30 Rockefeller Plaza 22nd tallest in New York City and the 47th tallest in the United States. It stands 400 feet (122 m) shorter than the Empire State Building. 30 Rockefeller Center underwent a $170 million floor-by-floor interior renovation in 2014. The construction of Rockefeller Center occurred between 1932 and 1940 on land that John D. Rockefeller Jr. leased from Columbia University. The Rockefeller Center site was originally supposed to be occupied by a new opera house for the Metropolitan Opera. By 1928, Benjamin Wistar Morris and designer Joseph Urban were hired to come up with blueprints for the house. However, the new
Rockefeller Museum British Mandate, James Henry Breasted, founder and director of the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute, recognized the need for an archaeological museum in Jerusalem to house important regional finds. Encouraged by Lord Plumer, the British High Commissioner, Breasted approached American philanthropist John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who agreed to donate two million dollars toward the project. Previously, he had offered to build an archeological museum in Cairo, Egypt, but he was turned down, possibly due to pressure from the British government, which was anxious to keep America from establishing a foothold in the region. The museum was designed by Austen Harrison,