The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1872-03-30
The Bridge at st. Louis

IN the IN Oh priuginS the mississippi River at
It. Louis.
The first stone WIS laid in this structure in
February 1868. ia a Golfer dam, for the west
abutment. Frcpi that time on the work has
been in progress, sometimes with few men.
sometimes WITH many, and at great cost.
There were peculiar difficulties in the work.
1t must start from the rock, and the rock wa,
far beneath the surface. 1t must resist foods
and Ice. 1t must be sufficiently high to leave
navigation unobstructed. 1t must be fifty feet
in the clear above high water mark. The aver.
age depth of water during the building season
is twenty feet. The deepest foundation below
the J0tto,a of the river was for the eastern pier,
that on the Illinois shore, seventy.nine feet!
The whole distance from the rock at tina. point
to the lower roadway OF the bridge was one hun.
bred and seventy.four feet. Above that road
way is the carriage-way, horse railway track,
&c. When the water is twenty feet above low
water mark the current is near six miles an hour.
The width of the stream, at the point to be
brideed is only sixteen hundred feet, not half
the ordinary width of the river almost anywhere
from st. Louis to St. Paul
The necessity of going to the rock below for
foundation Is the peculiar action of the river
here on the sand and mud at tho bottom. In
time OF high water, or when choked up with ice,
the river will sometimes scour out its channel to
depth of eighteen feet. How much deeper at
extraordinary seasons one cannot tell
The following incident illustrates some pecu.
lisrities of the Lower Mississippi. 1t is taken
frem the Report of the Engineer.in.chief of the
Bridge Company:
II is q fact well known to pilots nayigatiu.
the Mississippi twelve years ago that the cargo
ana engine of the steamboat America sunk one
hundred miles below the mouth Of the Ohio, and
was recovered after being submerged twenty
years, during which time an island was formed
over 1t snG farm established upon it. Cotton
wood trees that grew upon the island attained
such size that they were cut up toto cord-wood
and supplied fuel to the passing steamers. Two
food' sufticed to remove every vestiee OF the is
land, leaving the wreck of the America uncov.
cred by sand and forty feet below low water
mark, where, in 1856 the property was recover.
saw this wreck lying near the Arkansas shore,
With her main deck scarcely below low water
mark, d: the time she was lost. When tie wreck
was recovered the main channel If tie Mis,i..
sippi was over it, and the hull OF She yesse! had
been cut down by the action IF the current at
the bottom nearly forty feet below the level at
which it first rested, These remarkable but
we'll sttested facts" says the Chief Engineer
came under my own observation"
In stream SO capriciou- aud so likely to ge.
out OF bed, two piers we're to be placed the
larger one on base OF eigh'y-two feet by sixty,
and its GROWING work 70 rise ever two hundred
feet How could the foundations be laid f.? Who
could go underneath that mighty current to Law.
the solid masonry on immovable rock. to d.fv
flood, fire and tempest, aud ",he envious tooth
OF time = When built, who could pu. span
five hundred and fifteen feet long on those abu,.
ments that should hold itself and the immense
pressure on it?
-Four years and one month the work of build.
ing has been going on One wear ago. March
18th, 1871, st. Louis was iubilant The bells
rung. cannon were fred. The last the fourth,
the east pier, had touched bottom. "was found.
ed on rack" Steam whistles along ner twelve
miles of river front shriekei in with "the inf.
mite fierce chorus This is a mstter of great
moment men sid, 20 "they praised the Lord
with loud noi-e." M the Holy Book requires.
1t was hali-past Jour o'clock p. NJ, March 2Sth.
could have culled bouquet of fresh leaves and
blossoms for the occasion from the gardens here
overlooking the great river, from the peach,
pear, cherry and the lilac tree. No leaf or bios.
som now!
HOW THE WORK WAS DONE.
A caisson with air chambers, on the principle
OF the diving.bell, was constructed. and its roof