Their attitude,

I think their casualness,

the indifference to the risk that they're taking is what

separates the photograph.

If you see the picture once,

you never forget it.

This photograph which is known around the world

Shows Eleven men sitting on a beam about 800 feet above the city of New York

You can see Central park in the background see buildings below

and they're casually sitting there one right next to the other eating their lunch and

They're all construction workers, and they came from all over the world. There are Irishmen, there are Mohawk Indians.

It's a mixed bag of people, and they're all working in 1931-32.

The image first appeared in the New York Herald Tribune [on] October 2nd

1932 the Herald Tribune was a major New York publication

And it I think [that] generated an enormous [amount] of excitement about what was going on

they were getting as much publicity as they possibly could in any office that was rented whether you were a dentist or a

Hairdresser or a major Corporation they would get you into the news

Rockefeller put a quarter of a million people's work in the middle of the [depression] there were truckers are people in quarries people making windows

Different kinds of people, but it really had a serious effect on the economy

And that was the attitude very very positive towards the future very positive Towards America very

positive Towards business

The funniest part about the photographs were they were done for publicity

So you'll have stunts

Like this fellow Joseph McCluskey holding a flag up that seems to be attached to the top of the Empire [State] building

The other pictures also show men riding the final block of stone up going to celebrate

putting the last stone in place

We do have a photograph taken the same day

And what I call the hats off picture shows them looking at the camera and saying look at us

They're so proud of themselves. You know there's a real sense of pride and accomplishment

[and] I think that's also what all the pictures show the pride the guys had in their work

There are a couple of photographers who were present that day

William Left Which Charles [Ebbets] and

Thomas Kelly, who had to have a death wish [and]

They would have on their back a leather container that contained the glass plates, and they would actually switch them out [I]

Think that they liked to show off next to the construction workers

Well you guys walk these beams, but so can we we take risks, [too]

The question of the names of all these men comes up frequently

[who] are these men because on the back of the photograph They're not identified

We have people who have claimed that. They're their uncle [or] their relative

But most of them are either good guesses or plain guesses [I]

think it's kind of sad that they're not recognized because everybody else gets a credit and

Yet the people who actually have built the building are forgotten

the fact that they are immortalized in this picture and

They are the guys who risked their lives building this building

And I think that's what's important [about] the picture is that it places them in history as being important in

the Development of New York City and Rockefeller Center, and

Gives a great deal of credit to a group that basically goes uncredited

you