The Great Bridge: The Epic Story of the Building of the Brooklyn Bridge

by David McCullough

  Schools were officially open in New York that day, but it would have been difficult to find a classroom that was not empty. And although the Stock Exchange too was open, the half-dozen brokers still on duty there had little to do but watch the visitors in the galleries. Elsewhere any business not closed by noon had been left in the charge of a few lonely clerks.

  At the Custom House, Chester A. Arthur’s old domain, things were extremely quiet. The Post Office was open, but it too was as still as Sunday. Federal courts were closed and the only people inside the County Courthouse on Chambers Street were twelve jurors who had been locked up all night trying to agree on a verdict. At noon, gongs clanged on the floors of the Produce, the Cotton, the Maritime, the Mercantile, and the Coffee exchanges and all business promptly ceased. In less than an hour these buildings were empty, their doors locked. About the only place in town where business continued as usual was Castle Garden. It was remarked that only a storm on the North Atlantic ever stemmed the tide of immigration.

  Why there was quite so much excitement in New York, some observers were at a loss to explain. For Brooklyn people the bridge had a great deal of importance obviously enough, but for these throngs, the Times noted, “there could have been no special cause of congratulation, since not one in one thousand of them will be likely to have occasion to use the new structure except for curiosity.”

  No one will ever know when or how the story started. But possibly it was that morning, while the city waited for Chester A. Arthur to emerge from the Fifth Avenue Hotel, that one or more of those numberless countrymen in the crowd “purchased” the Brooklyn Bridge from some new-found city friend and thereby made an everlasting contribution to American folklore. Or perhaps it was one of the dark-eyed, mustachioed men being processed at Castle Garden, some brand-new aspiring American with his belongings tied up in string, who at the end of his very first walk in the New World that bright morning arrived somewhere in the neighborhood of the bridge in time to be taken. Or maybe the story simply started in the imagination of some contemplative onlooker who, after studying the people pressing by, concluded the large part of them would believe anything, buy anything, even the Brooklyn Bridge itself.

  The sun was barely up in Brooklyn before the streets were swarming with people. Virtually every single house and building downtown had a flag flying from its rooftop or hung from a window. Or if not a flag then a string of Chinese lanterns. Along Fulton Street and on the Heights most buildings were covered with streamers and bunting. There were flags in all 120 windows of City Hall. The dome of the courthouse was “gorgeous in its dress of flying colors.” In City Hall Square the decoration that attracted the most attention was one in front of the Park Theater showing a straggling village of Brooklyn in 1746, the primitive ferry of 1814, then the completed bridge of 1883, and after that a view of the East River as it would look in 1983 with a hundred bridges spanning it. Joralemon Street on the Heights, Remsen, Montague, and Pierrepont, the streets running toward the river, were banked with flags and bunting. And in the little parks at the ends of these streets, at Columbia Heights, the trees were filled with Chinese lanterns and most of the biggest houses had lanterns strung all the way from basement to roof.

  Every store window along Fulton, from the ferry to City Hall, on both sides of the street, and every doorway were decorated. A jeweler had made a miniature bridge with gold chain for the cables. A florist had made a bridge eight feet long, complete with bridge trains and boats passing below, all of flowers. Store windows carried framed portraits of the Chief Engineer and his father, Henry Cruse Murphy, Mayor Low, and General Slocum. And a sign in one window recalled something said a long time before: “Babylon had her hanging garden, Egypt her pyramid, Athens her Acropolis, Rome her Athenaeum; so Brooklyn has her Bridge.”

  On the Heights the two most elaborately decorated private homes were those of Seth Low and Washington Roebling, the two places where the President was to be a guest. Clusters of silk flags were in the mayor’s windows and over his spacious doorway hung the flag of Brooklyn. Down the street, toward the bridge, the entire front of the Chief Engineer’s house was covered with flags, shields, flowers, and the coat of arms of New York and Brooklyn. Over the street, suspended high enough for carriages to pass beneath, was one immense American flag.

  The river in the distance below was probably the most arresting spectacle of all. The water was actually a bright blue and it looked that morning as though every variety of ship afloat had gathered in a great, elongated flotilla that extended from the bay to somewhere upstream beyond the bridge. Flags were flying from the masts of ships tied up at the wharves below and along the opposite shore. “It was as if the forest of masts had blossomed beneath the influence of the young spring sunshine into a thousand gorgeous dyes. Everywhere the eye glanced there floated from, and almost concealed the network of rigging, flags and banners and signals and streamers…. All the vessels anchored in the stream were likewise a mass of fluttering color above their dark hulls.”

  Sometime before noon the Atlantic Squadron came steaming up from the bay and into the river below the bridge, with the flagship, the Tennessee, anchoring about on a line with the Wall Street ferry. The others were strung out behind in a line reaching nearly as far as Governors Island and they too were covered with bunting and their crews of bluejackets could be seen quite plainly from the Brooklyn shore. One man later described how the gold trimmings on the officers’ uniforms flashed in the sun.

  The ferries kept churning back and forth to New York the whole morning and were packed with people. On the Fulton Ferry it was just about impossible to move an arm or leg. Hundreds of people, it seems, had decided that the best possible way to witness the day’s events was to stick right on board and keep riding back and forth.

  About noon there was a great surge toward Sands Street. Within half an hour at least ten thousand people had crammed into the narrow streets near the Brooklyn terminal, and a force of several hundred police, formed in a hollow square in front of the building, had all it could do to hold back the crowd. As in New York, vendors were everywhere, only here there seemed more of them, and along with pictures and commemorative medals, they were selling sheet music about the bridge and a variety of little facsimiles done in metal, wax, or confection. “On the whole it was a good-natured crowd,” wrote one observer.

  Brooklyn’s part of the actual ceremonies got under way from City Hall at forty minutes past noon. The Twenty-third Regiment band in bright-red coats, followed by the Twenty-third Regiment in white helmets and blue coats, followed by a detachment of Fifth Artillery from Fort Hamilton and Marines from the Navy Yard, who in turn were followed by two hundred and some city officials, bridge trustees, and special guests, all in a body, led by the young mayor in a tall silk hat and followed by Mrs. Washington Roebling and her party in carriages, headed off down Remsen Street in the direction of the river, crossed Clinton, turned right at the next corner, onto Henry, and marched to the bridge. Their entire route was lined with crowds four and five deep. There were people looking down from rooftops and packed onto door stoops as mounted officers went clattering by and as one by one a great many familiar Brooklyn faces passed in review—ex-Comptroller Ludwig Semler…Judge McCue…Alfred Barnes…James Stranahan…William Kingsley…At Sands Street, where the police had cleared a path for them, all but a few of the civilians went directly into the station building, while the Twenty-third Regiment, Seth Low, William Kingsley, and a dozen others, at the command of “Route Step,” marched out onto the bridge.

  When the Erie Canal was opened in the autumn of 1825, there were four former Presidents of the United States present in New York City for the occasion—John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and James Monroe—as well as John Quincy Adams, then occupying the White House, and General Andrew Jackson, who would take his place. When the Brooklyn Bridge was opened on May 24, 1883, the main attraction was Chester A. Arthur.

  Grover Cleveland, the portly new governor, was als
o there, and he, of course, would be the next President, but nobody knew that then and few even speculated on the prospect. In fact, if there was excitement about Cleveland’s presence that May morning, it was mostly because people were anxious to see what the man looked like. The only other noteworthy figure to look for was Abram Hewitt, who was never exactly a crowd-pleaser.

  But the strapping Arthur was considered a New Yorker and he looked like a President if any man ever did. When he stepped into the sunshine from the main entrance of the Fifth Avenue Hotel at twelve forty, the response from the crowd was overwhelming. On his arm was Mayor Edson, an erect, gray, scholarly-looking man in gold-rimmed spectacles. A few steps behind were Grover Cleveland and Henry Slocum, all smiles and arm in arm now.

  Arthur was dressed in black frock coat, white tie, and a flat-brimmed black beaver hat that he kept taking off in response to the ovation. “The women in the crowd raised their hands above the heads of the men and waved their handkerchiefs,” wrote one of the dozens of reporters covering the event, “and from the swarming windows on either hand similar feminine signals of hearty welcome met the Chief Magistrate’s eye as he stepped into his open carriage.” Cleveland went unrecognized for several minutes, but then he stood up in his carriage and lifted his hat, and the people, having concluded who he was, responded wholeheartedly.

  The procession moved off, the “Dandy” Seventh Regiment and its band and a mounted police escort leading the way. Twenty-five carriages went rolling down Fifth to 14th Street, then east on 14th as far as Union Square, where they turned south again, down Broadway to City Hall. The greatest crowds anyone could remember seeing in New York lined the sidewalks and Chester A. Arthur, it would appear, was beloved by one and all. If he was not exactly a Jefferson or a Jackson nobody seemed to mind in the least.

  It was one thirty when the procession wheeled into City Hall Park, where the press of people was almost beyond control. In another ten minutes Arthur and Cleveland had stepped down from their carriages and participated in a review of sorts. Then everyone formed up behind the Seventh Regiment, and with the band playing for all it was worth, everybody set off for the bridge on foot.

  The historic ceremonial march to Brooklyn was made on the elevated promenade, but the roadways to either side of the promenade had already been opened to ticket holders and so thousands upon thousands of people lined the way. The band and soldiers went first, in route step as specified. Bayonets glinted in the sunshine and the music, whatever it was, had a decided effect on the dark-suited civilians. “It was a cheerful, jingling air which seemed to put life into the feet,” wrote a spectator.

  Up on the New York tower a lone photographer was busily at work under a black hood.

  Arthur, it was said, “trod the pathway with an elastic step” and “looked with evident admiration at the structure opening up to view.” (The next day a Broadway shoe merchant took space in the papers to announce that his “easy walking” shoes, made on patented lasts, had been “tested” at the opening of the bridge by President Arthur.) Cleveland was described as having a “wobbling gait,” like a London alderman.

  Just before the New York tower the Seventh Regiment halted, formed into two lines at the right of the promenade, and presented arms as the President passed by. William Kingsley, who had been waiting with a delegation of trustees in the shadow of the arches, removed his hat and stepped forward to grasp the President’s hand. There was then a lively exchange of greetings and introductions, while the band played “Hail to the Chief” four times.

  Guns were booming at Fort Hamilton and the Navy Yard as they all started out onto the main span. For Mayor Low and his Brooklyn reception committee, waiting beneath the opposite tower, only the heads of the lead men in the band could be seen as the procession approached—because of the gentle upward bow of the bridge. But as they came on, the heads gained shoulders and brass instruments. The oncoming figures not only grew larger as the distance narrowed, but more of each figure came steadily into view. They seemed to be coming up out of the planking of the promenade, the way approaching ships rise out of the horizon. Soon they had legs and feet and were on the downhill side of the span. Behind them, meanwhile, the solitary photographer on the New York tower had wheeled about 180 degrees and was back at work under his hood again. The band was playing full blast and the crowds on the carriageways to either side were cheering and waving as Arthur, “an Apollo in form,” trod by overhead. “The President ran his eye around the horizon with the air of one appreciating the happy combination of the works of God and man. He filled his lungs with the refreshing breeze…”

  Just before the Brooklyn tower the soldiers again parted ranks for the others to pass through. Seth Low made the official greeting for the City of Brooklyn, the Marines presented arms, a signal flag was dropped nearby and instantly there was a crash of a gun from the Tennessee. Then the whole fleet commenced firing. Steam whistles on every tug, steamboat, ferry, every factory along the river, began to scream. More cannon boomed. Bells rang, people were cheering wildly on every side. The band played “Hail to the Chief” maybe six or seven more times, and as the New York Sun reported, “the climax of fourteen years’ suspense seemed to have been reached, since the President of the United States of America had walked dry shod to Brooklyn from New York.”

  Under the arched roof of the great iron terminal some six thousand people were waiting. Enormous American flags hanging overhead were the only decorations but shafts of sunshine slanted through the long banks of windows and fell on the crowd like floodlights. The President and the Governor were to sit on a raised platform along the west side of the building, while directly opposite was a section for the trustees, city officials, clergy, and speakers of the day. Everyone else was packed onto a temporary wooden floor between these sections.

  At the sight of Arthur “the great multitude in the station arose and gave vent to the wildest enthusiasm.” Handkerchiefs, parasols, and hats were waved in the air. The shouting even drowned out the band.

  Presently James S. T. Stranahan began rapping for order with his cane and Bishop A. N. Littlejohn of Long Island stood up to offer a prayer.

  All afternoon, as the speeches dragged on, thousands of men, women, and children went walking back and forth across the bridge, stopping now and then to exchange greetings with friends on neighboring housetops or to gaze down the smokestacks of the excursion steamers that floated slowly under the bridge with the outgoing tide. People were saying the ferries looked like water bugs from such a height. They waved to the crowds on the ferries and the crowds on the ferries waved back. Everybody seemed on a holiday. They joined arms. Some sang. Rooftops all along the river had been converted into “summer gardens,” in the expression of the day, where thousands more spent the afternoon drinking beer, singing, and enjoying the glorious sunshine.

  What was it all about? What was everyone celebrating? The speakers of the day had a number of ideas. The bridge was a “wonder of Science,” an “astounding exhibition of the power of man to change the face of nature.” It was a monument to “enterprise, skill, faith, endurance.” It was also a monument to “public spirit,” “the moral qualities of the human soul,” and a great, everlasting symbol of “Peace.” The words used most often were “Science,” “Commerce,” and “Courage,” and some of the ideas expressed had the familiar ring of a Fourth of July oration. Still, everything considered, the speeches were quite appropriate on the whole and revealed much about the way people felt about the day and the bridge. The only real problem was that most of the audience never heard a word that was said, the big open-ended terminal being about the worst imaginable place to hold such a ceremony. There was no way to close off the din from outside and even under the best of circumstances the acoustics would have been miserable. For anybody sitting more than fifty feet from the speakers’ stand, which meant nearly everyone, it was more like watching men go through the motions of making a speech.

  Kingsley, the first speaker, got up very slowl
y, his long, rigid figure seeming to unfold like a telescope, as someone remarked. He looked deadly serious the whole time and kept his head down as he read his speech. But the audience had its attention fixed on the ceiling to his right, where a flagstaff had come loose at one end and was swinging to and fro, its shiny brass spear aimed straight down. The people directly below were packed in so tightly that nobody could move out of the way and it was impossible to reach the spear. So there it stayed swinging ever so gently and silently as one by one the speakers went through their pantomime orations.

  Mayor Low was next after Kingsley and as he stepped to the rostrum one well-dressed woman sitting nearby was heard to exclaim, “Why he is no more than a boy!” The Eagle said later he was more like the valedictorian of the day and complimented him on his excellent voice, which apparently some people could actually hear. True or not, President Arthur was seen to yawn behind his fan, then whisper something to Secretary of State Frelinghuysen, which made them both laugh, and farther down the line, Secretary of the Treasury Folger appeared to be taking a nap.

  Mayor Low was not very long about what he had to say and Mayor Edson, who held his speech in kid gloves, took even less time, which may have accounted for the enormous cheer when he sat down. At that point Stranahan was about to introduce Hewitt, the main speaker, apparently having forgotten that Jules Levy, a cornet player, was supposed to be next on the program. But the smiling Levy stepped forward all the same and as the Times reported “put the great multitude in a good humor” by playing “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Secretary Folger was seen to wake up and on the last note the crowd cheered so mightily that Levy did “Hail Columbia” as an encore. Again there was an ovation, but when Levy looked as though he was going to play still one more time, Stranahan seized him by the arm and led him off the platform. The audience was greatly disappointed by this and Levy looked furious. When Stranahan started to introduce Hewitt, Levy, from off stage, began playing “Yankee-Doodle.” There was a roar of laughter and Chester A. Arthur appeared to be more pleased by this part of the program than any other. Levy took his time on the last notes, while Stranahan, a man with no music in his soul, according to one account, just stood glumly waiting.