Building the Metropolis

Construction history is entirely unfamiliar to most scholars, and yet it is a crucial part of urban history. Alexander Wood joins the show to discuss how New York City was built from blueprints to scaffolding to demolition.

Essential Reading:

Alexander Wood, Building the Metropolis: Architecture, Construction, and Labor in New York City, 1880–1935 (2025).

Recommended Reading:

Joanne Abel Goldman, Building New York's Sewers: Developing Mechanisms of Urban Management (1997).

Gerard Koeppel, City on a Grid: How New York Became New York (2015).

Mike Wallace, Greater Gotham: A History of New York City from 1898 to 1919 (2017).

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