* Span was opposed on environmental, engineering critics
* The bridge’s distinctive dark orange color was an accident
* Last two known surviving bridge builders died in April
By Braden Reddall
SAN FRANCISCO, May 27 (Reuters) – The Golden Gate Bridge was
a larger than life engineering project undertaken against
dangerous odds and it opened 75 years ago on Sunday against
vehement protest, at the cost of 11 lives.
One of the most astonishing and admired man-made wonders of
the world, gracing millions of postcards, featured in countless
films, the bridge was not at first welcomed with open arms.
Ferry operators and environmentalists opposed it, and many
engineers doubted such a daring leap over a treacherous Pacific
Ocean strait could be built. The military worried a collapsed
Golden Gate span could block access to the Bay in war time.
Some San Franciscans even fought against it because they
thought a bridge might ruin the view, according to historians.
Kevin Starr, author of “Golden Gate: The Life and Times of
America’s Greatest Bridge,” said 2,000 related court cases were
filed over nearly a decade.
But Starr said litigation and regulatory scrutiny largely
concluded in the 1920s allowed builders to move quickly once
bank funding was nailed down in 1932, in an early form of
public-private cooperation.
“President Obama talks about shovel-ready projects,” Starr
said in a phone interview. “This was shovel ready.”
The less than two decades between conception and completion
means the Golden Gate compares well with the new quake-proof
second span of the Bay Bridge a few miles away, he said. That
$6.2 billion project is due to be done in 2013, 24 years after a
deadly earthquake literally jolted the authorities into action.
Yet building the Golden Gate, at an estimated cost of $1.2
billion in current dollars, was a Herculean task. While the idea
took hold in the prosperous 1920s, by the time ground was broken
the Depression had left many people desperate for jobs.
“Launched midst a thousand hopes and fears; Damned by a
thousand hostile sneers,” was how the head engineer for the
bridge, Joseph Strauss, described the bridge in a poem he wrote
to mark its completion in 1937. He died less than a year later.
Even the bridge’s arresting dark orange color was an
accident, first used as a primer while designers decided what to
paint it. The Navy had argued for black with yellow stripes, to
ensure it could be seen in a strait hostile to mariners, with
dense fog, heavy winds and strong ocean swells.
In the end, bridge authorities decided they liked the color
– known as International Orange – and stuck with it.
FORM AND FUNCTION
Starr speculated that some early opposition from locals may
have been due to the original styling, which was likened to an
“upside-down rat trap”, before it was altered to the sweeping
suspension bridge design.
“Its elegance is derived from its structural efficiency,”
Paul Giroux, from the American Society of Civil Engineers, said
at a panel discussion hosted by San Francisco’s Commonwealth
Club. “It’s a perfect blend of form and function.”
Construction began in 1933, 14 years after Strauss was first
approached. Bank of America archivist David Mendoza said
it took a personal appeal from Strauss to Amadeo Giannini,
founder of the then-San Francisco-based bank, to secure funding.
“Strauss was worried it might not get built,” Mendoza said
of that fateful meeting, now commemorated on a plaque.
After opening on May 27, 1937, thousands of people walked,
roller-skated and stilt-walked across. Cars came the next day.
Celebrations for the 50th anniversary became infamous for
the frightful swaying of the bridge under the weight of 300,000
people. This time round, the bridge will be closed to cars and
pedestrians during a fireworks show that will cap a day of
festivities along the bay waterfront on Sunday.
Beyond the revelry and Tributes, the bridge’s dark side will
lurk in the background: An estimated 1,400 people have jumped
off the bridge to end their own lives, a grim reality brought to
the attention of many people with a 2006 documentary film, “The
Bridge,” by Eric Steel. The filmmaker secretly captured more
than 20 suicides from the bridge.
“Four seconds drop and you’re done,” Starr said. “A few
people have survived, but not many.”
The Golden Gate Bridge Highway and Transportation District
is now studying the costs and feasibility of draping nets along
it to catch any jumpers, a twist on the nets deployed during
construction, which saved the lives of 22 workers.
Of the 11 men killed from falls during construction, ten
were killed after a net failed under stress from a fallen
scaffold when the bridge was near completion.
Safety was a serious concern during construction, with hard
hats widely used for the first time and workers forced to drink
sauerkraut juice if they arrived at work hung over, Starr said.
Living memory is limited. The San Francisco Chronicle
reported the last two known surviving builders, Jack Balestreri
and Edward Ashoff, died in April, within a week of each other.
