The Brooklyn Bridge turns 130 years old on May 24. That’s the date the bridge opened to massive crowds and fanfare in 1883.
The story of its amazing construction has been told many times. Yet one small moment during those 13 years deserves a shout-out: the day the bridge was crossed for the first time.
It wasn’t on foot but by rope. The man who took the plunge was E.F. Farrington, the bridge’s “master mechanic.”
In summer 1876, in preparation for building the steel-wire cables, a wire traveler rope was carefully looped around the anchorages built on each side of the river.
On August 25, after the rope had been secured in place, Farrington gave his workers a demo of how they would be getting from one side to the other, reports The Complete History of the New York and Brooklyn Bridge, published in 1883.
“A boatswain’s chair—a board slung at the four corners by ropes uniting in a ring overhead—was attached to the traveler at the Brooklyn anchorage, and Mr. Farrington took his place in it at 1 o’clock p.m. on that day, and was drawn across to New York, his chair being lifted over the towers; the time from anchorage to anchorage, 22 minutes.”
A New York Times article from May 24, 1883 notes that thousands watched Farrington zip-line his way across from Brooklyn to New York:
“The firing of cannon, the blowing of whistles by the river craft, and the shouts of the spectators went up in a vast greeting to the man who sat in the boatswain’s buggy, waving his hat in one hand and clinging to the ropes with the other.”
Tags: Brooklyn Bridge construction, Brooklyn Bridge old photos, Building the Brooklyn Bridge, E.F. Farrington, Opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, Stories of the brooklyn bridge, the East River Bridge
Ephemeral New York 
May 23, 2013 at 1:14 pm |
Oh dear I had a big party at my apartment on Brooklyn for the 100 anniversary time zooms. There were fab fireworks that night I remember it will.
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May 25, 2013 at 3:49 am |
Not a zip line, which is simply a pulley hung on the cable, and would have made for a much faster ride! He was attached to a moving cable, like a cablecar, if you will.
June 3, 2013 at 5:06 am |
Reblogged this on JANINEVEAZUE.
May 17, 2021 at 4:00 am |
[…] 1870 and completed 13 years later (at a cost of $15 million and with more than 20 worker deaths), the Brooklyn Bridge is marking its 138th birthday this […]