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The skyscraper
A skyscraper is a building in which an internal frame carries the weight, so that the outer walls need only keep out the weather. The skyscraper required three things at once: cheap steel, the safety elevator, and a building code that allowed it. Chicago had all three after the fire of 1871, which had emptied the centre and made rebuilding an open problem. The form was then exported worldwide, and is among the few building types with a demonstrably American origin. The steel came from Pittsburgh, from ore out of Minnesota.
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