The Coolidge examiner., 1937-04-01


- foundly affect his destiny
than does the bridge.
An empire was at stake
when Xerxes threw his pontoons
across the Hellespont, and Rome's
long arm stretched over Europe
when Caesars army bridged the
Rhine. Lack Of pontoons on which
to cross the Seine, Napoleon COM
planned, kept him from ending a
war. Our own Gen. Zachary Taylor
reminded the War department that
it's failure to send bridge materials
had prevented him from destroy
ing the Mexican army"
Yet history, being so largely the
annals of wars, fails to emphasize
the importance of bridges in every
day life. When you reflect how
bridges now make travel easy and
swift between towns, cities, states
even between nations where rivers
form frontiers-you feel that few
other devices conceived by m n
serve more to promote understand
ing and mutual progress.
Ride the air across America and
see how bridges dot the map. II
the day be clear half dozen may
be in sight at once. From culverts
over backwoods creeks to steel
giants that span broad rivers, you
see a bridge of some kind wherever
rails or highways cross a water
course. How many bridges OF all
kinds America has, nobody knows.
No official count exists. United
States army engineers, concerned
only with bridges that span navi-
gable rivers of the United States,
have more than 5000 on their list.
Look down on any river city, such
as Pittsburgh; see the steady two
way traffic that flows over its
bridges, like lines of ants march
ing. Think of the jams, the chaos in
traffic, should all bridges suddenly
fail!
Trace the bridge through history
and you see how its development
is an index to mans social and me-
chanical advance.
The Urge Is to Get Across.
Fallen trees, chance stepping
stones, or swinging vines formed
his first bridges. He used them in
flight from enemies, to hunt, fight,
or steal wife on his own predatory
quest. Fantastic old woodcuts even
show us living chains of monkeys
swinging from tree to tree across
jungle creeks! To get across, even
as when the waters parted and Is
raePs Children walked dry-shod
over the Red sea floor, was the
primary urge.
To this day, as in parts of Tibet,
Africa and Peru, men still cross
dizzy canyons on bridges of twisted
grass and wild vines. Yet the furnc-
ton of these primitive structures is
the same as that of the new Golden
Gate bridge or the new giant at
Sydney, Australia. They carry man
across.
We do not know who built the first
Queen Semiramis, about 800 B. c.,
an arched bridge spanned the
Euphrates at Babylon. The legend
ary Hanging Gardens" some say,
consisted of trees and plants set
along the roadway of this wide
bridge. Explorers at Nebuchadnez-
zar's palace at Babylon found no
traces of any bridge. Yet the use Of
the arch is very old thereabouts;
you see proof of this in the amazing
ruins of Ctesiphon palace, east of
Babylon, where the vaulted ceiling
of the grand banquet hall, still stand
ing, is IS feet high.
Romans left us fine examples of
the ancient arch bridge. To this day
their masonry work is unsurpassed
for strength and beauty; some of
their early stone bridges are still
in use. Only in recent times came
cast iron, steel, and cables. In our
own country it was the advent first
of railways and then Of improved
highways for motor cars and trucks
which was to strew bridges from
coast to coast.
In the pioneers bold trek to our
Middle West and beyond, they ford
ed streams or used crude ferryboatS
drawn by cables. Often the forty
miners swan their horses and oxen,
and floated their heavy wagons by
lashing logs on either side of the
wagon boxes. Covered wagons
bound for the Indian Territory"
camped at fords to rest, wash
clothes, swap horses and shoe them,
and to soak their tires. Today steel
bridges span many such creeks;
across them Whiz motor cars, so fast
that passengers barely tatch even
a glimpse of the streams that once
seemed so wide.
Built for Railroads.
Train riders, asleep or busy with
books and cards, are rushed for 20
miles over the famous Salt Lake
cutoff of the pioneer Union Pacific
railway. The world longest bridge
structure it is called. Stand this
trestle on end and it would reach
so high that men ON the ground