Kitabı oku: «Opening Ceremonies of the New York and Brooklyn Bridge, May 24, 1883», sayfa 3

Address of Hon. Abram S. Hewitt

Two hundred and seventy years ago the good ship "Tiger," commanded by Captain Adraien Block, was burned to the water's edge, as she lay at anchor, just off the southern end of Manhattan Island. Her crew, thus forced into winter quarters, were the first white men who built and occupied a house on the land where New York now stands; "then," to quote the graphic language of Mrs. Lamb, in her history of the City, "in primeval solitude, waiting till commerce should come and claim its own. Nature wore a hardy countenance, as wild and as untamed as the savage landholders. Manhattan's twenty-two thousand acres of rock, lake and rolling table land, rising at places to a height of one hundred and thirty-eight feet, were covered with sombre forests, grassy knolls and dismal swamps. The trees were lofty; and old, decayed and withered limbs contrasted with the younger growth of branches; and wild flowers wasted their sweetness among the dead leaves and uncut herbage at their roots. The wanton grapevine swung carelessly from the topmost boughs of the oak and the sycamore; and blackberry and raspberry bushes, like a picket guard, presented a bold front in all possible avenues of approach. The entire surface of the island was bold and granitic, and in profile resembled the cartilaginous back of the sturgeon."

This primeval scene was the product of natural forces working through uncounted periods of time; the continent slowly rising and falling in the sea like the heaving breast of a world asleep; glaciers carving patiently through ages the deep estuaries; seasons innumerable clothing the hills with alternate bloom and decay.

The same sun shines to-day upon the same earth; yet how transformed! Could there be a more astounding exhibition of the power of man to change the face of nature than the panoramic view which presents itself to the spectator standing upon the crowning arch of the Bridge, whose completion we are here to-day to celebrate in the honored presence of the President of the United States, with their fifty millions; of the Governor of the State of New York, with its five millions; and of the Mayors of the two cities, aggregating over two millions of inhabitants? In the place of stillness and solitude, the footsteps of these millions of human beings; instead of the smooth waters "unvexed by any keel," highways of commerce ablaze with the flags of all the nations; and where once was the green monotony of forested hills, the piled and towering splendors of a vast metropolis, the countless homes of industry, the echoing marts of trade, the gorgeous palaces of luxury, the silent and steadfast spires of worship!

To crown all, the work of separation wrought so surely, yet so slowly, by the hand of Time, is now reversed in our own day, and "Manahatta" and "Seawanhaka" are joined again, as once they were before the dawn of life in the far azoic ages.

 
"It is done!
Clang of bell and roar of gun
Send the tidings up and down.
How the belfries rock and reel!
How the great guns, peal on peal,
Fling the joy from town to town!"
 

"What hath God wrought!" were the words of wonder, which ushered into being the magnetic telegraph, the greatest marvel of the many marvelous inventions of the present century. It was the natural impulse of the pious maiden who chose this first message of reverence and awe, to look to the Divine Power as the author of a new gospel. For it was the invisible, and not the visible agency, which addressed itself to her perceptions. Neither the bare poles, nor the slender wire, nor the silent battery, could suggest an adequate explanation of the extinction of time and space which was manifest to her senses, and she could only say, "What hath God wrought!"

But when we turn from the unsightly telegraph to the graceful structure at whose portal we stand, and when the airy outline of its curves of beauty, pendant between massive towers suggestive of art alone, is contrasted with the over-reaching vault of heaven above and the ever-moving flood of waters beneath, the work of omnipotent power, we are irresistibly moved to exclaim, "What hath man wrought!"

Man hath, indeed, wrought far more than strikes the eye in this daring undertaking, by the general judgment of engineers, without a rival among the wonders of human skill. It is not the work of any one man or of any one age. It is the result of the study, of the experience, and of the knowledge of many men in many ages. It is not merely a creation – it is a growth. It stands before us to-day as the sum and epitome of human knowledge; as the very heir of the ages; as the latest glory of centuries of patient observation, profound study and accumulated skill, gained, step by step, in the never-ending struggle of man to subdue the forces of nature to his control and use.

In no previous period of the world's history could this Bridge have been built. Within the last hundred years the greater part of the knowledge necessary for its erection has been gained. Chemistry was not born until 1776, the year when political economy was ushered into the world by Adam Smith, and the Declaration of Independence was proclaimed by the Continental Congress, to be maintained at the point of the sword by George Washington. In the same year Watt produced his successful steam engine, and a century has not elapsed since the first specimen of his skill was erected on this continent. The law of gravitation was indeed known a hundred years ago, but the intricate laws of force, which now control the domain of industry, had not been developed by the study of physical science, and their practical applications have only been effectually accomplished within our own day, and, indeed, some of the most important of them during the building of the Bridge. For use in the caissons, the perfecting of the electric light came too late, though, happily, in season for the illumination of the finished work.

This construction has not only employed every abstract conclusion and formula of mathematics, whether derived from the study of the earth or the heavens, but the whole structure may be said to rest upon a mathematical foundation. The great discoveries of chemistry, showing the composition of water, the nature of gases, the properties of metals; the laws and processes of physics, from the strains and pressures of mighty masses to the delicate vibrations of molecules, are all recorded here. Every department of human industry is represented, from the quarrying and the cutting of the stones, the mining and smelting of the ores, the conversion of iron into steel by the pneumatic process, to the final shaping of the masses of metal into useful forms, and its reduction into wire, so as to develop in the highest degree the tensile strength which fits it for the work of suspension. Every tool which the ingenuity of man has invented has somewhere, in some special detail, contributed its share in the accomplishment of the final result.

 
"Ah! what a wondrous thing it is
To note how many wheels of toil
One word, one thought can set in motion."
 

But without the most recent discoveries of science, which have enabled steel to be substituted for iron – applications made since the original plans of the Bridge were devised – we should have had a structure fit, indeed, for use, but of such moderate capacity that we could not have justified the claim which we are now able to make, that the cities of New York and Brooklyn have constructed, and to-day rejoice in the possession of, the crowning glory of an age memorable for great industrial achievements.

This is not the proper occasion for describing the details of this undertaking. This grateful task will be performed by the engineer in the final report, with which every great work is properly committed to the judgment of posterity. But there are some lessons to be drawn from the line of thought I have followed which may encourage and comfort us as to the destiny of man and the outcome of human progress.

What message, then, of hope and cheer does this achievement convey to those who would fain believe that love travels hand in hand with light along the rugged pathway of time? Have the discoveries of science, the triumphs of art and the progress of civilization, which have made its accomplishment a possibility and a reality, promoted the welfare of mankind, and raised the great mass of the people to a higher plane of life?

This question can best be answered by comparing the compensation of the labor employed in the building of this Bridge with the earnings of labor upon works of equal magnitude in ages gone by. The money expended for the work of construction proper on the Bridge, exclusive of land damages and other outlays, such as interest, not entering into actual cost, is nine million ($9,000,000) dollars. This money has been distributed in numberless channels – for quarrying, for mining, for smelting, for fabricating the metals, for shaping the materials, and erecting the work, employing every kind and form of human labor. The wages paid at the Bridge itself may be taken as the fair standard of the wages paid for the work done elsewhere. These wages are:

Taking all these kinds of labor into account, the wages paid for work on the Bridge will thus average $2.50 per day.

Now, if this work had been done at the time when the Pyramids were built, with the skill, appliances and tools then in use, and if the money available for its execution had been limited to nine million ($9,000,000) dollars, the laborers employed would have received an average of not more than two cents per day, in money of the same purchasing power as the coin of the present era. In other words, the effect of the discoveries of new methods, tools and laws of force, has been to raise the wages of labor more than an hundred fold, in the interval which has elapsed since the Pyramids were built. I shall not weaken the suggestive force of this statement by any comments upon its astounding evidence of progress, beyond the obvious corollary that such a state of civilization as gave birth to the Pyramids would now be the signal for universal bloodshed, revolution and anarchy. I do not underestimate the hardships borne by the labor of our time. They are, indeed, grievous, and to lighten them is, as it should be, the chief concern of statesmanship. But this comparison proves that through forty centuries these hardships have been steadily diminished; that all the achievements of science, all the discoveries of art, all the inventions of genius, all the progress of civilization, tend by a higher and immutable law to the steady and certain amelioration of the condition of society. It shows that, notwithstanding the apparent growth of great fortunes, due to an era of unparalleled development, the distribution of the fruits of labor is approaching from age to age to more equitable conditions, and must, at last, reach the plane of absolute justice between man and man.

But this is not the only lesson to be drawn from such a comparison. The Pyramids were built by the sacrifices of the living for the dead. They served no useful purpose, except to make odious to future generations the tyranny which degrades humanity to the level of the brute. In this age of the world such a waste of effort would not be tolerated. To-day the expenditures of communities are directed to useful purposes. Except upon works designed for defence in time of war, the wealth of society is now mainly expended in opening channels of communication for the free play of commerce, and the communion of the human race. An analysis of the distribution of the surplus earnings of man after providing food, shelter and raiment, shows that they are chiefly absorbed by railways, canals, ships, bridges and telegraphs. In ancient times these objects of expenditure were scarcely known. Our Bridge is one of the most conspicuous examples of this change in the social condition of the world, and of the feeling of men. In the Middle Ages cities walled each other out, and the fetters of prejudice and tyranny held the energies of man in hopeless bondage. To-day men and nations seek free intercourse with each other, and much of the force of the intellect and energy of the world is expended in breaking down the barriers established by nature, or created by man, to the solidarity of the human race.

And yet, in view of this tendency, the most striking and characteristic feature of the nineteenth century, there still are those who believe and teach that obstruction is the creator of wealth; that the peoples can be made great and free by the erection of artificial barriers to the beneficent action of commerce, and the unrestricted intercourse of men and nations with each other. If they are right, then this Bridge is a colossal blunder, and the doctrine which bids us to love our neighbors as ourselves is founded upon a misconception of the divine purpose.

But the Bridge is more than an embodiment of the scientific knowledge of physical laws, or a symbol of social tendencies. It is equally a monument to the moral qualities of the human soul. It could never have been built by mere knowledge and scientific skill alone. It required, in addition, the infinite patience and unwearied courage by which great results are achieved. It demanded the endurance of heat, and cold, and physical distress. Its constructors have had to face death in its most repulsive form. Death, indeed, was the fate of its great projector, and dread disease the heritage of the greater engineer who has brought it to completion. The faith of the saint and the courage of the hero have been combined in the conception, the design and the execution of this work.

Let us, then, record the names of the engineers and foremen who have thus made humanity itself their debtor for a successful achievement, not the result of accident or of chance, but the fruit of design, and of the consecration of all personal interest to the public weal. They are: John A. Roebling, who conceived the project and formulated the plan of the Bridge; Washington A. Roebling, who, inheriting his father's genius, and more than his father's knowledge and skill, has directed the execution of this great work from its inception to its completion; aided in the several departments by Charles C. Martin, Francis Collingwood, William H. Paine, George W. McNulty, Wilhelm Hildenbrand and Samuel R. Probasco as assistant engineers; and as foremen by E.F. Farrington, Arthur V. Abbott, William Van der Bosch, Charles Young and Harry Tupple, who, in apparently subordinate positions, have shown themselves peculiarly fitted to command, because they have known how to serve. But the record would not be complete without reference to the unnamed men by whose unflinching courage, in the depths of the caissons, and upon the suspended wires, the work was carried on amid storms, and accidents, and dangers, sufficient to appall the stoutest heart. To them we can only render the tribute which history accords to those who fight as privates in the battles of freedom, with all the more devotion and patriotism because their names will never be known by the world whose benefactors they are. One name, however, which may find no place in the official records, cannot be passed over here in silence. In ancient times when great works were constructed, a goddess was chosen, to whose tender care they were dedicated. Thus the ruins of the Acropolis to-day recall the name of Pallas Athene to an admiring world. In the Middle Ages, the blessing of some saint was invoked to protect from the rude attacks of the barbarians, and the destructive hand of time, the building erected by man's devotion to the worship of God. So, with this Bridge will ever be coupled the thought of one, through the subtle alembic of whose brain, and by whose facile fingers, communication was maintained between the directing power of its construction, and the obedient agencies of its execution. It is thus an everlasting monument to the self-sacrificing devotion of woman, and of her capacity for that higher education from which she has been too long debarred. The name of Mrs. Emily Warren Roebling will thus be inseparably associated with all that is admirable in human nature, and with all that is wonderful in the constructive world of art.

This tribute to the engineers, however, would not be deserved, if there is to be found any evidence of deception on their part in the origin of the work, or any complicity with fraud in its execution and completion. It is this consideration which induced me to accept the unexpected invitation of the trustees to speak for the city of New York on the present occasion. When they thus honored me, they did not know that John A. Roebling addressed to me the letter in which he first suggested (and, so far as I am aware, he was the first engineer to suggest), the feasibility of a bridge between the two cities, so constructed as to preserve unimpaired the freedom of navigation. This letter, dated June 19, 1857, I caused to be printed in the New York Journal of Commerce, where it attracted great attention because it came from an engineer who had already demonstrated, by successfully building suspension bridges over the Schuylkill, the Ohio and the Niagara rivers, that he spoke with the voice of experience and authority. This letter was the first step towards the construction of the work, which, however, came about in a manner different from his expectations, and was finally completed on a plan more extensive than he had ventured to describe. It has been charged that the original estimates of cost have been far exceeded by the actual outlay. If this were true, the words of praise which I have uttered for the engineers, who designed and executed this work, ought rather to have been a sentence of censure and condemnation. Hence, the invitation which came to me unsought, seemed rather to be an appeal from the grave for such vindication as it was within my power to make, and which could not come with equal force from any other quarter.

Engineers are of two kinds: the creative and the constructive. The power to conceive great works demands imagination and faith. The creative engineer, like the poet, is born, not made. If to the power to conceive, is added the ability to execute, then have we one of those rare geniuses who not only give a decided impulse to civilization, but add new glory to humanity. Such men were Michael Angelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Watt, Wedgwood, Brunel, Stephenson and Bessemer; and such a man was John A. Roebling. It was his striking peculiarity, that while his conceptions were bold and original, his execution was always exact, and within the limits of cost which he assigned to the work of his brain. He had made bridges a study, and had declared in favor of the suspension principle for heavy traffic, when the greatest living authorities had condemned it as costly and unsafe. When he undertook to build a suspension bridge for railway use, he did so in the face of the deliberate judgment of the profession, that success would be impossible. Stephenson had condemned the suspension principle and approved the tubular girder for railway traffic. But it was the Nemesis of his fate, that when he came out to approve the location of the great tubular bridge at Montreal, he should pass over the Niagara River in a railway train, on a suspension bridge, which he had declared to be an impracticable undertaking.

When Roebling suggested the Bridge over the East River, his ideas were limited to the demands of the time, and controlled by the necessity for a profitable investment. He had no expectation that the two cities would embark in the enterprise. Indeed, in one of his letters so late as April 14, 1860, he says, "As to the corporations of New York and Brooklyn undertaking the job, no such hope may be entertained in our time." In eight years thereafter, these cities had undertaken the task upon a scale of expense far exceeding his original ideas of a structure, to be built exclusively by private capital for the sake of profit.

How came this miracle to pass? The war of the rebellion occurred, delaying for a time the further consideration of Roebling's ideas. This war accustomed the nation to expenditures on a scale of which it had no previous conception. It did more than expend large sums of money. Officials became corrupt and organized themselves for plunder. In the city of New York, especially, the government fell into the hands of a band of thieves, who engaged in a series of great and beneficial public works, not for the good they might do, but for the opportunity which they would afford to rob the public treasury. They erected court-houses and armories; they opened roads, boulevards and parks; and they organized two of the grandest devices for transportation which the genius of man has ever conceived; a rapid transit railway for New York, and a great highway between New York and Brooklyn. The Bridge was commenced, but the Ring was driven into exile by the force of public indignation, before the rapid transit scheme, since executed on a different route by private capital, was undertaken. The collapse of the Ring brought the work on the Bridge to a stand-still.

It was a timely event. The patriotic New Yorker might well have exclaimed, just before this great deliverance, in the words of the Consul of ancient Rome, in Macaulay's stirring poem,

 
"And if they once may win the bridge,
What hope to save the town?"
 

Meanwhile, the elder Roebling had died, leaving behind him his estimates and the general plans of the structure, to cost, independent of land damages and interest, about $7,000,000. This great work which, if not "conceived in sin," was "brought forth in iniquity," thus became the object of great suspicion, and of a prejudice which has not been removed to this day. I know that to many I make a startling announcement, when I state the incontrovertible fact, that no money was ever stolen by the Ring from the funds of the Bridge; that the whole money raised has been honestly expended; that the estimates for construction have not been materially exceeded; and that the excess of cost over the estimates is due to purchases of land which were never included in the estimates; to interest paid on the city subscriptions; to the cost of additional height and breadth of the Bridge; and the increase in strength rendered necessary by a better comprehension of the volume of traffic between the two cities. The items covered by the original estimate of $7,000,000 have thus been raised to $9,000,000, so that $2,000,000 represents the addition to the original estimates.