The first in an occasional TGT series looking at the stories behind famous pictures.

Lunch atop a Skyscraper was a publicity shot, designed to show New York as a thriving, growing city despite the ongoing Great Depression, and the new Rockefeller Plaza as one of the best addresses with the best views in the city. Ask your students whether it does that job?

However, the fact that this was a staged photo makes me no less freaked out that these workers were sat on an iron beam 69 floors above the New York street below. I’d definitely rather stand on Kjeragbolten!

-Bill