Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1904-01-04
GREATEST BRIDGE IN AMERICA.
Such Is the New One Between Brook
Iyn and New York.


Iyn and New York.
One of the greatest deeds ever
wrought in stone and steel is the new
East River bridge formally opened in
December. Beside the interest and ad-
miration excited by the building OF the
first bridge that linked Brooklyn with
Manhattan, this far more imposing eli
max of engineering genius has passed
almost unnoticed, for two reasons.
Weaving these tremendous webs OF
steel over mile and half of river
and shore, and swinging the crowded
traffic of the greatest city of the land
on slender cables around which man
may clasp his arms, are no longer a
novelty.
A fifty million dollar tunnel under
the Hudson river; a thirty-fve million
collar subway driven the length of the
narrow strip of a city packed TO suffO-
cation; fifty million dollars worth of
new railway terminals; one, two, or
three new bridges costing fifteen mil
lions each-these arouse only a furry
of interest in New York. 1t has no
time to turn aside for big things that
would mark epOchs elsewhere.
The new bridge is forty per cent
wider and one-sixth longer than the
older Brooklyn Bridge, and the traffic
capacity is more than twice as great;
or if 100000 can be crushed across the
cid bridge in a day, then nearly two
hn n
swarm across the greater structure.
Yet The. s0st IF tho rev bridge is less
by $3,5OO,00O, and the time of building
less by five years. These facts mark
the march of engineering knowledge
and experience in fifteen years.
The total length of the new bridge is
1920 feet, a mile and third of double
decked steel roadways soaring one hun
dred and thiryt-five feet above tide
water, hung from steel towers three
hundred and thirty-five feet high. Four
trolley tracks, two tracks for elevated
trains, two driveways, two fOOtpaths,
and a cycle path are laid in the one
hundred and eighteen feet of width,
three times as wide as a cross street in
New York. Twenty thousand tons Of
dead weight pull at the granite anchor
ages before a car or passenger crosses,
compared with fifteen thousand tons of
material striving to pull the older
Brooklyn Bridge up by the roots.
Experts say that no possible strain
can break down the bridge, and that
when the old Brooklyn bridge has
crumbled away and nothing is left but
the granite towers, the new bridge will
still be open for business" Skeleton
steel towers are substituted for the
granite monuments at the ends of the
ether bridge, a seeming paradox when
the Pennsylvania railroad is spending
millions to replace steel bridges by
solid stone TO make more permanent
way. Much added strength is in the
four cables, which are eighteen and a
quarter inches in diameter, against fif-
teen and three-quarters for the first
bridge. The difference is slight to
look at, but impressive when seen be-
meath the steel packeting which hides
the most wonderful and delicate
achievement in all bridge construction.
Each of these four cables is made of
1886 separate wires, each wire strung
separately across the East river, while
one hundred and forty men spun the
huge steel rope. This daring band of
wOrkmen bound twenty-six tons of
steel wires into this cable web each
lay, each wire thirty-five hundred feet
long, and only three-sixteenths of an
inch in diameter, scarcely bigger than
neavy picture wire. Five thousand
IONS of steel were thus fashioned into
four cables the thickness of a stout
Zee, and the strength of each little
wire, tested beforehand, became part of
a mighty harmony of effort. all pulling
together, yet the power to bear it's gi-
gantfc burden was no more than the
united endeavOrs of thirty thousand
picture wires" The four cables cost
S1,4O0, 0O0.-COllier's Weekly.