It is now called the Willis Tower, but I reckon it will revert back to its original and more famous name of the Sears Tower in Chicago, Illinois.
At 1450 feet it is the tallest building in the USA and in July 2007 I even visited this amazing feat of engineering myself! This was a picture I took on what was a glorious summer day that then turned into a thunder and lightening storm!
The tower was the brainchild of Sears and Roebuck who in the 1960s were the world's largest retailers. The idea to house many of their employees under such an impressive roof was implemented and from 1973 until 1998 the Sears Tower was the world's tallest building, eclipsed by the Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The CN Tower in Toronto is taller but different categories place the CN Tower as the largest freestanding structure in the Americas.
I am fascinated by such skyscrapers as not only are they an amazing feat of construction and engineering but they represent man's ambition to be faster, longer, taller in all such weird manner of feats!
I am lucky enough to have stood on the skydeck of the Sears Tower (as it was called then) and also the Petronas Towers. I'll have some work to do to visit both the Tapei 101 and the Burj Dubai before new buildings in Shanghai and Chicago outstrip the current number 1 and 2 tallest buildings!
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