In 1937, Austin’s Growing Skyline Saw Towers ‘Shooting Up’

Quite a rogue’s gallery of interesting buildings in 1937 — in the photo of the Driskill Hotel’s annex tower in the center of the page, do you see the “bungalow” building on the roof? Click for a larger view. Image: Austin History Center / Austin Public Library

On July 29, 1937, the Austin Statesman printed a special edition of its daily paper commemorating the end of construction on the Buchanan Dam project. One page, as seen above, celebrated the steady growth of Austin’s skyline and the economic prosperity it represented — with its centerpiece, the 307-foot tower of the University of Texas’ Main Building, having opened earlier that year.

New skyscrapers shoot up almost annually to make Austin more and more of a metropolis, as these photos of recent improvements or building projects now under way show.

— The Austin Statesman, July 29, 1937

More than 80 years later, it all sounds kind of familiar, doesn’t it?

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