New Buildings and New Spaces
This chapter views the New-York Tribune and the New York Times—the first in the industry to use skyscraper architecture as the medium for corporate image construction—in the context of the growing power of the press. In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the city was reimagined with new patterns of circulation, spaces, conduits, and nodes of power. Alongside the growth of the banking and insurance industries, the press colonized lower Manhattan and the value of land rose precipitously. New construction and printing technology required capital investment and new forms of corporate governance. Media architecture transformed from rented space in low buildings to purpose-built signature buildings with lawyers, press agents, and advertising firms as tenants. The shift to taller buildings reveals a preoccupation with both the symbolic and economic value of the skyscraper, as media content became more attentive to the built environment.