Brooklyn Bridge

The camera stands on the Brooklyn shore of the East River, and the first thing to get right is which bridge is which. The masonry tower and roadway directly overhead are the Brooklyn Bridge - you are underneath it, not looking at it. The bridge filling the view across the water, with steel towers and a string of lights along its span, is the Manhattan Bridge. Behind and beneath it the lower Manhattan waterfront runs away to the left, lit up and doubled in the river. The long exposures needed at this hour are why the water reads as glass and why the people on the promenade are soft. It is a good demonstration of why a panorama beats a photograph here: no single frame contains both bridges.

The Brooklyn Bridge is one of the most famous landmarks of the New York skyline. Connecting Manhattan and Brooklyn, this feat of engineering is one of the oldest suspension bridges in the United States and has been named a National Historic Landmark.

At the time that it was built, the Brooklyn Bridge was the longest suspension bridge and the first steel-wire suspension bridge in the world. Begun in 1870 by German immigrant John Augustus Roebling, the Brooklyn Bridge was completed thirteen years later by John Augustus’ son, Washington Roebling, after his father died from complications involving a crushed foot. Washington Roebling also suffered from his time spent supervising the work on the bridge. Decompression sickness from working in the bridge’s pressurized caissons under the river ultimately ruined Washington Roebling’s health, and required Roebling’s wife, Emily Warren Roebling, to assist him extensively with directing the work. Emily Warren Roebling was the first person to cross the bridge after it was finished. 150,000 people attended the celebratory inauguration of the bridge on May 24, 1883, all of them impressed by the network of steel cables and strong pillars that supported the structure. However, some New Yorkers were not entirely convinced that the bridge was safe. On May 17, 1884, in one of the most famous episodes of the Brooklyn Bridge’s history, P.T. Barnum led a troupe of 21 elephants across the bridge to silence the naysayers and prove the bridge’s integrity.

The Brooklyn Bridge’s most distinctive features are the 276-foot tall masonry towers that hold up the suspension bridge. The neo-Gothic arches in each of the towers make the Brooklyn Bridge one of the most beautiful and monumental sights in New York. Built of granite, limestone, and Rosendale cement, the towers are easily the most recognizable feature of the bridge, which has become a landmark example of New York’s classical architecture.