Smoke Trail Shows Bridge Route (Apr, 1933)
Filed under: Sign of the Times — @ 5:41 am
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Apr, 1933
Buy on Ebay
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Apr, 1933
Buy on Ebay
Smoke Trail Shows Bridge Route
SPECTATORS at the ground breaking ceremonies of the world’s largest suspension bridge which is soon to arise across the famous Golden Gate in San Francisco, were shown very plainly where the bridge would be located. Following the bridge route, a navy plane sped across the water, emitting a streak of smoke, showing just where the bridge would be erected.
The bridge is to cost $35,000,000 and will have one span over a mile long.
That was actually a pretty good idea.
Comment by Rick Auricchio — March 8, 2008 @ 9:10 am
Except that it shows 3 bridge towers, the middle one in midst of a deep channel that has one of the strongest currents in the world. It is assumed that after millions of years of draining the gold country of the Sierra Nevada that the largest gold deposits in California are at the bottom of that trench but it is 300 feet deep (the average depth of the Bay is about 14 feet) and twice a day some 390 Billion gallons of water pass through with the tides so that no one has ever been able to figure out how to get to it.
Comment by Stannous — March 8, 2008 @ 10:05 pm
It looks to me as if the Navy plane just emitted a stream of smoke, and those dotted white lines were conveniently added by the photographer.
Comment by Blurgle — March 8, 2008 @ 10:29 pm
Oh, the lines are definitely added for the print.
Perhaps at the time there was some thought of a third tower, or the publisher just didn’t believe they’d build the world’s longest span. The longest span is actually 4200 feet, far short of the mile cited in the article. A center tower would certainly cut the span in half, so the drawing is definitely wrong.
Comment by Rick Auricchio — March 9, 2008 @ 9:36 am
I’m sure they would have added an extra tower if they’d known how many times this bridge would be destroyed by Hollywood movie makers.
Comment by Odon — July 17, 2008 @ 10:33 am