The World Trade Center. The Port of New York Authority. Tower A . [Contemporary photocopy of the blueprints for the World Trade Center prepared for ? Goldberg]

Wrapper title and 244 leaves (numbered 1-324 with unassigned numbers and gaps in sequence as issued and as listed on the Schedule of Drawings), all being photocopies of an original set of blueprints. Oblong folio, 18 1/4 x 25 3/4 inches. "Incidentally, if you're going to build a great project, you should build the world's tallest building." Lee K. Jaffe's 1960 memo contained the seed of what became, for a while, not just the world's tallest building, but, even now, possibly the world's most famous building. Officially opened on April 4, 1973, The World Trade Center was a complex of seven buildings designed by Minoru Yamasaki and Emery Roth & Sons. The four folios of blueprints in this collection date from the breaking of ground through to the arrival of the first tenants, i.e. the most important period of construction. The idea of a World Trade Center in lower Manhattan was first floated in 1945 by the former governor of Florida, David Scholz. Though initially dismissed by New York Governor Dewey as primarily a real estate operation, and vetoed by the Board of Estimate in 1949, the idea continued to be examined by the executive director of the Port Authority Austin Tobin and PA Director of Port Development, Roger H. Gilman. The Port Authority was the only organization with the expertise, remit and ability to generate the funds required to complete a project of this scale. Established in 1921 as a joint fiat of New York and New Jersey, it was the nation's first regional planning authority. It assumed responsibility for the regional planning and development of the entire port district which encompassed terminals in both states, 17 counties and 108 towns. The Port Authority was the "sole institution capable of leveraging a project on the massive scale of the World Trade Center" (Darton). In 1931, the PA's charter was rewritten so as to allow it to use funds generated through pro table projects in order to support unprofitable ones. This revision was instrumental in paving the way for the building of the World Trade Center. The scale of the project was influenced by many different factors, some of which were incorporated into the legislation. One requirement was that at least 75 per cent of tenants should be involved in international business or servicing it. That a project of this scale was also supposed to generate revenue, meant that many of those behind it at the Port Authority staked their careers on it. Guy Tolozzi, the director of world trade stated bluntly, "I came to the conclusion, with Austin, that the only way to achieve that was to build the world's biggest project" (Gillespie p46). As the scale of the project was settled, Tolozzi engaged the Detroit-based architect Minoru Yamasaki to design the buildings. He ordered no strict plan beyond a requisite square footage of office space, hospitality, retail outlets and parking space. The appearance of the building was left entirely up to Yamasaki. Yamasaki (1912-1986) was a Japanese-American architect. Born in Seattle, he studied architecture at the University of Washington and later New York University. He worked for Shreve, Lamb and Harmon in New York and then Smith, Hinchman and Grylls in Detroit before setting up his own firm in 1949. Tolozzi was instrumental in pushing the architects; he flew to Detroit every fortnight to see how things were progressing. The idea of twin towers came to Yamasaki relatively early in the piece as one way of satisfying the required office space. Tolozzi was impressed with the initial drawings which included twin towers of 80 storeys. They were, however, roughly two million square feet short of what Tolozzi had asked for. Tolozzi told Yamasaki to revise the towers beyond the 80 floors. He told the architect: "Yama, President Kennedy is going to put a man on the moon. I want you to build me the tallest buildings in the world." The New York firm Emery Roth and Sons were also hired to work with Yamasaki on the World Trade Center. They had buil.…