The Pilgrims Arrive, But They Have No Limestone

When the pilgrims arrived in New York City, there was no Empire State Building. "How the hell are we going to raise tourist revenue?" was the question on every city father's mind. There was another problem. To build the Empire State Building, they were going to need limestone, and lots of it. Where to get it?

Bloomington, Indiana. Well, not exactly. About twenty-five miles south of there. Or maybe north. One of the directions. Still, a long journey from New York City, and this was before all the tracks had been laid for the subway.

They had to hoof it. In other words, walk. And ride on horseback and canoe, when the opportunity to trade with the locals arose. Took them a long time to get there, but they did, and now all they had to do was dig a quarry, using shovels and dynamite and whatever else they could lay their hands on. A practically forever task, but these are pilgrims. Not easily daunted. They dug and blasted and before you could say "ouch, I just blew my hand off!" they had 600,000 pounds or tons or however much limestone they needed. Now they just had to figure out how to haul all that limestone back to New York City without getting taxed to death, or beaten to a pulp by the locals. Unfortunately for the pilgrims, they did get beaten to a pulp by the locals, who stole John Day's shiny tin pouch with the papers meant for John Jacob Astor, letting him know all about the network of trading posts they were building out west, where the fur was.

Still, they persisted, and when they got back to New York City with the limestone, somebody said, "aren't we going to need some steel?" Everybody looked at each other and said "sh*t, why didn't I think of that?"

And that's how come the Empire State Building wasn't built in a day.