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Old Posted Apr 15, 2017, 4:57 PM
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Andy6 Andy6 is offline
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Join Date: Mar 2002
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Quote:
Originally Posted by balletomane View Post
I agree with you, for a building like Cityplace (probably the third most dominant structure in the city skyline after the Legislature and Fort Garry until the 1960's), I wouldn't consider it a historic skyscraper.
I'm trying to look at this question from a historical perspective, and not just how we perceive a historic skyscraper to look, so I'm still wondering if maybe a Winnipegger in 1918 would've thought of Cityplace (or the Somerset, Boyd or Sterling etc.) a skyscraper.
If the height-width ratio is used, then the Grain Exchange Building isn't a historic skyscraper, even though at the time of its construction it would've been the second tallest in the city after Union Bank.
No, the world was full of pictures of skyscrapers in Chicago and New York and everyone knew what they were. I doubt anyone would have called the Grain Exchange or the T. Eaton Co. Factory building (Cityplace) "skyscrapers". They weren't really amazingly tall to begin with, compared to grain elevators, the Ogilvie mill and various church steeples that were already all over the place. The Merchants Bank (SE Main & Lombard) predated the Union Bank and was as tall as the Grain Exchange originally was (7 floors) - it would be interesting to see if there were any references to the Merchants Bank as a "skyscraper" in Winnipeg newspapers.
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