Tens of thousands of pedestrians and more than 100,000 cars cross the New York landmark that connects Brooklyn and Manhattan every day. The Brooklyn Bridge is 140 years old today – it was designed by a Thuringian.
In a way, it is a women’s success story. It is definitely a story that forever connects New York and Germany. And so it doesn’t take long before the German Consul General David Gill is able to ask two tourists from Münsterland on his official birthday walk across the Brooklyn Bridge: “Do you know how old that bridge is?”
And then the German diplomat Peter and Steffen Farwick from Rheine amazes with the fascinating history of the New York landmark: “The architect of the Brooklyn Bridge was Johann August Roebling, who was born in Mühlhausen in Thuringia,” explains Gill father and son. “And he came to the USA as a relatively young man with a group of people from Mühlhausen and took up building bridges.”
Stretching and stretching – the bridge is a popular destination for joggers.
Architect died before completion
The planner Johann “John” Roebling, who immigrated in 1831, already had his name with one two-story railroad bridge at Niagara Falls – before then connecting Brooklyn to Manhattan.
Roebling allegedly got the idea for this when he got stuck in the ice on a ferry on the East River in winter. However, the German engineer did not live to see it realised: during the surveying work, one of his feet was smashed. Roebling dies of tetanus.
His son Washington takes over. In order to be able to anchor the two bridge pillars deep in the river bed, he experiments with compressed air chambers that have not been tried and tested until then. Like many other bridge workers, he catches divers’ sickness.
From father to son to daughter in law
Washington Roebling can only observe the construction through binoculars from the window of his apartment in Brooklyn. And so his wife Emily takes over, at least according to the popular legend. The reality is a little more sober, says historian and Brooklyn Bridge expert Richard Haw.
“Emily was an amazing woman. And in her own way, she played an important role in the completion of the bridge,” said Haw. “But not like most people think. She wasn’t an engineer. She was more the political force that kept the board of trustees responsible for this building happy with her persuasion.”
Emily Warren Roebling was the first to be allowed to cross the new bridge in a carriage in May 1883, 14 years after construction began: a long suspension bridge the likes of which the world had never seen before and also “the eighth wonder of the world”. was called.
When the US President’s helicopter flies over the Brooklyn Bridge, this is an attractive motif for photographers.
80 meter high pillars
Between her two With granite Neo-Gothic piers rising 80 meters out of the East River, the Brooklyn Bridge spans 486 meters. Four strands of galvanized wire carry the bridge – each 40 centimeters thick.
“This bridge is a great combination of German engineering and American entrepreneurship,” enthuses Consul Gill when he receives an original brick from the construction period from New York’s Traffic Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez.
Pedestrians can enjoy spectacular views of the Manhattan skyline from the Brooklyn Bridge.
30,000 pedestrians daily, 116,000 vehicles
This bridge not only symbolizes the transatlantic relationship, he says, but also how many immigrants from all over the world are immortalized in the cityscape of New York. The Brooklyn Bridge will always remain a jewel in the crown of the metropolis, says historian Haw, who has written a book about the Brooklyn Bridge.
She is a unique place. One of the few large bridges in the world with a central pedestrian walkway. “The focus was always on the fact that it can be crossed on foot.” On average, she does this 30,000 times a day. While pedestrians walk between the stalls in the tourist hustle and bustle above, around 116,000 vehicles and 3,000 cyclists rush across New York’s most popular bridge every day on the floor below.
With snow and ice, however, the same applies to New York’s landmark: quite drafty here!
Mass panic shortly after opening
The ideal place for a photo with the skyline in the back, says Elke Denecke from Aschersleben. Son Martin Denecke thinks she is impressive, and not just because of her beauty. But because of their fascinating construction. “The bridge was built at a time when people were still traveling here in carriages and on foot. And now I don’t know how many thousands of cars and trucks drive over here every day. And the bridge holds.”
New Yorkers didn’t always have this confidence in America’s first suspension bridge, whose piers were higher than any church spire in the city. Mass panic broke out shortly after it opened. There were dead and injured.
The southern tip of Manhattan may change again and again over the decades – the Brooklyn Bridge has shaped the image of the city for 140 years.
elephants for trust
The city politicians were looking for a way to instill confidence in New Yorkers, Consul General Gill knows: “And they thought about it: What is difficult in the city? Elephants. And so it happened that about a year after the opening of the bridge, a Ringmaster from New York led his 21 elephants and 17 camels across the bridge. And New Yorkers and Brooklynans from that day on believed the bridge would hold.”
The Brooklyn Bridge is to be expanded and renovated in the near future. And New York’s Commissioner for International Relations, Edward Mermelstein, hopes “that Germany will have something to do with it again.”
The Brooklyn Bridge is to be expanded and renovated in the near future.