If the United States has a national architectural form, it is the skyscraper. The notion of building a tower to the heavens is as old as Genesis, but it took some brash 19th century Americans to ...

In fact, the 12th tallest building in the world, the John Hancock Center in Chicago, has five sets of enormous diagonals on each of its four sides to keep from falling over in the wind.

Take for instance the U.S. Steel South Works Plant, which produced the material to build the Sears Tower and John Hancock ...