment and her lost smartphone, but that'll have to wait.
Return to the Empire State Building.
Located at the corner of 33rd Street and Fifth Avenue in the New York borough of Manhattan the 337 metre building was the tallest structure on Earth for thirty years (1931-61) and the first to have over one hundred floor (102).
It's appeared in two television stories (The Chase and Daleks in Manhattan) and several more comics, audios and prose works. It even seems to have survived the Dalek Invasion.
It was built on the site of what had been the most luxurious hotel in New York, the Waldorf-Astoria.
The ESB was conceived in the boom years of the 1920s; construction began in 1930 (the Waldorf-Astoria was demolished on 01OCT1 1929) and 410 days, forty million dollars and five4 lives later, the Art-Deco building was complete.
Unfortunately it was a financial disaster for Empire State, Inc, and it's president Al Smith2.
For more than a year income from the twenty or so tenants3, was less than that of the observation deck (about two million dollars). But all the office lights were switched on, to maintain the illusion. Profitability would take twenty years.
Profitability would take twenty years.
Notes.
1. So a bit early for a Halloween Special.
2. Whose presidential ambitions didn't go well either in 1928.
3. Optionally include one Dr. Clark Savage Jr.
4. In official accounts five workers died during the construction, though the New York Daily News gave reports of 14 deaths and a headline in the socialist The New Masses claimed forty two deaths. Officially the later are unfounded rumors, but, well, Daleks.....
Bottom.
Return to the Empire State Building.
Located at the corner of 33rd Street and Fifth Avenue in the New York borough of Manhattan the 337 metre building was the tallest structure on Earth for thirty years (1931-61) and the first to have over one hundred floor (102).
- 337 metres to the 102nd floor, 443 metres to the top of the antenna structure.
- Though actually there are only 86 usable floors and the observation deck on the 102nd, there are no actual intermediate floors.
It's appeared in two television stories (The Chase and Daleks in Manhattan) and several more comics, audios and prose works. It even seems to have survived the Dalek Invasion.
It was built on the site of what had been the most luxurious hotel in New York, the Waldorf-Astoria.
- The first hotel in the city have have private bathrooms and electric lighting. It was the iconic hotel for the city, opening in 1893.
- It was a heavy, weighty, Germanic design, stuffed full of antiques, marble facades, and dignity. At its height it has 1,300 rooms. While laughed at for its pomposity, dignitaries and the wealthy flock to it, to eat one of Oscar of the Waldorf’s celebrated meals, or dance in the Waldorf’s iconic ballroom.
- New York’s fashionable women compete to outdo each other on what becomes known as Peacock Alley, the main corridor of the hotel that ran the full length of the building, all along 33rd Street.
The ESB was conceived in the boom years of the 1920s; construction began in 1930 (the Waldorf-Astoria was demolished on 01OCT1 1929) and 410 days, forty million dollars and five4 lives later, the Art-Deco building was complete.
Unfortunately it was a financial disaster for Empire State, Inc, and it's president Al Smith2.
For more than a year income from the twenty or so tenants3, was less than that of the observation deck (about two million dollars). But all the office lights were switched on, to maintain the illusion. Profitability would take twenty years.
Profitability would take twenty years.
Notes.
- Smith occupies the top floors, as offices and living quarters.
- Smith is the only tenant with keys to the building, everyone else is admitted (after the public hours end at 5PM) by security at the front door, until 8PM. After that if you leave, you're out until 7AM.
- There was a séance, to contact the ghost of Thomas Edison, in 1932. It was a publicity stunt dreamed up to attract tenants and failed.
- Back in 1925 NBC aired its inaugural radio show from the Waldorf-Astoria’s ballroom, hosted by comedian Will Rogers hosts the show.
- The Waldorf, in its early years, faced the same problems the Empire State now faces. No guests, no future: Astor’s Folly. John Jacob Astor IV, later to drown on the Titanic, solved the problem with a charity ball that attracted the wealthiest families of New York, thus establishing the hotel’s reputation.
- Astor, a devotee of science fiction, utopian, and author of A Journey In Other Worlds. He died on the Titanic in 1912.
- Smith placed a time capsule in the foundations of the building on 09SEP1930.
- As mentioned before only the lowest 86 stories are usable. The first through 85th floors contain about two hundred thousand square metres (20 hectares) of commercial and office space, while the 86th floor contains an observatory. The remaining 16 stories are part of the spire, which is capped by an observatory on the 102nd floor.
1. So a bit early for a Halloween Special.
2. Whose presidential ambitions didn't go well either in 1928.
3. Optionally include one Dr. Clark Savage Jr.
4. In official accounts five workers died during the construction, though the New York Daily News gave reports of 14 deaths and a headline in the socialist The New Masses claimed forty two deaths. Officially the later are unfounded rumors, but, well, Daleks.....
Bottom.