1950 - Architecture, Real Estate

Architecture, Real Estate

The White House at Washington, D.C., gets a complete overhaul under the direction of President Truman. He has the nearly 150-year-old structure gutted, replaces its timbers with steel and concrete, and adds a balcony off the private quarters on the third floor that was built in 1927.

Otis Elevator installs the first passenger elevators with self-opening doors in the Atlantic Refining building at Dallas. Self-service elevators will force thousands of operators to seek other means of employment.

New York's United Nations Secretariat building is completed by Wallace K. Harrison and consultants to provide offices for the UN's 3,400 employees on land overlooking the East River.

Twelve new office buildings are completed in New York with more than 4 million square feet of floor space.

Architect Eliel Saarinen dies at Bloomfield Hills, Mich., July 1 at age 76; air-conditioning pioneer Willis H. Carrier at New York October 7 at age 73.