Foshay

There, I look out everyday on the tallest building in the world, Foshay, the mighty giant Foshay Tower of Minneapolis. Only, I must say, it's a bit hard to see, hidden as it mostly is behind another skyscraper. Wait, there's its edge. I see its dirty tan edge!

The Foshay Tower is made of concrete, the brownish kind, like The Empire State Building, a lesser known skyscraper somewhere to the east of here.

Walking along the Mississippi River, keeping an eye as I can on that otherworldly Minneapolis skyline, the Foshay Tower seems to duck in and out of view. I catch a glimpse here and there of the tallest building in the world. Only a careful eye can pick it out. It seems so small.

"How can this be?" You ask. "Surely the tallest building in the world would be easier to spot."

Right.

Good point.

It does seem rather shorter than all the other Minneapolis skyscrapers, and apartment buildings, and tallish statues, and maybe some of the bigger SUV's.

I heard The Foshay Tower was modeled on The Washington Monument, and one can see it. It angles in as it rises. It has the same sort of shape and feel, in a more squat, usable sort of way. I heard this Foshay fellow went bankrupt and was ruined just a couple months after the tower was finished. He paid a huge commission to John Philip Sousa to write a song for its opening back in 1929, but the check to Sousa bounced higher than the Foshay Tower, which maybe isn't so terribly high after all.

Do you want to hear Sousa's Foshay song?

No, I know. I don't either.