Ultimately, with this depiction of the Bush Terminal oil company skyscraper, Hassam shows the viewer his vision of New York City’s prosperity as an emerging city full of tall and beautiful skyscrapers. As John Van Dyke wrote in The New New York, “The white sky-scraper of New York…catches light…the solid ‘blocks’ standing shoulder to shoulder along the streets, the bunched group of high buildings…make up walls more massive than those of Stamboul” (Van Dyke, 5). For Van Dyke, writing in 1909, the skyscrapers of New York were beginning to overshadow the walls of the powerful cities of the past, like Istanbul, just as America was starting to emerge as a force that would overpower Europe during World War I. Indeed, Istanbul, for example, was a member of the Central powers that were defeated by America in the war (“World War I”). Thus, through his use of the flags to highlight the affluent and powerful New York buildings and institutions in the flag series, Hassam not only was able to evoke a sense of patriotic pride from his viewers, but he also rendered New York City as a city of the future and one that would rival and even surpass the older European cities. He contributed to the idea that New York was an emerging modern metropolis that would be as influential and as prosperous as Paris and other European cities had been, demonstrating his belief that “the thoroughfares of the great French metropolis” were “not one whit more interesting than the streets of New York!” (qtd. Hassam, Fort, New York, VI). Indeed, Hassam painted the flag series just at the time when America was establishing itself as a world power, and Europe had proved itself to be weakened in World War I, which resulted in the scarring of European soil by the trench warfare, the depletion of Europe’s resourses, the death of a generation of young men, and the collapse of four European empires, the Austro-Hungarian, German, Ottoman, and Russian empires (“World War I”). America’s rising status was further secured as it’s entrance into World War I rescued the European nations and America helped to direct and resolve the peace afterward. So, in his patriotic flag series, Hassam was able to reflect America’s emerging status as a world power, one that would eventually surpass the European nations, through his portrayal of New York’s growing prosperity and power.
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New York Skyscrapers from Jersey City. c. 1908. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C.