According to Montgomery (2003), "Higher floors of buildings tended to rent at a substantial discount, due to the need to climb several flights of stairs to reach one's workplace or residence. Otis's invention of the safety elevator at mid-century heralded the end of this constraint on vertical real estate development" (495). Likewise, Masden notes that the increasingly confident use of the relatively new ' elevators' also fueled demand for more steel frame structures; such new steel-framed buildings were known during this early period as "elevator buildings" instead of skyscrapers, a term that was first coined in 1883 (Marsden 78).

The underlying theory behind steel frame construction during its early use, though, fueled some well-intentioned but misguided efforts that adversely influenced future applications, selection of building materials, site selection and other salient factors involved in construction. In this regard, Mumford (1959) reports that, "Unfortunately, the skyscraper was an almost automatic response...
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