The evening world. Newspaper, August 1, 1922, Page 20

{ | | | } | | | | Oey ENN in amine —e ‘The New. ~rork Tower From the Brooklyn From @ Photograph made in THE EVENING WORLD, TUESDAY, AUGUST I, 1922.’ Brooklyn Bridge 2, Aged 59, Still Young Shore. 1876 Col. Roebling, Who Built the Rridge, Pre- dicts Life of 200 Years; and Says Slip- ping of the Cables Was Intended--- ‘“‘Ought to Be Good Ferever,’’ Verdict of Lindenthal, Famous Bridge Engineer. T t@ now more than 100 years since a suspension bridge was first proposed over the Hast River. The first suggestion of an en- gineer, Pope, in 1819, subsequently was realized when the Roed- lings, father and son, conceived and built the Brooklyn Bridge, from 1870 to 1883. Since the opening date there has been virtually nothing done to help the great structure to withstand its ever-increasing load. In 1888 the mazimum number of passengers carried across the Brooklyn Bridge in one hour was 1,560; to-day it ia nearer 250,000. The deautiful span has loat none of its grace and charm. But tt ts overworked, That t# why automobiles have been ordered off the road- ways and a new bridge is being demanded although some authorities \ insist the old “Hast River Bridge” 4s good for at least another 100 years, 4f not overloaded, , built the bridge on plans made by his By Victor H. Lawn. atner, said it ought to last at least Coprrient, ous Figs Reem ventas World) 100 or 200 years, and he insisted that ae penwenr: it 1s not now in thc slightest danger. 5) RH the fears of more —,, ea Raleroane ‘All this excitement,” he said, “Is han a century for the purpose of hastening the con- at last to be realized? struction of a new bridge across the Is the bridge that river. Even {f a new bridge ts badly made New York fa- B¢cded, there is no truth in the report that Brooklyn Bridge is in any-dan- ger. When the cable slipped it did cumb to the advance just what it was intended to do. If it had failed to slip one end of the mous finally to suc- of time? Do the figures of engineers show- bridge would have fallen down.” tag the Brooklyn Bridge to-day car- Kingsley L.. Martin, Chief Engineer ying a load many hundreds of times of the bridge during the McClellan Reavier than {ts original projectors administration, is another expert who contemplated mean anything? does not believe tt should be rebullt, Bo far the answer to all these ques- Several other engineers familiar with Mons has been “No” and according the bridge and its history are also on to bridge experts the answer will record as believing it aafe. continue “No” indefinitely if the When John A. Roebling, In 1867, Structure is not put to too great & first suggested a span over the East etrain. River to connect the cities of Brook- Announcement by Grover A. jyn and New York every one threw ‘Whalen, Commissioner of Plant and jy hands in horror. Structures, that the main cable on wininogsible! Preposteroust | ‘Th #he north side of the bridge had gyi. ony + pa rites ewe a gtretched and slipped one and one- 1, 1h» merext breeze!? } half inches in its saddle atop the memes’ breere! Manvhattan tower has revived—if it But Roebling knew it could be done. ever really died down—the scepticism He was one of the great engincers of with which the world has looked up- his time. Aided by the crafty Tweed, on this great suspension bridge. who saw vast opportunities to enrich Gust: y Lindentha., une of tao foe. 4nd strengthen Tammany with this most bri¢_s authorities in the coun- &igantic bridge contract, the project try, declared that such uctuce as Was authorized. Congress on March the Brooklyn Bridge 4, 1869, passed an act permitting con- vars," struction, the entire plans were ap- “if properly cared for,” he , Proved June 21 of the same year, and “this bridge ought to be good for c:v- on Nov. 1 the first contract was let, dn fact, it May 2, 1870, was virtually a holiday. 1 believe Great crowds turned out to watch the that the towers are perfectly sound towing of the first caisson to Brook- ipping of a cable lyn. is not such a ne thing that it The original estimate of cost by Mr. cannot be remedi Roebling was $2,000,000. Later this Col. Washington A. Roebling, who was increased to $5,000,000, But by the time the bridge was opened, May 24, 1888, the cost had reached the staggering amount of $15,000,000, President Arthur, Gov. Cleveland, Seth Low, then Mayor of Brooklyn, and Franklin Edson, Mayor of New York, led the ceremanial procession on that date. It was virtually a national holiday. Battleships in the river and Signal Corps men on top of the towers during the day and fireworka at night added color to an already picturesque event. But the people were still timid. They hesitated to trust the bridge despite the stanchness of the two brick towers, This fear was accentuated by tne only great tragedy in the history of the bridge six days later, Decora- tion Day. The bridge was thronged with sightseers, Suddenly there was a jam An old Yiew, from he New? Vork side — e Rapid eco in thie IflIt's Not Overloaded. Tee New York Tow w shows w vere ras e nes slipped at the short flight of stairs near the Manhattan end of the promenade. Rowdies, shoving * promiscuously, drove those coming from Brooklyn against those leaving Manhattan. Some one cried “The bridge ts ing!" and a mad scramble for Park Row began. When the thousands had reached safety the police found twelve dead und scores injured. For months afterward Brooklyn Bridge waa vir- tually deserted July 25, 1899, sixteen years after the Hrooklyn Bridge had been dedi- cated, morning pape peared with headlines and captions “At last it has happened,” Phey referred to the breakage the ufternoon before of u “quepender'’—one of the girdles which hold the cable in position, sane Cars were halted for two days and weave: even after engineers bad proved by = oe =e The Bridge as itis Today Length Width . Centre ‘height vs Wires in each cable rater é meter of cables.......- Height of towers above roadw: Total height of towers. Length of main span. Present total length. Total weight of bridge...... test that there was no danger of the bridge collapsing, ferryboats, the only other means of getting from Brooklyn to New York, were jammed, Gradually, however, New York re- gained its complacency and added loads were piled on the “‘tottering bridge.” Col. Washington A. Roebling, who pushed the bridge to completion after the death of his ploncer father, prior to that time had {asued a long state- ment In which he warned against overloading the bridge. He sald In part, commenting on the buckling of a cable earlier, in 1898: “When the building of the bridge was started neither elevated trains run by locomotives nor electric roads were thought of, * * * In 1880 some of the bridge trustees insisted that I ghould adapt the bridge for the passage of elevated locomotive trains. I yielded with reluctance and against my better judgment “But the crying evil on the bridge is that every year since it has been opened to traffic there hava been numerous additions to the dead load, small in themselves but large in the aggregate. * * * Tho climax of overloading wns reached when the trolleys took possession of the road- ways, * * * I oan readily belleve that the Incident of a horse dying on the track caused a blockade of cars which’ increased the live load from two to three times what It was estimated at originally.” Since Nov. 26, 1898, when Mr. Roebling made this statement, trolley and elevated traffic has been doubled many times, more pedestrians have used the bridge annually, But far more important, and the question which has given Commissioner Whalen and his engineers most pause, has been the addition of automobile traffic, An aitomobile was not dreamed of in those faraway days when the elder Roebling conceived his plan, [t was for this rea- son that recently all automobile traffic was ordered off the Brooklyn Bridge, The roadways are now re~ an etree —E— STATISTICS OF BROOKLYN BRIDGE When originally built the bridge measurements were: Miles of wire in all four cables. . : Estimated strength of each cable....... Brown Bros, PHoTroe Waleie's/e)6 cia 'eleie o NOGO | ROGR ° 12; 200 tons 159 feet 272 feet ay... turned to thetr original owners horses and mules. But the trolley cars and steel-chame sis clevated trains, which weigh sow eral times what their ancestors tm 1883 weighed, are at!ll being run ove th® bridge, and with the new set vicd-order of the Transit Commission in effect next month there will be probably 20 per cent, more elevated cars running into Park Row tham now, “There ts no need for fear,” age cording to Commiasioner Whale, “The automobiles are off and the bridge will stand indefinitely so long as the load {s not again materially increased, We will have another bridge before many more years, prob= ably a little above the Williamsburg Bridge. In another few years the elevated lines will all be in tubes um- der the East River.” Until the present century beges Brooklyn Bridge was the hub of New York, Everything began or ended at the bridge and all papers had columns headed “Brooklyn a Affairs." And, like every other prominenl place, Brooklyn Bridge was the rem dezvous for suicides, More peo) have jumped into fame or obli from this span than from any other point in the city, Steve Brodie started the rage July 23, 1886, He insisted he jumped into the Bast River, and there were enough born every minute to keep him in quarters and half-dollars for the rest of his life. Since that time there have scores of persons who have jump into the river. Some were recavered with grappling irons, others were quickly fished out and sent to jal? ¢ last time Brooklyn came !nto print was Tuesday, when the entire B, R. T. system was ted up and thousands crossed the foot-\. path to get to thi bom Moet of ) the previous tie-ups nad been due to \ minor accidents, although on April 2 the Manhattan Ralted ol) trate