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American Experience | Golden Gate Bridge | Transcript | PBS
show transcript
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John Van Der Zee: When the idea returned to the Board of Supervisors it got stalled. So Strauss hired a man named Doc Meyers who was a political fixer and bribed one of the members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors named Warren Shannon. Shannon became the bagman. He would, come to the Strauss offices and be given a sealed envelope with a $100 bill inside, which he either kept for himself or distributed to the necessary supervisors to bring them on board.
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Narrator: Unlike Strauss, Ellis's ambition lay not in the glory of fame, but in the pure challenge of calculating every engineering detail.
John van der Zee: The bridge is like a gigantic math problem. And he had the mathematical skills to implement it. This was, in effect, 10 and a half volumes of pre-computer higher mathematics, done by one man, using a circular slide rule and a hand-cranked adding machine.
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American Experience | Golden Gate Bridge | People & Events | PBS
building the Golden Gate
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By a Fault Line
California's ominous San Andreas Fault slashes from north to south through the Bay area, passing the Golden Gate a short distance out to sea. How would a bridge across the Golden Gate fare in an earthquake? Charles Ellis sounded a confident note in a 1929 lecture to the National Academy of Sciences:"If I knew that there was to be an earthquake in San Francisco tomorrow and I couldn't get into an airplane and had to remain in the city, I think I should get a piece of clothesline about 1,000 or 2,000 feet long, and a hammock, and I would string it from the tops of two of the tallest redwoods I could find, get into the hammock and feel reasonably safe. If this bridge were built at that time, I would tie me to the center of it, and while watching the sun sink into China across the Pacific, I would feel content with the thought that in case of an earthquake, I had chosen the safest spot in which to be."
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American Experience | Golden Gate Bridge | People & Events | PBS
Joseph Strauss (Ohio) bridge "designer"
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Golden Gate and San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge Construction - 1934-1936
includes pictures of construction
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Golden Gate Bridge
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Strauss’ design was enhanced by consulting architects Irving and Gertrude Morrow,
a husband and wife team, who gave the bridge a sleek art deco look.
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