What if you could build something SO tall it touched the clouds?

The Empire State Building Opens Its Doors!

How the world's tallest building reached for the clouds

The Empire State Building opened in 1931 as the world's tallest building — 102 floors high!

On May 1, 1931, something incredible happened in New York City. President Herbert Hoover pressed a button in Washington D.C., and WHOOSH — the lights of the Empire State Building flickered on for the very first time!

This wasn't just any building. It was the TALLEST building in the entire world! Standing at 1,454 feet tall (that's like stacking 25 blue whales on top of each other!), it took only 410 days to build. That's just over a year!

Here's what's mind-blowing: about 3,400 workers helped construct this giant every single day. They were like a team of superheroes, working at incredible heights without being scared. Some workers even ate lunch while sitting on steel beams hundreds of feet in the air!

The building has 102 floors and 6,514 windows. Imagine having to clean ALL of those! The builders used 10 million bricks and enough steel to build 60,000 cars.

💡 The Empire State Building has been struck by lightning over 20 times per year, but it has special equipment that keeps everyone inside safe!