The “Jews’ Highway” crossing the East River

As the second (and some say much less attractive) bridge spanning the East River, the Williamsburg Bridge didn’t score the same adulation as the Brooklyn Bridge did.

Opened in 1903 and until the 1920s the longest suspension bridge in the world, the humble Williamsburg sparked the migration of thousands of Jewish immigrants from the cramped Lower East Side to slightly more spacious Brooklyn.

The bridge scored such heavy traffic from Jewish New Yorkers in the early 1900s, the tabloid-ish New York Tribune called it the “Jews’ Highway.'”

“In its early years, the walkway, which was wide enough for pushcarts, was so crowded with peddlers transporting their wares to and from Manhattan that one newspaper dubbed it the ‘Jews’ Highway,'” writes Victor Lederer in the Brooklyn Historical Society’s Williamsburg.

Watch a fantastic news clip of opening day on the bridge and the top-hatted dignitaries who ceremoniously walked across it first.

[Photo: Jews praying on the Williamsburg Bridge, New Year’s Day, 1909, from the LOC]

Two beautiful bridges of an older New York

Most New Yorkers have never crossed either of these beauties.

Hell Gate Bridge, which has connected Queens and Randalls/Wards Island since 1916, is used by railroads only.

High Bridge, built in 1848 and spanning the Harlem River between Upper Manhattan and the South Bronx, has been closed since 1970.

It’s supposed to reopen to pedestrians in 2014 after a lengthy renovation—fingers crossed!

In the meantime, there are ways to experience them up close though. To really absorb the loveliness of the Hell Gate, head to Astoria Park, particularly the enormous public pool there. The bridge looms large in the background.

High Bridge is a little trickier. Highbridge Park in the Bronx affords wonderful views, and you can get close to the iron bars that blocks access to the bridge’s pedestrian walkway.

The Williamsburg Bridge’s inferiority complex

When the Williamsburg Bridge opened on December 19, 1903, Scientific American (by way of nycroads.com) had this to say about a structure critics conceded wasn’t nearly as breathtaking as its neighbor, the Brooklyn Bridge:

“Considered from the aesthetic standpoint, the (Williamsburg) Bridge is destined always to suffer by comparison with its neighbor, the (Brooklyn) Bridge,” the magazine wrote.

“It is possible that, were it not in existence, we would not hear so many strictures upon the manifest want of beauty in the later and larger (Williamsburg) Bridge, which is destined to be popular more on account of its size and usefulness than its graceful lines.

“As a matter of fact, the (Williamsburg) Bridge is an engineer’s bridge pure and simple. The eye may range from anchorage to anchorage, and from pier to finial of the tower without finding a single detail that suggests controlling motive, either in its design or fashioning other than bald utility.”

The battle over naming the Queensboro Bridge

What’s in a name? Plenty, especially among certain factions of New Yorkers at the turn of the last century.

That’s when the city began building a great bridge that would link Manhattan to Queens. City officials planned to name it the Blackwell’s Island Bridge, after the spit of land (now Roosevelt Island) it would skip over in the East River.

But real estate bigwigs from Manhattan and Queens objected; they felt the name had bad connotations. Blackwell’s Island at the time was infamous for its poorhouse and prison.

The real estate guys were afraid New Yorkers would shy away from the bridge—and their neighborhoods—to avoid the unsavory assocation.

On the other hand, many Irish residents were opposed to the Queensboro name because they felt it sounded too British.

The leader of one Irish group even suggested calling it the Montauk Bridge, thinking it had a more American ring to it.

In the end, Queensboro was selected as the official name before the bridge opened in 1909. And it’s stuck ever since.

An airplane view of two East River bridges

The Hell Gate and Triborough Bridges—spanking-new and gleaming in this technical postcard—connect Astoria to Ward’s and Randall’s Islands. The islands are two separate entities here, but they’ve long since been united into one island via landfill.

It’s a strange view: Manhattan and the Bronx look like pastoral, barely populated villages. Astoria, on the other hand, comes off as an industrial wasteland.

The Triborough Bridge was renamed the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge in 2008. I hope they don’t rename the Hell Gate; it’s too colorful a name to lose.