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Chicago River Bridges 1st Edition Patrick T. Mcbriarty
Digital Instant Download
Author(s): Patrick T. McBriarty
ISBN(s): 9780252097256, 0252097254
Edition: 1
File Details: PDF, 14.06 MB
Year: 2013
Language: english
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

Patrick T. McBriarty
Chicago River Bridges
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

CHICAGO RIVER BRIDGES

Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

CHICAGO RIV
 ER BRIDGES
Patrick T. McBriarty
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

University of Illinois Press  Urbana, Chicago, and Springfield

 © 2013 by Patrick T. McBriarty
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
C 5 4 3 2 1
∞ This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Photography by Laura Banick, Kevin Keeley,

Patrick McBriarty, and David M. Solzman.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

McBriarty, Patrick T.
Chicago River bridges / Patrick T. McBriarty.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-252-03786-3 (hardcover : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-252-09725-6 (e-book)
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

1. Movable bridges—Illinois—Chicago.
2. Movable bridges—Illinois—Chicago River.
I. Title.
TG420.M28 2013
388.4'11—dc23 2013003508
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

Dedicated to Barb Fox

 CONTENTS
viii Preface
x Acknowledgments

2 Introduction
46 The Bridges of the Main Channel (from East to West)
48 Lake Shore Drive Bridges 79 Dearborn Street Bridges
54 Columbus Drive Bridge 86 Clark Street Bridges
56 Michigan Avenue Bridge 95 La Salle Street Bridge and Tunnel
62 Rush Street Bridges (No Current Bridge) 99 Wells Street Bridges
69 Wabash Avenue Bridge 107 Franklin-Orleans Street Bridge
71 State Street Bridges

110 The Bridges of the South Branch (from North to South)

113 Lake Street Bridges 142 Adams Street Bridges
121 South Branch Bridge (No Current Bridge) 147 Jackson Boulevard Bridges
123 Randolph Street Bridges 151 Van Buren Street Bridges and Tunnel
129 Washington Street Tunnel and Bridges 158 Congress Street Bridge
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

134 Madison Street Bridges 160 Harrison Street Bridges

139 Monroe Street Bridge 164 Polk Street Bridges (No Current Bridge)
 The Bridges of the South Branch (from North to South) (continued)
167 Taylor Street Bridges (No Current Bridge) 187 Dan Ryan (I-90/I-94) Expressway Bridge
169 Roosevelt Road (Formerly 12th Street) Bridges 189 South Halsted Street Bridges
174 18th Street Bridges 197 Throop Street Bridges (No Current Bridge)
178 Canal Street Bridges 199 Loomis Street Bridges
184 Cermak Road Bridges 203 South Ashland Avenue Bridges

212 The Bridges of the North Branch (from South to North)

215 Kinzie Street Bridges 257 Blackhawk Street Bridge (No Current Bridge)
224 Grand Avenue Bridges 259 Weed Street Bridges (No Current Bridge)
227 Ohio Street Bridge 261 North Avenue Bridges
229 Erie Street Bridges (No Current Bridge) 265 Cortland Street Bridges
233 Chicago Avenue Bridges 270 Webster Avenue Bridges
237 Pearson and Union Street Bridges (No Current Bridges) 273 North Ashland Avenue Bridge
238 North Halsted Street Bridges (River) 275 Fullerton Avenue Bridges
242 North Halsted Street Bridges (Canal) 279 North Damen Avenue Bridges
247 Ogden Avenue Bridges (River and Canal) (No Current Bridges) 282 Diversey Avenue Bridges
250 West Division Street Bridges (River) 285 North Western Avenue Bridges
254 East Division Street Bridges (Canal) 288 Belmont Avenue Bridges

294 Chicago Bridges by Design Type

306 Notes
312 Glossary
320 Bibliography
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

324 Index
 PREFACE
T
he genesis of this book is my appreciation for manufac- constantly changing urban landscape. The topic was irresistible,
turing, engineering, and industrial landscapes. I have representing pragmatism, ingenuity, and Chicago’s unique con-
always had a curiosity about how things work. This, tribution to the evolution of moveable-bridge technology.
combined with an affinity for the power, wonder, and Originally interested in putting together a complete Chica-
gritty aesthetic inherent in heavy industry, aroused my interest in go-bridge bible, it soon became clear that capturing the full his-
industrial structures. It was clear to me upon discovering Chica- tory of all the bridges over Chicago’s waterways would be too
go’s drawbridges that they held an inherent beauty that should broad. With the Calumet and Chicago rivers, not to mention the
be shared with a wider audience. canals, the research alone would add years of work. There was
The seed was planted twelve years ago, one Sunday after- enough material, as good friend Phil Keeley pointed out, for two
noon, when I wandered down to Kinzie Street with a camera and or three books. So I begrudgingly decided to go after the core
photographed the bridges. However, everyday life soon buried of the history and focus on the Chicago River.
the idea. Six years later, while taking a year off from work, the I discovered that even limiting myself to the Chicago River
seed germinated. Those twelve months soon became thirty-six, presented too broad a scope. The alterations to canals off the
as researching the “bridge book” grew from an idea into a com- river included the Illinois & Michigan Canal, Sanitary & Ship Canal,
pulsion and productive obsession. and North Shore Canal just within the city limits. So I omitted
My early research uncovered a vast untapped history scat- the canals and nonnavigable portions of the North and South
tered across a variety of sources that was begging to be or- branches, which primarily contained fixed bridges and seemed
ganized. I also quickly discovered that, amazingly, a complete tangential to the emerging moveable-bridge theme. I also elected
book on Chicago’s bridges did not exist. Both excited and to omit coverage of the railroad bridges, which entailed an en-
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

scared about what I was getting into, the magnitude conveyed tirely new vein of research and seemed best presented in a sep-
by these magnificent, silent steel structures drew me deeper into arate collection. I hope these omitted and significant chunks of
the topic. More than just a means to cross the river, the city’s Chicago’s bridge history will be captured in some future work.
drawbridges offered a connection to Chicago’s past amid the Ultimately, this book was limited to the navigable portions of the
 Chicago River; centered on Chicago’s downtown, it presents the bridge designs and then, finally, to the core of the book con-
bridges of the Main Channel, the South Branch down to South taining the individual bridge chapters. The chapters are pre-
Ashland Avenue, and the North Branch up to Belmont Avenue. sented geographically in three parts: the Main Channel, South
The fifty-five bridge chapters contained herein detail the history Branch, and North Branch of the Chicago River. Each bridge
of three tunnels and 173 Chicago River bridges, past and present. chapter starts with the current bridge (if one exists), followed
It should be noted that throughout this book, I have chosen by a chronology from the first bridge to the last bridge removed
to use the less common spelling of moveable instead of movable from that location.
to emphasize the element of movement inherent to the draw- Seeking to understand these structures and give the bridges
bridges. Similarly, the word city is used to refer to Chicago in its their due over the past seven years has been a satisfying, frus-
most general sense, while the capitalized word City refers to the trating, and consuming effort. I hope that this work will provide
municipal authority or more explicit “City of Chicago.” an appropriate guide and tribute to the magnificent Chicago
The book is organized to first introduce Chicago’s general River bridges and the individuals who designed, built, and
bridge history, moving to an explanation of the development of worked on them.
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

Preface
ix
 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I
t is hard to express all my thanks to the many people who have the Chicago River for photographic trips between February and
provided assistance, advice, editing comments, and support May 2007. Sam Sproviero allowed me to keep the dinghy and
throughout the process of writing and completing this book. The granted me access to the dock behind Green Dolphin Street. I
repeated encouragement of my friends and queries of “How’s want to thank my brother, Matt McBriarty, for use of his garage
the book coming?” have been greatly appreciated, despite my the past few winters to store the powerboat purchased for the
initial anguish at still being in the throes of completing this work. project and also for his and Dave Ritchie’s help on the numerous
For believing in the project and bringing it to fruition, I must projects to fix and maintain this “pig of a boat.” Thanks, guys,
thank the folks at the University of Illinois Press and in particular for the lipstick! Rick Hayslip, the manager at the Goose Island
the chief acquisitions editor, Laurie Matheson. Her excitement Boatyard, runs a solid operation. Doug MacFarlane repeatedly
and belief in the project have been invaluable in making this lent his truck to move the boat, spring and fall.
book a reality. Additionally, three peer-review readers provided David Solzman, author of The Chicago River and profes-
thoughtful and critical suggestions that improved the manuscript; sor of geography, deserves significant credit for cheerleading,
their input is appreciated. guidance, and support at key points in the development of this
Thanks go to Phil Keeley, who provided great understanding, book. I am also very thankful to him for allowing me to use the
editorial help, advice, and encouragement throughout the project. List of City Bridges, 1914, a bridge inventory he received from
Similarly, my parents, Charlie and Eileen McBriarty, have been the estate and private collection of Richard Sutphin. Similarly,
most supportive and helped edit the manuscript at key stages. Paul Schellinger, the editorial director of reference at the Uni-
Similar thanks go to James Scanlon and Paul Mendelson for versity of Chicago Press, provided significant advice regarding
their line editing. the audience and voice for this book. The help of architects Jay
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

For marine support, I must first thank Tom Neill for the use Muller and Terry Sullivan of Muller+Muller, Ltd., and Brian Steele
of his powerboat for the first photographic excursion on the river. of the Chicago Department of Transportation has been greatly
I wish he were still here to see the results. Mary and Tim Cork- appreciated. Brian was instrumental in getting behind the scenes
ell deserve a big thank-you for letting me keep their dinghy on for several bridge lifts and putting me in contact with CDOT
 supervisor Darryl Rouse. Mr. Rouse has provided great insight itime Museum archives. Additional thanks go to Dean Tank and,
and a valuable resource on Chicago bridge-lift operations. particularly, Don Glasell for their help at the Chicago Maritime
Ulrich Danckers and Jane Meredith, authors of Early Chi- Museum. Rick Strilky has been very helpful with referrals, sup-
cago, have my thanks for meeting with me and reading and port, and suggestions. Adrienne “Nikki” Guyer deserves thanks
providing comments on an early manuscript. I cannot say enough for her encouraging comments on an early draft of the book. Pro-
about the value of their book on Chicago’s beginnings and early motional ideas for the book from Harvey Moshman, a producer
history, peoples, and events. at Channel 2 News in Chicago, are also greatly appreciated.
Many others helped in a variety of ways: Dick Simpson, Not least, photographers Kevin Keeley and Laura Banick
professor and former alderman, on the changing forms of gov- deserve great thanks for their hard work, time, and excitement
ernment financing during Chicago’s history; Robert Graham, ar- for this project. I am greatly indebted to Kevin in particular for
chivist at the Historical Collections of the Great Lakes at Bowling his efforts and time. Kevin, I owe you many drinks, on which I
Green State University, with several historical images; Richard am sure you will have many opportunities to collect. Thanks!
Kahan, John Fincher, and Jack Dudley, for valuable insights into This book would not have been possible without the libraries
book publishing, sales, and distribution; Tom Lenard, for valuable and archives that hold, preserve, and maintain so many wonder-
background and history on Grebe’s Boatyard; and Dave Cherry, ful books, periodicals, images, and manuscripts for public use. I
regarding the history and demise of Chicago’s traction system. am immensely grateful to these institutions and their librarians,
Thanks also to the Bridge Department within the Chicago Depart- archivists, and administrators. Specific thanks go to the peo-

Acknowledgments
ment of Transportation for access to its archives and specifically ple at the Chicago Public Library, particularly the Government
to engineer Jay Orlando with Lake Shore Drive’s Ogden Slip Collections’ reference librarians and archivists at the Special
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

single-leaf bascule. Collections Archive. Likewise, thanks are due to the Chicago
I am indebted to Grant Crowley, owner of Crowley’s Yacht History Museum’s Research Center librarians and archivists,
Yard, for his repeated help, advice, knowledge, and referrals to especially Debbie Vaughan, who provided cheerful assistance
xi
additional experts and for facilitating access to the Chicago Mar- so many times throughout my many visits there. Dan Wendt,
 Peggy Bradley, and Gerald Austiff at the Metropolitan Water and librarians at the Illinois Regional Archives Collection at the
Reclamation District of Greater Chicago helped me with the Northeastern University Library. I should also like to thank Kay
historical images collection and gave me access to the library. Geary, the public services librarian at the Transportation Library
Thanks to the librarians and archivists at the Newberry Library of Northwestern University, for her help and excitement about
who were so helpful and professional and to the student aides the project. Thanks, everyone.
Acknowledgments
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

xii
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

CHICAGO RIVER BRIDGES

 INTRODUCTION
T
here is something magical about drawbridges. The sim- thus, bridges become essential. For early humans, crossing these
ple idea of a moving bridge sparks the imagination. The obstacles was dangerous or nearly impossible. Getting swept
paradox of a firm roadway pulling apart and opening away, bashed among the rocks, and drowned or simply getting
conjures both danger and excitement. Using simple wet and cold while crossing a stream could result in sickness or
mechanics, moveable bridges draw our attention and incite a even death. One alternative was traveling upstream in search of
childlike fascination. In the long history of bridges, drawbridges a natural ford to wade across, but natural bridges or fords were
are a relatively new and intriguing human invention. rarely where people wanted or needed them.
Natural bridges were formed and destroyed long before the The development of tools allowed humans to evolve. Ar-
existence of humankind. Shifting continents, earthquakes, and chaeological studies date the use of simple tools for crushing or
volcanic eruptions reshaped the earth; wind and water carved killing food as early as 3.4 million years ago. However, recorded
and eroded the landscape. As life on earth flourished, a fallen history reaches a mere 5,000 years into the past. We can only
tree across a stream allowed the deft of claw or foot to move guess when the first bridge was built by humans. A simple bridge
from one side to the other. Bridges are a natural, ancient, and requires only a few basic tools and the idea to set the form in
elemental concept. place. Ages ago, across isolated cultures and great distances,
Early peoples found great power in bridges, not just for bridge building became universal.
transportation, but as a concept. A bridge as a metaphor is With the advance of human society, bridges became politi-
prevalent across many languages and cultures, for the notion cal, strategic, and often military structures that allowed travel by
of a bridge is uplifting and positive. It takes us places that were soldiers and civilians alike. Before the invention of the wheel—
once forbidden, impossible, or inconceivable. A simple concept, and then because of it—bridges expanded to better spread civ-
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

bridges are priceless, connecting people, places, and things, ilization, conquest, and culture. These great utilitarian structures
literally and figuratively. are among the earliest public works. Roman roads and bridges,
On a planet that is two-thirds water, the landmasses are sep- for example, many still in existence today, were key in expanding
arated by oceans and subdivided by rivers, lakes, and streams; the empire.
 Like paving stones on a road, bridges are elemental building cations, are well suited for spanning great distances, last a long
blocks of human advancement. Very few concepts are more ba- time, and are generally safe.
sic to transportation than bridges. They have evolved, variations The moveable bridge is the other basic type. The term some-
on a theme, as bigger, better, and more expansive structures times refers to a portable bridge used, often by the military,
conquering ever greater challenges. Yet even the simplest forms to quickly cross an obstacle by deploying, using, dismantling,
remain in common use today. moving, and reusing the bridge. For this book, moveable bridges
Bridges exist and have flourished because of the tremen- are those that are fixed in place, moving only to open or close.
dous benefit and use they have provided throughout the ages. The term moveable bridge is then generally interchangeable with
In most cases, investment in a bridge yields a value many times what most people call a drawbridge.
greater than its cost of construction. Bridges provide an easy The drawbridge is a uniquely human invention combining
path, save time and energy, and increase human productivity. the concepts of connection and movement at a fixed location.
They encourage commerce and offer immeasurable benefits on Through man’s ingenuity, the moveable bridge has evolved to
personal, economic, and cultural levels. The immediate value offer a great variety of designs and uses to solve two basic ap-
of a bridge compounds over time and frequently supports new plications for defense or the crossing of navigable waterways.
or more intensive uses than the original builders could have The earliest recorded evidence of drawbridges indicates
imagined. their use for defensive purposes. Around 2000 BC, an Egyptian
All natural bridges and most constructed bridges are fixed. fortress at Buhen had two drawbridges to protect each entrance.
A fixed bridge is the oldest and most common type of bridge. These bridges could be drawn back on rollers to defend the fort
It is permanent and connects point A to point B across some from attack. During the Middle Ages, drawbridges were com-

Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

obstacle. The evolution of fixed bridges has stretched human- monly used to protect the front gates of the growing number
kind’s ingenuity, technology, and engineering savvy. The biggest, of keeps and castles. As larger and more elaborate defenses
highest, and longest bridges in the world are all fixed bridges. were built, the entrances also grew in size. Soon, drawbridges
3
Such bridges require minimal maintenance, fit a variety of appli- light enough to be moved by just a few men were inadequate.
 Counterweights were employed to balance against the heavy
wood doors, making bigger and heavier drawbridges practical.
This ancient design became known as a bascule bridge and was
the key to developing today’s modern drawbridges.
Bascule is a French term that refers to a seesaw-like me-
chanical device. It is derived from baculer, which means to strike
on the buttocks and likely originally described landing on one’s
buttocks (bas is the French equivalent of down; -culer is a verbal
derivative of rump or buttocks). As shown by the diagrams, if
the counterweights are the equivalent of the buttocks, opening
such a bridge would cause it to bascule.
Castle bridges and most modern bascule bridges operate
in the same manner, like a huge seesaw. The pivot point or point The simplified bascule principle used in the design of most Chicago drawbridges.
© Patrick McBriarty
of rotation is typically located off center to create a short and
long arm for the bridge. The long arm extends over the obstacle,
usually a waterway; the short arm holds the counterweight to was the only reasonable solution that allowed both land and
balance against the heavier long arm. The counterweight moves water travel. As early as 1275 BC, during the reign of Ramses
the bridge’s center of gravity to or very near the bridge’s point of II of Egypt, pontoon bridges crossed the Nile and were drawn
rotation. The counterweight provides the mechanical advantage open for the passage of ships.
that allows heavy drawbridges to be operated with very little ef- Further growth and development of cities increased demand
fort. The bascule bridge was used extensively for defense from for bridges and new bridge forms like the arch, suspension, and
the ninth into the fourteenth centuries. bascule bridges evolved. The Industrial Revolution stimulated
Moveable bridges are not just for defense, though; they also great innovations across areas of everyday life and brought ma-
solved the problem of crossing navigable waterways. Most cities terial science and formal engineering to the vanguard of bridge
develop around natural break points in transportation, such as a building. Meanwhile, major infrastructural projects such as canals
harbor, river mouth, or the junction of two rivers. As communities and railroads spurred further bridge design and innovation.
developed, conflict arose between land and water travel. The For many cities in an era of sailing ships and then steamers
Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

growing population centers needed reliable means for crossing where water was the primary means of transportation, the de-
the waterways, but fixed bridges potentially blocked the very velopment of fixed and moveable bridges over waterways was
shipping routes that created the cities. A high-clearance fixed critical to continued growth. Nowhere was the development of
4
bridge was often impossible or impractical; a moveable bridge the moveable bridge more important than in Chicago. Though not
 much more than thirty miles in length, the heavily trafficked Chi- cases, for a century or more. Chicago has long hosted the world’s
cago River has had more drawbridges than any other river. The greatest collection of drawbridges.
relatively young City of Chicago incorporated in 1837 and quickly How do these huge, aging machines work, and how did Chi-
transformed from a swampy outpost into a world-renowned city. cago come to build the greatest network of moveable bridges of
Experiencing some of the most rapid population growth in history, any municipality? The answer to this question is the fascinating
Chicago became the busiest port in the world during the 1880s. story of Chicago’s river bridges.
The waterway cutting through the heart of downtown Chicago
was soon stitched together almost exclusively by drawbridges. Why Drawbridges Made Sense for Chicago
The drawbridges were a key element in fostering growth and cre- The development of Chicago’s bridges parallels the development
ating a Chicago that would be unimaginable without its bridges. of the city itself. From the beginning, the Chicago River was an
In Chicago’s first hundred years, the demands for free nav- important waterway for Native Americans, then explorers, trad-
igation of ships and the connection of street traffic across the ers, and settlers, and connected them to western lands. In 1673
river made the bridges a focal point for tension and conflict. Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet were the first recorded Eu-
They became the scenes of collision, drowning, flood, fire, and ropeans to portage into the Chicago River and view the swampy
negligence that caused the destruction of bridges, damage to land that today bears a metropolis. Starting at St. Ignace (now
ships, and loss of life. Construction or removal of a bridge directly part of the state of Michigan), they navigated by canoe down
influenced the commerce of the city, generating controversy and Lake Michigan into Green Bay, up the Upper Fox River to Lake
strife. Local political battles were common, and eventually the Winnebago, and down the Lower Fox River onto the Wisconsin
Chicago River was placed under federal oversight. These forces River and then the Mississippi River. Paddling back against the
forged many important bridging solutions. Though specific to current, they were taught an easier return route by local Native
Chicago, such solutions were frequently applicable to the bridg- Americans up the more placid Illinois and Des Plaines rivers and
ing needs of the world. onto the Chicago River. A portage crossed the low continental
Chicago’s hundreds of bridges have supported the traf- divide separating the Des Plaines River and the Chicago River,
fic of the city while also yielding right-of-way to ships bringing the latter of which emptied into Lake Michigan. From here they
trade and commerce to the region. Today’s steel and concrete paddled up Lake Michigan to St. Ignace, where Jolliet carried
structures spanning the waterways, some built at the beginning on without Marquette to Montreal.
of the twentieth century, have opened and closed hundreds of Having personally traveled most of the twenty-three-hun-

Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

thousands of times. Thousands of tons of roadway are lifted dred-mile route from the St. Lawrence River to the Great Lakes
and then fitted back together gently and precisely. Operating to and the fifteen-hundred-mile Mississippi River route connecting
within fractions of an inch, these great machines have repeated the Gulf of Mexico to the Chicago portage, Jolliet saw great
5
this dance capably and effectively for decades and, in some value in a continuous water route and proposed a short canal
 low body of water called Portage Lake, or Mud Lake. It varied
in depth and length according to the wetness of the season and
stretched five to six miles in length, running parallel to the por-
tage road. Occasionally, the Des Plaines would flood its banks
to connect with Mud Lake and in turn overflow into the Chicago
River, creating a continuous water route navigable by canoe.
The year after Marquette and Jolliet first passed through
Chicago, development of the fur trade in the area began. Explorer
René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, utilized the portage
several times, as did his famous right-hand man, Henri de Tonti.
From the 1680s through the 1690s, at least one hundred French
traders, explorers, and missionaries passed through or settled
in the region to establish various depots, forts, and the Mission
de l’Ange Gardien (Mission of the Guardian Angel) along the
Marquette and Jolliet’s route of exploration to the Mississippi River via Green Bay Chicago River.
and return route through the Chicago portage. © Patrick McBriarty
Throughout most of the eighteenth century, growing hostili-
ties, including two protracted wars between the Fox Indians and
to replace the Chicago portage. Chicago’s location at a natural the French (the First Fox War [1712–16] and Second Fox War
break in transportation—combined with continuing westward [1728–33]) and the French and Indian War (1754–63), destroyed
settlement and rapid development of shipping and trade—would all settlement and trade in Chicago. This route to the West had na-
ensure that the Chicago River became a busy waterway and tional importance for the young United States; however, Chicago
nurture a great city. and its portage remained under the control of hostile tribes until
The “Chicagou” Portage (as it was labeled on early French after the Treaty of Greenville and the establishment of Fort Dear-
maps) was a key link between waterways. Its eastern end began born in 1803, initiating U.S. control of the area. In 1795 the Treaty
at the West Fork of the South Branch of the Chicago River near of Greenville secured from the Native Americans a six-square-mile
the modern-day intersection of 26th Street and Western Avenue. piece of land at the mouth of the Chicago River and free passage
The seven-mile portage road ran southwest over the low, marshy of the portage and waterways to the Mississippi River. The first
Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

ground and ended at an eastward bend in the Des Plaines River, Fort Dearborn was destroyed at the beginning of the War of 1812
near today’s intersection of Harlem Avenue and 49th Street. Of- but was reestablished in 1816 as settlers returned.
ten used by Native Americans, and then increasingly by western As described by Chicago fur trader Gurdon Hubbard in 1818,
6
Europeans after 1673, the portage also included the long, shal- navigating the portage could be quite an ordeal. Upon reaching
 the portage, boats were dragged through the shallow channel or,
when the channel was dry, placed on short rollers and shoved
or pulled up to a mile and a half to Mud Lake. Once there, four
men would get in and pole each boat,
while six or eight others waded in the mud alongside, and
by united efforts constantly jerking it along. . . . While part of
the crew were thus employed, others busied themselves in
transporting our goods on their backs to the river. . . . Those
who waded through the mud frequently sank to their waist,
and at times were forced to cling to the side of the boat to
prevent going over their heads; after reaching the end and
camping for the night came the task of ridding themselves of
the blood suckers [leeches]. . . . Having rid ourselves of the
blood suckers, we were assailed by myriads of mosquitoes,
that rendered sleep hopeless. . . . It took us three days of toil
to pass all our boats through this miserable lake.1
Plans for a canal 150 years after it was first proposed by Map of the entrance and mouth of the Chicago River in 1830.
Jolliet resulted in real-estate speculation and city boosterism that
spurred the early development of Chicago. In 1822 Congress During this time, the soldiers at Fort Dearborn, who often re-
made the first appropriation granting land for the construction ceived supplies by ship, made several efforts to free the mouth of
of the Illinois & Michigan (I&M) Canal to replace the Chicago the Chicago River from the shifting sand dunes on the lakefront.
portage. In 1825 the opening of the Erie Canal, connecting the In 1834 army engineers permanently opened the river to create
Hudson River and New York to the Great Lakes, also encour- Chicago’s harbor. That year 176 ships arrived, with 250 vessels
aged the development of Chicago. This led to eastern financing the next and 1,427 sailing ships and 39 steamships the following
and New York connections, as Chicago was seen as the next year. This established the Chicago River as an important harbor
leaping-off point for westward expansion. Not surprisingly, the and waterway.
City of Chicago’s first mayor, William B. Ogden, arrived from The permanent harbor, growing ship traffic, and the increase

Introduction
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New York in 1835 to oversee family real-estate investments in in trade and population meant greater demand for improved
Chicago. By the mid-1830s, most Native Americans had been transportation; not surprisingly, Gurdon Hubbard was a big pro-
forced west of the Mississippi, essentially ending Chicago’s early ponent of building the Illinois & Michigan Canal, which finally
7
French-Indian culture. opened in 1848 to replace the portage. This new water route
 connected through fifteen locks from the West Fork of the South
Branch to the Illinois River at LaSalle, Illinois. A complete wa-
terway now linked the eastern cities of New York, Boston, Phil-
adelphia, and Baltimore to St. Louis, New Orleans, and points
in between. In Chicago, and specifically in Bridgeport at the
eastern end of the I&M Canal, freight was transferred from ship
to canal barge and vice versa on the way to its final destination.
The canal was deepened in 1871 to accommodate larger barges
and improve the flow of water and sewage away from Chicago.
These improvements created a canal that was sixty feet wide and
six feet deep for the entire ninety-six-mile length. This secured
the Chicago River’s position for the next hundred years as a key
waterway to the city and the nation.
The I&M Canal increased western trade and more reliably
brought agricultural goods to Chicago. Imagine a farmer driving
his wagon team, hoping to be first to market, gambling that rain
would not turn the roads to mud and strand him short of town
while his year’s harvest rotted. A canal barge leading straight to
Chicago that saved time and worry would be a great advantage
to the agricultural production of the region. Suddenly, there was
a reliable link to Chicago markets and the waiting eastern trade Map of the entrance and mouth of the Chicago River in 1870.

goods that arrived via Great Lakes ships. The improvement in

transportation accelerated growth. The continuous waterway Long since established by canoe and now canal boat, the
through Chicago linking the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico transportation route on this relatively narrow, low-banked wa-
dramatically bolstered Chicago’s prospects as the gateway to terway through the prairie landscape effectively prohibited fixed
the West. The I&M Canal solidified the importance of the Chicago bridges on the Chicago River except along its farthest reaches.
River as a port and waterway and reinforced shipping rights. With shipping growing by leaps and bounds, a typical fixed
Introduction
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Although the canal was officially closed in 1933 and then filled bridge would cripple Chicago’s future. Construction of a high
in within the city limits, the City of Chicago maintained right-of- fixed bridge with a 100- or 150-foot clearance for sailing ships
way along this corridor. This same strip of land now carries the was far too costly in time, materials, and land; such a fixed bridge
8
Stevenson Expressway (I-55). would require long approaches to carry horse-and-wagon teams
 pany to tunnel under the river. However, a new ordinance requir-
ing tugboats to use hinged smokestacks in order to pass under
the bridges afforded enough relief that the company was later
dissolved. The idea was revisited a decade later, and several
tunnel proposals were presented to the city council between
1864 and 1866.
In 1868 the city council approved the first tunnel at Wash-
ington Street. Two additional tunnels followed, at La Salle Street
in 1871 and Van Buren Street in 1892. The drivers of heavily
loaded wagons disliked using the tunnels, however, because
horse teams had to slow or stop to rest partway up the ramped
roadways. There was also much less light carriage and pedes-
trian traffic than expected, as the tunnels were found to be dark
and murky. At first a seemingly superior alternative uninterrupted
by ship traffic, the tunnels never really offered significant compe-
tition to city drawbridges. These tunnels would, however, become
important to the streetcar companies, and new tunnels for the
city subway system would also be constructed under the river
decades later.
The geology and geography of the area underpinned Chi-
Map of the Chicago portage and Illinois & Michigan Canal in 1848. cago’s need for drawbridges. Its slow-moving river and loca-
tion on the glacial plains at the southwest corner of the Great
up and over it, which, even in the best weather, would prove Lakes made it an ideal jumping-off point for westward travel
problematic. On the narrow Chicago River, drawbridges made the and expansion. The short seven-mile Chicago portage over the
most sense. These less intrusive and much more cost-effective low continental divide and then the I&M Canal that connected
moveable bridges enabled both ship and street traffic (though to the Chicago River just five miles upstream from Lake Michi-
not at the same time) to ensure Chicago’s continued growth. gan made Chicago important to both the Eastern Seaboard and

Introduction
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Yet, with increasing frequency, open drawbridges prompted the agricultural West. Named “Nature’s Metropolis” by William
consideration of other means of crossing the river. Tunnels were Cronon, despite the wet, swampy ground, Chicago was ideally
first proposed in the early 1850s, and William Ogden, William situated along a natural transportation route at a key transfer
9
Gooding, Edward Tracy, and Thomas C. Clarke formed a com- point and became a center for commerce, industry, and urban-
 ization. Traders, merchants, and then industry expanded along
Development of Chicago by decade
the river and depended on the waterway for the shipment of
City of Chicago Chicago River bridges
goods and supplies. The early grain, lumber, and meatpacking
Decade Population Draw Fixed
houses of Chicago demanded waterfront property. Because the
1830 1,000* 0 0
Y-shaped river naturally divided Chicago into North, West, and
1840 4,853 3 0
South sides, it was the drawbridges that helped to create and
1850 29,963 7 2
connect the city’s disparate parts into one developing whole.
1860 109,260 16 1
There was no reasonable alternative to moveable bridges. 1870 298,977 26 0
1880 503,185 36 1
Why Chicago Built So Many Drawbridges 1890 1,099,850 48 4
Chicago’s bridge history began in 1832 when the first bridge 1900 1,698,575 57 11
was built, more than a year before Chicago was incorporated 1910 2,185,283 60 13
as a town. A second bridge was constructed in the winter of 1920 2,701,705 60 15
1832–33 to carry wagon teams across the South Branch. In 1930 3,376,438 68 18
1940 3,396,808 71 17
1834 Chicago’s third bridge—and first drawbridge—was built
1950 3,620,962 72 16
across the river’s main channel at Dearborn Street. Crossing
1960 3,550,404 73 18
the waterways was essential, and the Chicago bridges had to
1970 3,369,359 67 24
meet the changing demands of the city. They were adapted from 1980 3,005,072 61 28
supporting pedestrian and horse-drawn vehicles to also accom- 1990 2,783,726 61 29
modating railroad and streetcar traffic and, eventually, truck and 2000 2,896,016 57 †
31
automobile traffic, all the while opening for ships. In less than two 2010 2,695,598 55 †
32
hundred years, more than 350 bridges were built to maintain the Table includes both City and railroad drawbridges.
150 crossings over the forty-two miles of Chicago waterways. At *Estimated to be approximately 80 percent Native Americans.
least 200 of these were drawbridges. Chicago quickly became
†
Several of these drawbridges are now fixed in place and no longer open.

the drawbridge capital of the world.

Growth of the city required new and better river crossings under the increasing traffic that necessitated their replacement
and replacement of worn-out or inadequate bridges. Chicago, with more durable structures and designs.
Introduction
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centered on the South Side, quickly expanded along the northern The city limits of Chicago began expanding in 1847 to incor-
and southern branches of the Chicago River, leading to expo- porate neighboring lands and nearby towns. The most dramatic
nential growth. With heavy use, wood bridges soon gave way additions came in 1889 with the annexation of the Lake View,
10
 Jefferson, Hyde Park, and Lake townships. This additional land
included the Calumet River and Harbor and a significant stretch
of the North Branch of the Chicago River, further increasing the
City’s bridge inventory and responsibilities.
Meanwhile, Chicago’s first railroad, the Galena & Chicago
Union Railway, was begun in 1848, and in 1852 the first railroad
bridge crossing the river was built near Kinzie Street. Over the
next few decades, development of the railroads made Chicago
the most important railroad hub in North America. This necessi-
tated additional drawbridges over the Chicago River and other
city waterways. The eastern and western railroads met in Chi-
cago, furthering its status as a center for trade, commerce, and
development. Additionally, the growth of the railroads spurred
technological advancements in material science, engineering,
and construction, and a key element of their expansion was
bridge innovation and design.
Repeated efforts to deepen and widen the river also forced
additional bridge building. Between the 1860s and 1870s, the
South Branch was dredged, lengthened, and widened, and col-
lateral slips and canals, including a mile-long canal serving the
Union Stock Yards, were added. In an age totally lacking envi-
ronmental protection laws, the unchecked development soon
turned the Chicago River into little better than an open sewer. By
1889 health concerns initiated the charter of the Chicago San-
itary District (now the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District
of Greater Chicago) to address water sanitation. The resultant
Chicago Drainage Canal, later renamed the Sanitary & Ship Ca-

Introduction
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nal, would replace the I&M Canal.

The Sanitary District, an independent public agency created
Chicago’s growth by annexation as of 1915. by the State of Illinois, undertook the extraordinary engineering
11
 feat of reversing the flow of the Chicago River. The city had ning, design, construction, and land acquisition to maintenance,
always drawn its supply of freshwater from Lake Michigan, and operation, and repair.
reversal of the river would help protect the lake from waste and Before Chicago had a local government, its first two bridges
runoff. A massive excavation and engineering project, the Sani- were built by residents. Tavern owner Samuel Miller built the first
tary District reversed the river so it flowed away from Lake Mich- bridge; another tavern keeper, Charles Taylor, and his brother
igan in 1900. Since then, water from Lake Michigan has flowed Anson built the second after raising subscriptions from locals.
into the Main Channel and into the South Branch and via the On August 10, 1833, Chicago incorporated as a town, and bridge
Sanitary & Ship Canal into the Illinois and Mississippi rivers. The maintenance and oversight fell to the newly elected Common
project also widened much of the Chicago River to a width of two Council (the precursor to today’s Chicago City Council). That
hundred feet to accommodate larger ships. The “Lakes to Gulf” December a Bridge Committee was created to advise and over-
route opened in July 1910, connecting the Great Lakes and the see repair of the town’s two bridges. The town’s third bridge at
Gulf of Mexico for ships and barges. Somewhat smaller in scope, Dearborn Street, built in 1834, was also privately funded. Chi-
the eight-mile North Shore Sanitary Canal began diversion of cago’s incorporation as a city on March 4, 1837, continued local
the waste of the northern suburbs into the North Branch of the government responsibility for bridge maintenance, while bridge
Chicago River that same year. The Sanitary District constructed construction remained almost entirely privately financed. This
the canal from Lake Michigan in Wilmette to connect with the was consistent with the overriding principle of government during
North Branch just east of Foster and Kedzie avenues. This led to the nineteenth century that the cost of public projects should be
extensive construction of fixed bridges by the Sanitary District borne by the users.
across this new canal in the city and suburbs. In 1847 the Common Council appointed a special commit-
Wholesale bridge replacement was accelerated three times tee to oversee the construction of the first bridge at Madison
during Chicago history. The flood of 1849 destroyed all five of Street. The Common Council used special bridge committees
Chicago’s bridges, and the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 destroyed again after the flood of 1849 to oversee rebuilding of the town’s
eight downtown bridges. Finally, navigational interests supported five bridges. An additional special committee was appointed
by federal oversight required replacement of most of the city’s to borrow funds for bridge construction. It was during this cri-
swing bridges between 1890 and 1930. sis that the first municipal funds, amounting to fifteen hundred
dollars, were appropriated toward construction of the second
How Chicago Paid for Its Bridges Madison Street Bridge. However, residents, businessmen, and
Introduction
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Throughout history it has been in Chicago’s best interests to landowners shouldered the bulk of the bridge replacement costs.
build new and better bridges, yet bridges cost money. Despite Going forward, local bridge committees would organize to gather
the obvious benefits of spurring business, industry, and real-es- private and political support and manage subscription lists for
12
tate development, bridges involve a variety of costs, from plan- new crossings or bridge replacement. Pledged contributions
 for a bridge were gathered and recorded by simply denoting mainder. In 1857 the third Madison Street Bridge was contro-
the contributor’s name and pledged amount, thus creating the versial as the first bridge entirely financed by public funds. The
bridge subscription list. practice of subscription lists and private financing did not simply
Chicago also reused bridge components and complete disappear, however. Bridge construction and maintenance were
bridges whenever possible. In 1849 the boiler iron floats of the old still expensive propositions. The City adopted a policy whereby
Madison and Wells Street bridges were reused on new bridges. private financing was expected to pay for at least half the cost
In 1854 the first Polk Street Bridge was built using the old Clark of the first two bridges at any river crossing; thereafter, the
Street Bridge. Similarly, in 1856 the old Randolph Street Bridge City would pay for construction and maintenance of additional
was moved to become the first North Avenue Bridge, and a new bridges. For example, in 1862 the cost of the second Clybourn
Randolph Street Bridge was built in its place. Occasionally, a Place Bridge (now Cortland Street) was built with private sub-
busy crossing with an inadequate bridge received a longer, wider scriptions and City funds, whereas the City paid for the entire
span. On these occasions, if still serviceable, the old bridge was cost of the third Cortland Street Bridge in 1873.
moved and reused, usually to create a new crossing in a growing In 1862 payment issues between the contractor and sub-
but less trafficked area. scribers for the first South Halsted Street Bridge led to sub-
After receiving City approval, the railroad companies financed scription lists, once final, being handed over to the City. There-
and built their own bridges. Occasionally, the City was able to after, the city clerk and treasurer extended funds, hired and paid
convince railroads to contribute funds for highway bridges when contractors, and collected funds from subscribing residents.
it was in both parties’ best interests. The first example of this was Over the following decades, the process of special property-tax
the construction of the Rush Street Bridge in 1856. The Illinois assessments evolved to replace the local bridge committees
Central (IC) Railroad, founded in 1851, opened its line from Chi- and subscription lists. This soon allowed more sophisticated
cago to New Orleans in 1856, which terminated at the lakefront financing practices such as the issuance of bridge bonds backed
south of the river by Michigan Avenue. Meanwhile, the new Galena by special property-tax assessments. Thus, voluntary contri-
& Chicago Union (G&CU) Railroad terminal was on the north side butions ended, and the City taxed the expected benefactors
of the river. This put the Chicago River between the two railroads. of a new bridge, the surrounding property owners, via special
The IC and G&CU railroads and the City of Chicago contrib- assessments. It was understood that a bridge would compensate
uted equally to the first Rush Street Bridge, a critical connection taxpayers by way of increased business, higher rents, or both.
for passengers and freight. Similarly, the current Monroe Street In 1870 a new Illinois State Constitution was adopted that

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Bridge, completed in 1919, was also funded by the railroads in allowed municipalities to assume indebtedness up to 5 percent
conjunction with the building of Chicago’s Union Station. of annual assessed property values. From then on, the City as-
By the mid-1850s, the City began to provide up to half the sumed all costs for river-bridge construction; whenever possible,
13
cost of each bridge, and private subscriptions covered the re- though, the City leaned on railroads and streetcar companies to
 contribute funds for highway bridges. For the first time, the City met and Chicago rivers. Soon thereafter, the City and the Sanitary
of Chicago was able to take on long-term debt to finance public District would begin replacing the obstructive swing bridges. The
works. Prior to this, city government was run on a “pay as you Sanitary District launched a $2.5 million bond issue in 1900 to
go” basis, and bridge construction, maintenance, and operating fund “river improvements, including erection of bascule bridges
expenses had to be funded out of the annual budget. in place of center pier structures.”2 The Sanitary District also
Surrounding municipalities also sometimes paid for Chicago constructed and paid for railroad and highway bridges crossing
bridges. In 1874 the City shared financing for the first bridge at the new Sanitary & Ship Canal between 1898 and 1910. The San-
Fullerton Avenue with the town of Lake View to the north, as itary District, funded through property taxes, built an additional
Fullerton Avenue was the border between two municipalities. eleven bridges, in agreement with the City, over the Chicago
Also, many bridges built outside Chicago limits would later be River between 1902 and 1907.
incorporated, such as the first Belmont Avenue Bridge. Built An Illinois Supreme Court ruling in February 1901 limited the
in 1875, it was funded by Cook County and the towns of Lake City of Chicago’s municipal debt, and only $1.25 million could be
View and Jefferson. Added to Chicago by annexation in 1889, secured for the city’s first bascule bridges. In 1904 the City was
Belmont Avenue and other bridges would add to the City’s bridge able to issue an additional $5.5 million in bonds to fund public
inventory and maintenance costs. works projects, which included construction of more bridges. By
By 1880 Chicago had thirty-three bridges over the Chicago 1910 ten Chicago-type bascules had been completed. The fol-
River and its branches. All were center-pier swing bridges. Seven lowing year, the City received voter approval to issue $4,655,000
of these bridges, at State, Clark, Wells, Randolph, Madison, Van in new bridge bonds, and between 1913 and 1922 thirteen ad-
Buren, and South Halsted streets, carried street railways, and ditional bridges were completed.
an eighth at Archer Avenue carried both a street railway line and In 1937 the City negotiated appropriations from the Motor
the Chicago & Alton Railroad. No bridge was built that year, and Fuel Tax Fund, initiated by the State of Illinois in 1927. The City
the entire maintenance budget for bridges and viaducts was successfully argued that the law’s articles applying to the main-
$61,847.85. In relative terms, these funds would pay for half of tenance of bridges on arterial streets included Chicago bridges,
the two-lane, all-steel Rush Street Bridge built in 1884, or for six and twenty-five of the City’s eighty-two bridges were so located.
wood and iron bridges such as the 1877 North Halsted Street That October $142,000 in state funds was obtained, initiating an
Bridge. Today, about $10 million is spent annually to maintain annual appropriation from the state Motor Fuel Tax Fund to the
and operate city bridges, and construction of a new fixed bridge City of Chicago for the local bridge and maintenance fund.
Introduction
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costs more than twice that amount. Chicago also took advantage of federal funds whenever
By 1890 the City of Chicago was responsible for forty-four available. The Lake Shore Drive Bridge, completed in 1937,
swing and eight fixed bridges over the I&M Canal and the Calu- was part of a huge lakefront development project undertaken
14
 by the Chicago Park District and funded by the Public Works The Rise and Fall of Chicago Drawbridges
Administration. The PWA was part of President Franklin Delano Drawbridge construction peaked in the 1870s and rebounded
Roosevelt’s New Deal program to help move the country out of again in the first decade of the twentieth century. The growth of
the Great Depression and create jobs. The South Ashland Ave- the city and the short life spans of all-wood and wood and iron
nue Bridge, built in 1938, also used PWA funds, and the State bridges drove this; replacement of the swing bridges created
Street Bridge was constructed with a 45 percent PWA grant and a second spike in drawbridge construction. New technology,
completed in 1949. materials, and better designs increased the life span of draw-
Funding for about half of the subsequent Chicago River bridges from four to five years in the 1840s to forty to fifty
bridges came either from the City’s share of the Motor Fuel Tax years in the 1880s. By 1900 Chicago had fifty-seven working
Fund or from state and federal sources. The North Ashland Av- drawbridges, nearly fifteen more than it does today. The number
enue Bridge, built in 1936, used a combination of these and of working drawbridges would continue to rise and peaked at
PWA moneys, whereas the 1938 Torrence Avenue Bridge and seventy-three by 1960.
the 1940 South Western Avenue Bridge were funded primarily After the establishment of the Board of Public Works in 1861,
by the City’s share of the Motor Fuel Tax Fund. Construction of the City Bridge Department began managing bridge planning,
the Ohio Street and Congress Parkway bridges in the 1950s and construction, and maintenance. A major problem during this time
’60s was paid for entirely by state and federal funds, as they were was damage caused to bridges by commercial ships. Collisions
both part of the interstate highway system (both are owned and caused a great deal of repairs and were all too common due to
maintained by the State of Illinois, but operated by the City of human error. The City and the shipping companies sued each
Chicago). Similarly, the last new drawbridge at Randolph Street other for damages whenever fault could be proven on the part
was built with $18 million in state and federal funds in 1984, but of either the bridge tender or the ship’s captain. This wear and
was designed, owned, and operated by the City of Chicago. tear on the swing bridges encouraged new bridge building.
The $21.4 million fixed bridge on North Avenue was aided Although drawbridge development and construction was at
by a $5 million appropriation from the 2004 Transportation Ap- an all-time high, ship traffic was about to enter a period of de-
propriations Bill, allocated through the Federal Highway Admin- cline. The nature of shipping on the Great Lakes was changing;
istration’s Highway Bridge Replacement and Rehabilitation Pro- although more than 21,000 ships arrived and departed from the
gram. The balance of the funds came from the City of Chicago. Chicago River in 1887, a trend toward increasingly larger steel
Although the City is responsible for operating and maintaining ships that could carry greater cargo loads was under way. This

Introduction
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Chicago’s highway bridges, state or federal funds are generally reduced the number of ships on the Great Lakes and the Chicago
required to fund new bridge construction because of rising re- River. Although total tonnage continued to increase until 1893,
placement costs. the number of ships on the river began a steep decline, and
15
 bridges, was not meeting the needs of the city and the changes
Bridges built over the Chicago River by decade
in shipping, which encouraged a move by heavy industries away
Moveable Fixed
from the Chicago River in favor of the Calumet River and Harbor.
Decade bridges built bridges built
Developed after the Great Fire in 1871, the Calumet River soon
1830s 3 6 competed for Chicago River shipping and offered large tracts of
1840s 11 5
open land for commercial development. Lower real-estate pricing
1850s 16 1
in the developing Calumet area proved attractive to Chicago’s
1860s 21 1
growing heavy industries and big business. In 1906 the Calumet
1870s 28 5
River surpassed the Chicago River in total tonnage and by 1916
1880s 14 3
exceeded its number of ship arrivals and departures.
1890s 14 11
1900s 21 3
After 1911 federal authorities required a clearance of sixteen

1910s 11 11 and a half feet on all new drawbridges over the Chicago River.
1920s 8 5 With this standard in place, the remaining commercial traffic on
1930s 10 5 the river transitioned to barges and tugboats that could pass
1940s 2 0 freely under the bridges. Most Chicago tugboats now have a
1950s 3 0 hydraulic lift under the wheelhouse to raise them for better vis-
1960s 4 7 ibility and lower them to pass under the bridges.
1970s 1 3 Yet substantial drawbridge construction continued into the
1980s 2 1 1920s and ’30s and was considered a greatly needed element
1990s 0 1 of the city’s modern infrastructure. In 1921 the Calumet Harbor
2000s 0 1 gained federal approval to become a deepwater port, led by
2010s 0 1
longtime area investor and booster James H. Bowen. That year
Total 169 70 more than 80 percent of Chicago’s shipping tonnage and 73
percent of incoming ships used the Calumet River and Harbor.
by 1900 just 9,788 ships came in and out of the river; by 1920 Despite a brief uptick in shipping during World War II, however,
only 2,545 ships, carrying just 16 percent of the total tonnage commercial traffic on the Chicago River has been on the wane
of 1887, used the river. since 1921.
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Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

Government officials reacted slowly, failing to construct bet- The City Bridge Department was responsible not only for
ter drawbridges to create a wider river channel and allow the operating and maintaining all highway bridges over the water-
largest Great Lakes ships. This constrained the development ways, but also for viaducts and street overpasses. Thus, the
16
and location of Chicago industry. Urban infrastructure, including cost advantage of a fixed bridge compared to a drawbridge was
 naggingly apparent throughout Chicago bridge history. As early would produce twenty-five minesweepers, nineteen tugs, and
as 1880, City officials proposed a fixed-bridge policy and the three water tankers for the U.S. Navy during the war. They would
development of an extensive lakefront harbor as an alternative also construct three additional minesweepers in 1953–54 for the
to using the Chicago River as a harbor. This plan would have Korean War and one prototype landing craft swimmer recon-
allowed the downtown drawbridges to become fixed. Though of- naissance ship in 1968. Navy underwater demolition teams, also
ten revisited, the plan was never implemented, and the lakefront know as SEAL teams, used this prototype boat for insertion and
was preserved for public use. Although Municipal Pier (now Navy retrieval during the Vietnam War.
Pier), completed in 1916, was primarily added to the lakefront After World War II, shipping on the Chicago River, particu-
in support of shipping, it was also available for public use as an larly the North Branch, declined significantly. In May 1950, the
escape from the city and the enjoyment of the cool lake breezes Chicago City Council passed a resolution in favor of immobilizing
in an era before air-conditioning. Used during World War II as the eight existing moveable bridges above North Avenue, but
a naval training center, afterward it was returned to its original received no response from federal authorities. Three years later,
use for commercial shipping and freight transfer, which ended the City compiled an exhaustive survey and again proposed a
in the late 1960s. Employed for a variety of uses since, it fell into fixed-bridge policy on the North Branch. It reported that the only
disrepair. In the 1990s, it underwent a two-hundred-million-dollar large vessels requiring bridge openings north of North Avenue
remodeling and is now Chicago’s number-one tourist attraction. were minesweepers, and the last contracted Grebe minesweeper
In the early 1900s, the City began promoting a fixed-bridge was to be delivered that same year. Most of the bridge openings
policy on the North Branch. Chasing the promise of significant were for recreational sailboats and construction barges, and the
reductions in bridge maintenance and operating costs, the City City argued that it would be no great hardship for this traffic to
embarked upon a sixty-year effort to gain federal approval of run under a twenty-one-foot fixed bridge. For example, in 1954,
the policy. In-depth surveys and impact studies were presented the Belmont Avenue Bridge opened only 83 times, compared with
in 1924 and 1925, but the requests for federal approval were 1,369 openings in 1907. And, as the report stated, “insofar as the
consistently denied. mine-sweepers are concerned, the shipyard can be relocated
A notable U.S. Navy contractor and ship builder, Henry C. elsewhere in the Chicago area if it continues to be of importance
Grebe & Company, was located on the river just north of Belmont to the National Defense program.”3
Avenue. The existence of this shipyard on the North Branch was City arguments finally prevailed in 1955, and the Army Corps
likely a significant reason for the continued need for moveable of Engineers agreed that the bridges above North Avenue were

Introduction
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bridges on the North Branch, up to and including the Belmont essentially operating as fixed spans. The greatest decline in
Avenue Bridge. The existence of this shipyard benefited the drawbridge use was on the North Branch, where the loss of ship
nation during World War II, as Great Lakes shipbuilding made traffic left many of the bridges sitting years between openings.
17
a significant contribution to the war effort. Grebe & Company In 1961 the first North Branch drawbridge was replaced by a
 fixed span at Fullerton Avenue. A similar proposal was made for one-person operations. What started in the 1970s and 1980s as
a controversial fixed bridge over the South Branch during the informal cooperation between the boatyards and the bridge op-
1950s that would act as part of the interstate highway system. erators was formalized in 1995, and the revised Code of Federal
Although meant to provide a sixty-foot river clearance, the plan Regulations concerning the Chicago River now requires advance
generated vigorous protests from shipping interests for several notification for bridge lifts. The biannual river trips made by rec-
years before finally being approved in 1961. The high fixed bridge reational boats to and from Lake Michigan are now scheduled
was constructed as part of the Southwest Expressway, later and require the City to open the bridges to river traffic only two
renamed the Dan Ryan Expressway, and opened in 1965. No to three days per week in the spring and fall.
other fixed bridges have been built over the navigable portion
of the South Branch since. Chicago’s Contribution to
Following the 1970s, the total number of operational draw- Moveable-Bridge Development
bridges began to gradually decline. At the beginning of the By the 1880s, Chicago featured the greatest concentration of
decade, three moveable bridges at Throop Street, Polk Street drawbridges in the world. Though initially constructed by master
crossing the South Branch, and Erie Street crossing the North carpenters and masons, most of Chicago’s bridge builders were
Branch were removed and not replaced. Eight North Branch practical men, self-taught or trained through trade-apprentice-
drawbridges were replaced by fixed spans between 1973 and ship systems passing down the skills and art of bridge building.
2012. The removal of the Ogden Avenue Overpass in 1994 also Such men would build most of the city’s street, highway, and
resulted in the removal of two additional Chicago-type bascule railroad bridges well into the late 1800s.
bridges without replacement. The United States Military Academy at West Point was the
The fixed-bridge policy on the North Branch was expanded first school in the United States to teach engineering, beginning
in the 1990s, and at first the City was permitted to treat the in 1824. The origin of bridge engineering in the United States
remaining drawbridges above North Halsted Street and on the is often marked in 1847 after Squire Whipple, an engineer from
east side of Goose Island as fixed spans. Several years later all upstate New York, self-published A Work on Bridge Building. This
City drawbridges on the North Branch were converted to fixed book provided the first accurate mathematical stress analysis
spans. By bolting I-beams across the center of these structures, of a bridge truss. Formal training in engineering was acceler-
the leaves were permanently locked together. Operating machin- ated by the American Civil War. As the engineering profession
ery was either removed or abandoned, with two conversions grew, it spilled over into bridge building and design. Several
Introduction
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including dismantling of the then unnecessary bridge houses. decades after the Civil War, engineers would gain primacy over
The City has also added restrictions to navigation on the and standardize bridge building and design. The best and bright-
Chicago River and instituted various cost-saving measures, such est builders, engineers, architects, and inventors were attracted
18
as the roving bridge-tender crews and conversion of bridges to by the rapid growth of the industry that contributed so much to
 the vibrancy of Chicago. Not surprisingly, Chicago developed a patents throughout the early twentieth century, including sev-
strong bridge-building industry and became a center for bridge eral bascule-bridge patents. Characterized as egotistical and
engineering. self-serving, Strauss spent several years and a great deal of
John Van Osdel, considered Chicago’s first architect, de- his own money to promote the building of a bridge across San
signed and built an early pontoon swing bridge in 1841 at Wells Francisco Bay and is best known as the chief engineer of the
Street. During the 1850s, Derastus Harper, superintendent of Golden Gate Bridge.
public works for the City of Chicago, designed and constructed Swedish-born John Ericson also made his mark on Chi-
several early wood pontoon swing bridges and the very first Chi- cago. Ericson, supported by talented City bridge engineers like
cago pivot bridges at Lake, Clark, and Wells streets. A decade Alexander von Babo and Thomas Pihlfeldt, developed the Chi-
later, John K. Thompson, a city commissioner of public works, cago-type bascule design. Over their careers, Pihlfeldt and von
provided important swing-bridge improvements. Another import- Babo combined to provide more than seventy-seven years of
ant self-taught bridge builder in Chicago was William Howard of design and engineering service to the City of Chicago. Other
the firm Fox & Howard, a company that dominated bridge build- notable bridge inventors and engineers also working in Chicago
ing in Chicago from 1860 to 1872. Between the 1850s and the included Captain William Harman, Ralph Modjeski, Theodor Rall,
early twentieth century, four or five firms—two or three of them John Page, Hugh Young, Donald Becker, and Stephen Michuda.
often Chicago based—would bid usually on any given bridge Because of this abundance of talent, many new innovations,
project, highlighting the competitiveness of the profession na- technologies, and materials were attempted first in Chicago. In
tionwide. Similarly, construction of America’s rail and road infra- regard to moveable bridges, these include:
structure during this time involved many Chicago-based bridge  The first turntable pontoon swing bridge, completed
builders and engineers. in 1849
William Scherzer, a Chicagoan and Swiss-trained engineer  The first all-iron swing bridge west of the Alleghenies,
working in the latter half of the nineteenth century, patented opened in 1856
one of the very first modern bascule designs. Tragically, he died  The first large-scale vertical-lift bridge, completed
at the age of thirty-five and received his patent posthumously. in 1894
His brother Albert, however, originally an attorney, would use  The first Scherzer rolling-lift bridge, designed in 1893
William’s design to create the Scherzer Rolling Lift Bridge Com- and built in 1895
pany. The Chicago-based company developed fourteen addi-  The first Chicago-type bascule bridge, opened in 1902

Introduction
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tional bridge patents and built more than 175 Scherzer bridges  The longest single-leaf bascule bridges, successively
nationwide by 1916. built in 1908, 1913, and 1919
Joseph B. Strauss moved to Chicago after attending the  The first double-deck, double-leaf drawbridge,
19
University of Cincinnati and developed more than thirty bridge completed in 1916
  The world’s largest bascule bridge when completed uel Miller and Archibald Clybourne for the forks of the Chicago
in 1937 River, near Wolf Point. They paid a two-dollar tax and posted a
 The world’s second-largest bascule bridge, completed one-hundred-dollar bond to ensure the faithful performance of
in 1982 their ferry service. Local residents had free passage; all others
Chicago’s advancement of bridge technology and position paid half of the rates of the Peoria ferry, as listed:
at the cutting edge of bascule-bridge design is also evidenced in Foot Passenger 6¼ cents
the number of U.S. bridge patents with Chicago origins. Chica- Man and Horse 12½ cents
goans have contributed more than 100 of the approximately 350 Dearborn sulkey chair with spring 50 cents
patents on drawbridges. Within those, Chicagoans generated One-horse Wagon 25 cents
nearly 60 percent of the 120 bascule-bridge patents, by far the Four-wheeled Carriage drawn
highest percentage from any city in the world. by two Oxen or Horses 37½ cents
Cart with two Oxen 37½ cents
The History of Chicago Drawbridges Head of neat cattle or mules 10 cents
Chicago River Ferries Hog, Sheep or goat 3 cents
For centuries a canoe was the usual means to reach and cross Hundred-weight of goods, wares and
the Chicago River. Antoine Ouilmette, a French trader who settled merchandise or bushel of grain 6¼ cents
in Chicago in 1790, offered the first known ferry services for hire And all other articles in equal and
to cross the river or guide passage through the Chicago portage. just proportions.5
Captain John Whistler noted an “Indian Ferry” at the forks of the The main landing was on the southeast bank of the river near
river, tended by a man living nearby, on his 1809 map of Fort Lake Street and utilized a scow (a large rectangular, flat-decked,
Dearborn (whether this competed with or referred to Ouilmette is shallow-draft boat) to transfer people and wagon teams. Like the
unknown). Residents and soldiers from Fort Dearborn also kept early bridges, these ferries were created out of self-interest and
boats along the riverbank and at various small piers. to increase business.
Chicago’s first tavern, known as Wolf Point Tavern, built in Mark Beaubien assumed the ferry license in April 1831, hav-
1823, was on the west bank near the forks of the Chicago River. ing posted a bond and purchased a scow from Samuel Miller. A
In early 1829, Archibald Caldwell, who ran the tavern, strung a truly colorful character, Beaubien fathered twenty-three children
rope across the North Branch and left a canoe on either shore, and was a licensed merchant, landlord, storekeeper, and gambler
Introduction
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establishing what was referred to as the “grapevine ferry.”4 On known for racing horses with local Native Americans. The ferry
the opposite bank, Samuel Miller’s tavern competed as the local was soon reportedly left unattended, and those wishing to cross
meeting place. On June 2, 1829, the commissioners of Peoria had to operate it themselves. By the fall, Beaubien was brought
20
County issued the first official ferry license in Chicago to Sam- before the Cook County Court and ordered to attend the ferry
 “from daylight in the morning, until dark, without stopping.” 6 charged a penny per person to cross) until the bridges could be
Whether Beaubien complied is unknown; however, the first two reconstructed. A ferry at 12th Street (now Roosevelt Road) was
bridges over the North and South branches the next year put an established sometime later and then replaced by a bridge in 1855.
end to his ferry business. The first Rush Street Bridge replaced the Rush Street ferry
In 1839 more crossings were needed, and a ferry at State (or Lake House ferry, as it was sometimes known) in 1856. The
Street was started and praised by the Chicago Daily American as following excerpt from Gale’s Reminiscences of Early Chicago
a “successful experiment.” Using a well-built thirty-by-twelve-
7
well describes the difficulties of using the ferry:
foot scow that offered seats for ladies, the ferry connected to Of the early ferry, it may be said that it was invariably on the
a clean, solid platform and walkway at either shore. Voluntarily wrong side of the stream; and just as it was making ready to
supported by patrons for reasons of comfort, convenience, and come over for you, probably a little lumber-craft would come
business, it was considered superior to a similar ferry at Clark in sight, towed by two men in a yawl, and down to the bottom
Street. The City-run Clark Street ferry opened after removal of would go the rope that was stretched across the river to be
the Dearborn Street Bridge that same year. The City put up a used for propulsion. The yawl would go through with its tow,
small ferry room and provided two lamps, but in 1840 a bridge the skipper responding to the ferryman’s cheery greeting
replaced the entire operation. as he passed. The craft safely through, Vain Hope would
In May 1842, a City ordinance required all ferry owners to spit on his calloused hand, seize the protruding spokes of
obtain a license. Noah Scranton, brought to court by the City for the horizontal windlass on shore, and soon the slimy rope,
running the State Street ferry the past two years in violation of dripping with the ooze dragged up from the river bottom,
the ordinance, was found not guilty. His attorneys successfully was in position. Then, grasping it with his wooden pull near
argued that a federal ordinance from 1787 established the water- the bow, Vain Hope walked slowly to the stern, repeating
way as a common highway and therefore forever free. Scranton this movement until the opposite shore was reached; or,
proposed several schemes that would allow him to run the ferry standing in one place, would propel from there. Were you in
and pay the City’s one-hundred-dollar license fee, but no agree- a hurry or in a helping mood, you would lend a hand. And if
ment could be reached and his ferry was effectively ended. He the passing of some little merchantman detained you, there
next constructed a pleasure boat, the Commodore Blake, and, was ample compensation for the loss of time in the novelty
along with a Mr. Z. Woodworth, began a lake ferry service called of sqeeing the stranger, and wondering where it hailed from
the Chicago and Michigan City Lines. and what its cargo.8

Introduction
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In 1847 the Common Council ordered a free ferry to cross This was the last regular ferry crossing for the next half-century.
from Rush Street to the Lake House, a prominent inn on the The only exception was the occasional temporary ferry during
north side of the river. Ferries were also employed briefly after the replacement of a bridge when a temporary bridge was not em-
21
flood of 1849 (including Noah Scranton’s State Street ferry, which ployed to maintain the crossing.
 ORIGINS OF JURISDICTION OVER THE CHICAGO RIVER AND ITS BRIDGES
For most of the duration of Chicago’s history, shifting Native Amer- therefore.”* The Treaty of Greenville (1795), ending the Northwest
ican tribes controlled the land. In 1534, with exploration of the St. Indian War between the United States and a dozen Native tribes
Lawrence River by Jacques Cartier and the creation of New France, (Chippewa, Delaware, Eel River, Kaskaskia, Kickapoo, Miami, Pi-
French influence came to North America; in subsequent decades, ankashaw, Potawatomi, Ottowa, Shawnee, Weea, and Wyandot),
this influence pushed west into the Great Lakes area through ex- ceded huge tracts of land, including Chicago, and reasserted the
ploration, expansion of the fur trade, and missionary work. The right of a free passage through portages and the waterways.
“Chicagou” portage was “discovered” by Marquette and Jolliet in Significant American influence in Chicago, at that time part of
1673 and was the starting point for Robert La Salle’s expedition the Indiana Territory, arrived in 1803 with the establishment of Fort
to the Gulf of Mexico (where he claimed the Mississippi River, its Dearborn. The fort was built by Captain John Whistler and held
tributaries, and all the surrounding land for France in 1682). a garrison of sixty-eight men. Chicago became part of the new
British influence over Chicago arrived after secession by the territory of Illinois in 1809. On August 9, 1812, British-supported
French of the lands east of the Mississippi in the 1763 Treaty of Potawatomi attacked and killed or captured most of the garrison
Paris, which ended the French and Indian War (known as the Seven and settlers. Fort Dearborn was burned to the ground. In 1816, after
Years’ War in Europe). Following the Revolutionary War, the British the end of the War of 1812, the fort was rebuilt, and in 1818 Illinois
then ceded these lands to the new United States in the 1783 Treaty became the twenty-first state in the Union. On January 15, 1831,
of Paris. However, the British would continue to meddle in Indian the Illinois General Assembly created Cook County, with Chicago
affairs and vie for control of the Great Lakes and its lucrative fur as the county seat. Prior to this, Chicago had been moved in and
trade for several decades. out of nine successive county jurisdictions between 1790 and 1823.
The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 established navigational With Chicago’s founding as a town in 1833, its Board of Trustees,
right-of-way on the Chicago River, declaring “the navigable waters known as the Common Council, had sole responsibility over the next
leading into the Mississippi and St. Lawrence, and the carrying fifty-seven years for the placement, construction, and maintenance
places between the same, shall be common highways, and forever of the ferries and bridges on the Chicago River.
free, as well to the inhabitants of the said territory, as to the citi-
*Congress of the Confederation of the United States, An Ordinance for the Gov-
zens of the United States, and those of any other states that may ernment of the Territory of the United States, North-West of the River Ohio, passed
be admitted into the confederacy, without any tax, import or duty July 13, 1787, Article IV.
Introduction
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In the 1920s, the Wrigley Company operated a ferry that pany, which began in 1935. The company now operates the
transported its executives and employees between company bright-yellow Chicago Water Taxis, running regularly from stops
headquarters and the train stations. The oldest existing ferry at Michigan Avenue, La Salle/Clark, Madison Street, and China-
22
service operating on the river today is the Wendella Boat Com- town from spring to fall. Recent improvements in water quality,
 tourism, and sightseeing over the past couple of decades have
encouraged a significant expansion in the number of ferries and
tour boats operating on the Chicago River.

Early Bridges (1832–40)

Chicago’s earliest bridges were typically bent bridges con-
structed using four logs to form a square, or bent, as it was
Rendering of wood bent fixed bridge based on descriptions of the first North Branch
called. The bents were sunk into the riverbed twenty to thirty feet
and South Branch bridges. © Patrick McBriarty
apart, with the top several feet exposed. Log stringers, usually in
pairs, were laid to connect the bents with the shore. This bridge
framework then supported a timber roadway laid across the log
stringers, usually composed of logs split lengthwise, six inches in
diameter by ten feet long. These bridges usually had no railings,
and the timber roadway was not secured by any pin or nail. The
timbers often had to be reset, and the structures were reported
to tremble and shake under every wagon that passed. As one
early settler recalled, in the winter of 1833–34, a “splendid team
from Detroit” was so startled crossing the bridge they jumped into
the river and drowned before anything could be done.9 Around
this time, the boom in population made lumber for home building
so scarce that the fifth town ordinance, issued on November 7,
1833, made any person removing wood from the town’s bridges
subject to a fine of five dollars for each offense.
The town’s first drawbridge, built across the Chicago River
Chicago’s first drawbridge, looking east, toward Lake Michigan, in the 1830s.
in 1834, operated like two castle drawbridges that met in the
middle. Built by a shipwright and subject to heavy traffic, this
“gallows frame” bridge soon became temperamental and had Pontoon Swing Bridges (1840–52)

Introduction
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to be removed five years later. Ironically, this first drawbridge, a Moveable bridges had become a necessity by the 1840s, and
double-leaf principle, would prove the ultimate bridging solution the pontoon swing bridge became the design of choice for the
for the Chicago River with the development of modern bascule next dozen years. These floating bridges could be built quickly
23
designs more than fifty years later. and inexpensively and could accommodate the growing pedes-
 water. In one attempt to solve this problem, a pontoon made of
iron boilerplate was introduced at Wells and Madison streets in
1847. Future designs would soon eliminate this problem, but on
March 12, 1849, many docks, most ships, and all of the city’s
bridges in the Chicago River were destroyed by an early thaw
and spring flood.
In 1839 John Van Osdel proposed building a bridge at Wells
Rendering of a pontoon swing bridge based on specifications for the first Randolph Street that adopted a railroad-type turntable; it seems, though,
Street Bridge submitted to the Common Council in 1839. © Patrick McBriarty that such a bridge was not built there or at any other crossing
prior to the flood. Ten years later, all of the bridges built imme-
trian and wagon traffic back and forth across the river. Opening diately after the flood incorporated a railroad turntable to open
and closing these bridges, however, could take as much as a and close the floating pier (or draw). The significant mechanical
half hour. Each bridge opened by releasing three corners of the advantage of this relatively new technology allowed the con-
floating draw and pivoting on the fourth corner. It was then pulled struction of much heavier and stronger pontoon swing bridges.
to one side using rope or chains connected to the free end and Supported by a circular pier, these float bridges were sufficient
running to either shore. A bridge tender pulled one chain, usu- to withstand a spring flood in 1857 similar to the one in 1849.
ally with a windlass, while a second bridge tender slacked. The These wood bridges typically lasted eight to ten years and were
reverse brought the floating draw back into place to close the replaced by a more sophisticated design during the next de-
bridge. Ships on the river were occasionally known to run over cade. Turntable pontoon swing-bridge designs did not entirely
the rope before it sank in an effort to cut it, leaving the bridge disappear, though, and were often used as temporary bridges to
agape until the rope could be replaced or repaired; consequently, maintain traffic during bridge construction up into the mid-1940s.
chain became preferred for its strength and weight, which quickly
sank to the bottom of the river, untouched by ships.
By 1849 all of Chicago’s bridges at Randolph, Madison,
Clark, Wells, and Kinzie streets were pontoon swing bridges. The
first pontoons were wood boxes with caulked and pitched seams
that created an internal air chamber for buoyancy. Most bridges
Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

soon had the added sophistication of incorporating pumps to

counter the seepage of water. If not regularly tended, the wood
pontoons eventually became waterlogged, and occasionally the Rendering of a pontoon turntable swing bridge based on specifications for the third
24
weight of a heavy wagon team would push the bridge under- Kinzie Street Bridge submitted to the Common Council in 1849. © Patrick McBriarty
 The following is transcribed from Rufus Blanchard, Discovery and Conquests of the Northwest with the History of Chicago, 565–68.

THE FLOOD OF 1849

The last thing one might expect in Chicago, situated as it is, on banks of the river to witness what was by this time considered to
almost a dead-level, is a flood in one of the branches of its river. be inevitable, namely, a catastrophe such as the city never before
But this actually took place one fine morning in March, 1849. After sustained. It was not long before every vessel and canal-boat in
a two or three days heavy rain, which had been preceded by hard the south branch, except a few which had been secured in one or
snow storms during the later part of the winter, the citizens of the two little creeks, which then connected with the main channel, was
town were aroused from their slumbers by reports that the ice in the swept with resistless force toward the lakes. As fast as the channel
Desplaines river had broken up; that its channel had become gorged at one spot became crowded with ice and vessels intermingled, the
with it; that this had so dammed up its waters as to turn them into whole mass would dam up the water, which, rising in the rear of the
Mud Lake; that in turn, they were flowing thence into the natural obstruction, would propel vessels and ice forward with the force
estuary, which then connected the sources of the South branch of of an enormous catapult. Every lightly constructed vessel would at
the Chicago river with the Desplaines. These reports proved to be once be crushed as if it were an egg-shell; canal-boats disappeared
correct. Further, it was also rumored that the pressure of the waters from sight under the gorge of the ships and ice, and came into view
was now breaking up the ice in the South branch and branches; that below it in small pieces, strewing the surface of the boiling water.
the branch was becoming gorged in the main channel at various At length a number of vessels were violently precipitated
points, and that if something were not done, the shipping, which against Randolph street bridge, then a comparatively frail structure,
had been tied up for the winter along the wharves, would be seri- and which was torn from its place in a few seconds, forcing its way
ously damaged. into the main channel of the river. The gorge of natural and artificial
Of course each owner, or person in charge, at once sought the materials—of ice and wood and iron—kept on its resistless way to
safety of his vessel, added additional moorings to those already in the principal and last remaining bridge in the city, on Clark St. This
use, while all waited with anxiety and trepidation the result of the structure had been constructed on piles, and it was supposed would
totally unexpected catastrophe. It was not long in coming. The river prevent the vessels already caught up by the ice from being swept
soon began to swell, the waters lifting the ice to within two or three out into the lake.

The Bridges of the Main Channel

feet of the surface of the wharves; between nine and ten A.M. loud But the momentum already attained by the great mass of ice,
reports as of distant artillery were heard towards the southern ex- which had even lifted some of the vessels bodily out of the water,
tremity of the town, indicating that the ice was breaking up. Soon, was too great for any ordinary structure of wood, or even stone or
to these were added the sounds proceeding from crashing timbers, iron to resist, and the moment this accumulated material struck the
from hawsers tearing away the piles around which they were vainly bridge, it was swept to utter destruction, and with a crash, the noise
fastened, or snapping like so much pack-thread, on account of of which could be heard all over the then city, while the ice below it
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

the strain upon them. To these in turn were succeeded the cries of broke up with reports as if from a whole park of artillery. The scene
people calling to the parties in charge of the vessels and canal boats just below the bridge after the material composing the gorge had
to escape ere it would be too late; while nearly all the males, and swept by the place just occupied by the structure, was something
25
hundreds of the female population, hurried from their homes to the that bordered on the terrific.
 The cries and shouts of the people, the crash of timbers, the
toppling over of tall masts, which were in many cases broken short
off on a level with the decks of the vessels, and the appearance of
the crowds fleeing terror-stricken from the scene through Clark and
Dearborn streets, were sounds and sights never to be forgotten by
those who witnessed them. At State street, where the river bends,
the mass of material was again brought to a stand, the ice below
resisting the accumulated pressure, and the large number of vessels
in the ruck, most of which were of the best class, the poorer ones
having previously been utterly destroyed, helping to hold the whole
together. In the meantime several canal boats, and in one instance a
schooner with rigging all standing, were swept under this instanta-
neously constructed bridge, coming out on the eastern side thereof
The Chicago River and Harbor after the flood of 1849,
in shapeless masses of wreck, in the instance of the schooner, and
looking east, toward Lake Michigan.
of matchwood in the instances of the canal boats. Presently the ice
below this last gorge began to give way, clear water appearing, while
a view out into the lake showed that there was no ice to be seen. the lake, the vessels were secured, in some cases by dropping the
It was then that some bold fellows armed with axes, sprang upon anchors, and in others by being brought up at the piers by the aid
the vessels thus jammed together, and in danger of destruction. of hawsers.
Among the foremost and most fearless were: R. C. Bristol, of The Democrat of the 14th, in its record of the event, says
the forwarding house of Bristol & Porter; Alvin Calhoun, a builder, (speaking of the upper jam): “Below all this lies another more solid
brother to John Calhoun, founder of the Chicago Democrat news- dam, composed of larger vessels, and consequently stronger ma-
paper, and father of Mrs. Joseph K. C. Forrest, Cyrus P. Bradley, terial, wedged in so firmly as to defy extraction. . . . Thus is formed
subsequently Sheriff, and Chief of Police, and Darius Knights, still on of the most costly bridges ever constructed in the West, and the
an employe [sic] of the city. These gentlemen, at the risk of their only one Chicago now boasts of. Crowds of persons were at the
lives succeeded in detaching the vessels at the Eastern end of the wrecks yesterday, and crowded the decks of the various vessels.
gorge, one by one, from the ruck, until finally some ten or twelve Many ladies were not afraid to venture over this novel causeway,
large ships, relieved from their dangerous positions, floated out beneath which the water roared, falling in cascades from one ob-
into the lake, their preservers proudly standing on their decks, and struction to another, the whole forming perhaps the most exciting
returning with salutes, the cheers of the crowd on shore. Once in scene ever witnessed here.”
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.
 Pivot and Swing Bridges (1852–90)
Pivot bridges, as early swing bridges were known, were designed
to replace the pontoon swing bridge. These bridges used new
truss designs that began in the United States with the Town
lattice-wood truss patented by Ithiel Town in 1820. This was
followed in 1840 by a patented wood and iron truss design by
William Howe of Spencer, Massachusetts. By the 1850s, pivot
bridges were already in use on the Eastern Seaboard. Various
Howe truss designs were used by the railroads both nationally
A Howe truss. © Patrick McBriarty
and in Chicago on the swing bridges. The flat topography of the
relatively narrow Chicago River created an ideal application for
the pivot or swing truss bridge designs.
The wood truss gave pivot bridges several advantages:
they were raised above the river rather than floating on the river,
permitting passage of small craft without opening the bridge,
allowing for heavier and more durable structures, and reducing
bridge maintenance. Pivot bridges typically provided forty- to
sixty-foot draws on each side of the center pier for the passage
of ships. When closed, the truss structures were supported at
the ends by the approaches. In the center of the bridge, a circular The earliest known drawing of a pivot-bridge design from
pier, usually in the middle of the river channel, held the turntable, Leonardo da Vinci’s notebooks (ca. 1485–90).

consisting of a center pivot surrounded by friction rollers. The

superstructure rotated on the pivot like a lazy Susan as a pinion These early swing bridges were far superior to the pontoon
or drive gear connected with the large circular gear. This gave floating bridges. They could open and close in a fraction of the
the bridge tenders the mechanical advantage in turning these time and carried a wider roadway to accommodate more traffic
heavier bridges, which were supported by the center pier and and much heavier loads. The two draws also worked well with
turntable while open. At least a half-dozen pivot bridges were maritime navigation rules: approaching vessels were to stay to

Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

built in Chicago between 1852 and 1858. Most followed the starboard (to the right side) of the waterway so as to pass port to
design plans developed by City superintendent of public works port (left side to left side). The swing bridge left a channel open
Derastus Harper, who constructed the first three of these bridges in each direction with the open swing bridge between them and
27
at Lake, Clark, and Wells streets. so worked well with existing maritime practices.
 The introduction of rim-bearing turntables provided in-
creased stability for pivot bridges. With this change, the weight
of the bridge was carried by the ring of cast-iron rollers instead
of being concentrated at the center pivot. Thereafter, both center-
and rim-bearing swing bridges were simply referred to as swing
bridges. For decades engineers would argue over whether cen-
ter-bearing or rim-bearing turntables were best, which may have
had to do with the different applications for bridges or railroads.
Ultimately, the best bridge rim-bearing turntable designs were a
hybrid, distributing the weight of the structure evenly over eight
points to ensure an even wear of the rollers and on the center
pin, allowing the bridge to turn more easily and keep the center
pin and turntable in proper alignment.
The first Chicago rim-bearing swing bridge was the Rush
Street Bridge, built in 1856. It was followed in 1857 by the third
Madison Street Bridge, which utilized two tubular iron-arch
bridges patented in the same year by Thomas Moseley of Cin-
cinnati, Ohio. This novel arrangement was never reused, but it
further demonstrates that, even early on, Chicago initiated and
adopted new bridge technology.
In 1868 Chicago commissioner of public works James K.
Thompson received two patents for a modified bridge turntable
and an improved Howe truss design.10 The turntable improve-
ment arranged the bearing circle, cross beams, and bearing
beams, allowing the turntable to work more easily and possess
greater strength and durability through a more efficient design.
Thompson’s improved Howe truss design accounted for wood
Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

components typically needing replacement well before the iron

compression members, arranging the assembly of the members
J. K. Thompson’s improved turntable design, patented in 1868.
to facilitate repairs. Individual members could now be removed
28
and replaced without having to take the entire span out of service.
 Both innovations were incorporated in five city bridges
throughout 1867 and 1868. Upon receiving his patents, Thomp-
son petitioned and received a royalty of $250 per turntable and
$2 per linear truss foot from the City, totaling $3,028. At that
time, it was acceptable for government employees to pursue
commercial ventures so long as it did not interfere with their day-
to-day work. The City attorney approved the payment, as, prior to
construction, Thompson had notified members of the Common
Council regarding incorporation of these innovations. Exempting
those destroyed by the Great Fire, Thompson’s bridges proved
their worth and lasted almost twice as long as earlier city swing
bridges. This was just one of many refinements and innovations
made to the extremely robust swing-bridge design, allowing for
construction of longer, wider, heavier spans to convey increased Warren and Pratt trusses. © Patrick McBriarty
traffic and more formidable loads. Most Chicago bridges built
through the early 1870s used some form of a Howe truss super- readily available, of superior quality, and affordable. New all-steel
structure. The swing bridge was the dominant moveable-bridge bridges used either a Pratt or a Warren truss superstructure. The
design both in Chicago and nationally for more than forty years. Warren truss was patented in 1848 by British engineers James
The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 destroyed eight bridges at Warren and Willoughby Monzani. After the mid-1880s, most new
Chicago Avenue and Rush, State, Clark, Wells, Van Buren, Polk, Chicago bridges were built of steel. Chicago’s first steel bridge
and Adams streets. Seven of these were wood or wood and was the Chicago & North Western Railway Bridge near Kinzie
iron bridges, and the eighth was the iron Rush Street Bridge. A Street and was among the first all-steel railroad bridges in the
major portion of the city was destroyed, and the fire left more United States. Both this bridge and the all-steel Glasgow Bridge
than one hundred thousand people—about a third of the pop- over the Missouri River for the Chicago & Alton Railroad were
ulation—homeless. Thereafter, all-iron bridges were preferred. completed in 1879.
The city’s need to reestablish the destroyed crossings was of Still, at this time, most Chicago swing bridges were operated
critical importance, and all eight bridges were replaced in 1872. by hand and took ten to fifteen minutes to open and close. The

Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

Five of these eight were all-iron bridges. At least one of these bridge tender used a T-bar or angular iron bar called a “key” that
new bridges introduced to Chicago the Pratt truss, invented by was four to six feet in length and mated with a fitting in the center
Thomas Pratt in 1842. In the late 1870s, the increasing scale of the bridge deck. Once in place, the long handle extended to
29
of the Bessemer and open-hearth processes made steel more chest height, and the bridge tender pushed it around in a circle
 to rotate the bridge. The key turned a shaft, and a pinion gear A decade later, the Corporation Council studied the rights
meshed with the large circumference gear under the bridge. By of the City to regulate the bridges. In April 1867, an ordinance
the 1880s, steam-powered engines were incorporated into many was passed requiring that, after a full ten minutes of delay to
of the bridges, and by the mid-1890s, electricity began to re- street traffic, bridge tenders must then close the bridge and
place steam power. Bridges converted to electric power typically keep it closed for a full ten minutes between 6:00 a.m. and 7:00
used 600-volt direct current supplied by streetcar companies. p.m. This was challenged by navigational interests, but the City’s
City agreements granting streetcar companies the right to use right to regulate the bridges was upheld by the Illinois Supreme
the bridges required that power be run to the bridge. Opening Court in February 1870. Three years later, it was suggested that
or closing a bridge now took as little as forty seconds, about 20 the city’s twenty-nine bridges stay closed during the day and
percent faster than steam power. However, it was (and still is) open to ships at night. After careful consideration, the Board of
the passage of ships that consumed most of the time during a Public Works concluded in its annual report that this “would be
bridge opening, delaying street traffic and causing congestion. a serious blow to the city itself” and that such a rule would be
an assault on the “industry and enterprise of Chicago” and in
Early Regulation of the Bridges turn injure the working classes who had themselves requested
City regulation of the bridges began during the swing-bridge the change.12
era. In August 1856, a new ordinance required tugboats to “cut Navigation season continued pretty much as it had been
down, or lower their smoke stacks, so as to admit of their pas- from mid-April to December, as ships held right-of-way and the
sage under Wells Street and Randolph Street bridges.” 11
This bridges had to open on demand. This caused the citizenry and
was done so that bridges were not forced to open when the local businesses great consternation and contrasted dramati-
tugs did not have a ship in tow. Most of the tug owners refused cally with the winter, when the bridges provided uninterrupted
to comply, believing the ordinance was arbitrary and that vary- crossings. An 1870 survey of traffic revealed Madison Street as
ing bridge clearances made compliance nearly impossible. The the city’s busiest bridge, crossed by 44,490 pedestrians and
ordinance was enforced by the City, though, and soon only a 4,265 vehicles between 6:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. each day. Rush
few tugs were able to navigate the river. In response, all tugs Street was the eighth busiest, with 10,385 pedestrians and 2,342
refused to tow ships beyond the Clark Street Bridge. For a full vehicles crossing during the same thirteen-hour period.
day, ships were left to hand-haul their way through the remaining In 1874 the bridge ordinance was amended so that between
bridges. This led to almost constantly open bridges that caused 6:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m., bridge openings were limited to no
Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

intolerable delays and congestion and benefited neither party. more than ten minutes. That same year, a proposal that was ta-
Over the next few days, the crisis was resolved, with the tug bled and sent to the Bridges and Harbor Committee suggested
owners agreeing to comply and the number of bridge openings that bridges carrying streetcar lines stay closed from 6:30 to
30
significantly reduced. 8:00 a.m., 12:00 to 2:00 p.m., and 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. In early
 1881, the bridge ordinance was again amended (to the outrage Department to approve plans for all new bridges over navigable
of navigational interests) by ordering the bridges not to open waterways and to seek the alteration of any existing bridge that
between 6:00 and 7:00 a.m. and 5:30 and 6:30 p.m., Monday interfered with navigation. The act also gave the U.S. War De-
through Saturday. The ordinance was contested in Escanaba & partment specific jurisdiction over Chicago waterways, including
Lake Michigan Transportation Company v. City of Chicago, which the Chicago Harbor, the Main Channel of the Chicago River,
reached the U.S. Supreme Court in 1883. The power of the City
13
the North Branch to Belmont Avenue, and the South Branch up
of Chicago to regulate bridges was again upheld. to and including the Sanitary & Ship Canal. These efforts were
The increase in ship traffic saw the busiest bridges opening aimed at establishing consistent channel, harbor, and naviga-
three to four times per hour during the day. This meant that a tional aids across the nation’s waterways. The Army Corps of
bridge might be open twenty to twenty-five minutes per hour Engineers, which had long ago established a Chicago presence,
during daylight hours. As the Citizens’ Association reported in provided survey expertise and recommendations to the secretary
1884, “Our street-railway and bridge traffic, already enormous, of war. Once reported, the secretary could order removal of ob-
is increasing very rapidly, and the necessity for additional ac- structions to navigation, which included bridges, and fine local
commodations and facilities becomes daily more apparent. The authorities as much as five thousand dollars for every month an
obstruction to street traffic caused by the bridges, has also be- obstruction remained. The legislation signaled the eventual end
come a question of momentous, if not paramount, importance of swing bridges in Chicago.
to the business interests of the city.”14 The frustration of the The City of Chicago’s construction of a new swing bridge
residents was palpable, to the point that commissioner of public at Canal Street the same year provided the first test of the
works DeWitt Cregier lost his reelection bid in 1886 for protecting new Rivers and Harbors Act. The new Canal Street Bridge was
marine interests by neglecting to enforce the bridge ordinance. quickly declared an obstruction to navigation by the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers due to the restricted channel and its loca-
Experimentation and New Designs (1890–1902) tion near a bend in the river. A legal battle ensued, and the U.S.
Between 1890 and 1902, no other city in the world experimented Supreme Court upheld the new legislation. As a result, the City
with as many different moveable and bascule-type bridges as of Chicago was ordered to remove the bridge just two years
Chicago. Maritime interests demanded better waterways, as after it was built. Subsequently, city bridges were subjected to
the center pier, the ultimate design flaw of the swing bridge, federal approval and review; however, no viable alternative to the
had become a major obstacle on the busy and narrow Chicago swing bridge yet existed. This created an urgent need for a new

Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

River. Shipping was at its peak, and the dramatic increase in the moveable-bridge design that would provide an unobstructed
size of steel hulls of oceangoing and Great Lakes ships led to channel width of at least one hundred feet, creating a serious
federal oversight over national waterways. With passage of the problem for the perpetually cash-strapped City. Over the next
31
Rivers and Harbors Act of 1890, Congress authorized the War twenty years, a variety of bridge designs were developed, pat-
 ented, and built in Chicago and across the nation’s waterways
in hopes of solving this challenge.
The City of Chicago attempted three different experimental
designs over the next decade. The first was a folding-lift bridge,
designed and patented by Captain William Harman. The first dou-
ble-leaf bridge, this nonessential crossing was built cheaply at
Weed Street in 1891. Each leaf was double hinged and folded up
and back on itself like a jackknife, giving the bridge its nickname.
The City, dissatisfied with this first bridge but without any real
alternatives, built a second bridge at Canal Street in 1893 amid
assurances that the next one would be greatly improved. Ulti-
mately, the design had too many moving parts and was deemed
too complicated. Inadequate to the task, it was replaced eight
years later.
The City’s next experiment was with a vertical-lift design, William Harman’s folding-lift bridge design, patented in 1888.
patented by J. A. L. Waddell and built at South Halsted Street in
1894.15 Massive towers on each riverbank connected the road-
way, the entirety of which raised and lowered like an elevator.
When opened, the bridge provided a 155-foot clearance for ships
to pass beneath. It was a significant milestone in engineering and
steel construction. Though more reliable than Harman’s fold-
ing-lift bridge, it was unsightly and was soon determined too
expensive to build, maintain, and operate.
The third and most promising design was the Scherzer roll-
ing-lift bridge. The City built the first of these in 1895 at Van Buren
Street over the South Branch and received forty-five thousand
dollars from the Metropolitan West Side Elevated Train Company
Introduction
Copyright © 2013. University of Illinois Press. All rights reserved.

(or Met). The Met contributed toward the bridge in a deal with the
City to build a similar Scherzer four-track elevated-train bridge
a half-block north of Van Buren Street. Chicago engineer Wil-
32
liam Scherzer drew plans for both bridges before his death. The J. A. L. Waddell’s vertical-lift bridge design, patented in 1893.
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
 Legkellemetlenebbnek az éjszakai munkát és járást-kelést találta,
így elhatározta, hogy először ezen fog majd változtatni.
A vakok egyszerű munkás életet éltek, szorgalmasan dolgoztak,
de nem erőltették meg túlságosan magukat, ruhájuk és élelmük untig
elegendő volt, megvoltak a pihenő napjaik, sőt a pihenő heteik is,
nagyon szerettek zenélni és énekelni és a szerelem csakúgy
megvolt közöttük, mint odaát a hegyeken túl.
Csodálatos, milyen biztonsággal és határozottsággal rendezték
be birodalmukat a vakok! Minden megvolt, ami életüket
megkönnyíthette. A völgy közepéről sugáralakban szétfutó utak
kivétel nélkül egyugyanazon szög alatt találkoztak és mindegyiket
más-más jel különböztette meg a másiktól. Az utak és mezők
minden egyenetlenségét régen elsimították már és minden tárgy az
ő különös igényeikhez alkalmazkodott.
Bizonyos érzékeik csodálatosan kifejlődtek. Harminc-negyven
lépésről meghallották a legkisebb mozdulatot, sőt még az ember
szívének a verését is. A hang már régen pótolta a látást közöttük, az
ásóval és kapával pedig csak olyan ügyesen bántak, mint akárki
más. Szaglásuk egészen rendkívüli volt. Az embereket szaguk után
megismerték, mint a vadászkutyák, szelíd lámáikat pedig, amelyek a
sziklák között éltek és a körfalhoz csupán táplálék és fedél kedvéért
jártak le, úgy kezelték, mint másutt a teheneket vagy lovat szokás.

Nunez csak azután lázadt föl, hogy hiába próbálkozott a

meggyőzéssel.
Eleinte minduntalan a látás adományáról akarta őket
fölvilágosítani.
– Nézzétek – próbálta magyarázgatni – vannak dolgok, amiket ti
nem értetek!
Egyszer-kétszer akadtak, akik lehorgasztott fejjel és feléje
fordított fülekkel végighallgatták mondókáját és Nunez minden tőle
telhetőt megtett, hogy megmagyarázza, mit is jelent a látás. Hallgatói
között állandóan ott volt egy fiatal leány, akinek a szemhéjai nem
voltak olyan vörösek és beesettek, mint a többieké, úgyhogy szinte
azt lehetett hinni, hogy csak behúnyva tartja szemeit.
Nunez különösen ezt a leányt szerette volna meggyőzni.
Beszélt a látás gyönyöreiről, a hegyek hókoronázta ormairól, a
csillagokról és a napkeltéről, de hallgatói csak mulattak rajta.
Fölvilágosították Nunezt, hogy egyáltalán nincsenek hegyek és hogy
a világ a szakadék szélén végződik. Onnan emelkedik az az óriási
tető, ahonnan a harmat és a dér hull alá, amikor pedig Nunez erre
kijelentette, hogy a világnak nincsen vége a szakadék szélén és
hogy onnan semmiféle tető nem emelkedik a völgy fölé, egyszerűen
bomlasztó tanításoknak bélyegezték ezeket az állitásokat. Nunez
látta, hogy megdöbbentette őket és föladta a reményt, hogy
fölvilágosítsa a vakok népét a dolgok igazi állásáról.
Hozzákezdett, hogy a látás praktikus előnyeit ismertesse meg
velük.
Egy szép reggel látta, amint Pedro a tizenhetediknek nevezett
uton a házak felé közeledik, de még a vakok hallásának és
szaglásának határain túl jár.
– Nemsokára ideérkezik Pedro közibénk, – jövendőlte.
Egy öreg ember megjegyezte, hogy Pedronak semmi dolga
nincsen a tizenhetedik uton és abban a pillanatban, mintha csak
meg akarta volna erősíteni az öreg szavait, Pedro sarkon fordult és
átvágott a tizedik útra, amely visszavezette a körfalhoz. Persze a
vakok elkezdték csúfolni, amikor Pedro nem érkezett meg és amikor
Nunez később a többiek előtt megkérdezte Pedrotól, hogy járt-e a
tizenhetedik uton, az egyszerűen letagadta a dolgot és attól kezdve
Nunez ellenségévé vált.
Első kísérletének csúfos kudarca után nem adta fel rögtön a
harcot, hanem rávette az embereket, hogy vezessék el jó messze a
falutól, ott, ahol a szántóföldek végződnek és a körfal kezdődik.
Kijelentette, hogy olyan távolságból is el tud mindent mondani, ami a
faluban történik, pedig nincsen olyan éles fül, amelynek hallása
olyan távolságból is meg tudná különböztetni a hangokat. Az
emberek járás-kelését valóban meg is tudta figyelni, de azokat a
dolgokat, amelyek ezeknek az embereknek a szemében valóban
meglepőek lettek volna, mégsem láthatta, mert azok az ablaktalan
házak belsejében folytak le.
Csak ezután az ismételt kudarc után határozta el magát Nunez
arra, hogy most már erőszakhoz folyamodik. Arra gondolt, hogy
felkap egy ásót és hirtelen leteríti egyiküket-másikukat vele, hogy
szemtől-szembe való küzdelemben bizonyítsa be előttük a látás
előnyeit. Elhatározásában el is jutott odáig, hogy felkapott egy ásót,
de ekkor új tapasztalatra ébredt: érezte, hogy nem képes hidegvérrel
leütni egy vak embert.
A már felragadott ásó megállott kezében és ekkor látta, hogy a
körülötte álló vakok valamennyien tudatában vannak annak, hogy
felragadta az ásót. Feszülten figyelve állottak körülötte, feléje
fordítva füleiket, várakozva, hogy mi fog történni.
– Tedd le azt az ásót, – szólalt meg az egyik és reménytelen
kétségbeesés vett Nunezen erőt.
Már-már engedelmeskedett nekik.
Mégis meggondolta magát. Széttaszította a közelében állókat,
kiugrott a körből és elrohant a mezők irányába.
Felfelé haladt a hegyek felé, majd egyszerre leült az út mentén. A
harcot megelőző elfogódottság vett rajta erőt, de ez már-már teljes
reménytelenségbe ment át nála. Kezdett rájönni, hogy még harcolni
sem lehet olyan emberekkel, akik egészen más gondolatvilágban
élnek, mint ő. Messze lent, a faluban közben megindult egy sereg
ember ásóval-kapával felfegyverkezve. Hosszú, szétszórt vonalban
közeledtek feléje a számtalan utat mind elállva. Lassan közeledtek,
egyre beszélgetve egymással és a kordon minduntalan megállott,
hogy szimatoljon a levegőben és hallgatózzék.
Mikor ez először történt meg, Nunez csak nevetett rajta. De
később már elfelejtett nevetni.
 Egyikük ráakadt nyomára a letaposott fűben és négykézláb
tapogatózva elindult rajta.
Öt percig figyelte a kordon lassú közeledését s ekkor bizonytalan
cselekvési vágya egyszerre lázas izgalommá fokozódott. Felállt,
egy-két lépést közeledett a körfalhoz, majd megfordult és visszafelé
indult. A vakok ekkorra már alig pár lépésnyire állottak tőle.
Ő is megállott és mindkét kezével megmarkolta ásóját.
Megtámadja őket?
Vére vadul lüktetett halántékaiban és egyre csak azt gondolta:
„A vakok országában az egyszemű a király!“
Megtámadja őket?
Visszanézett a magas és megmászhatatlan körfalra, melyet
számtalan apró ajtó szakított meg, majd szembefordult az üldözők
egyre közeledő vonalával. Az első raj mögött újabb és újabb
csoportok fejlődtek fel ásóval, kapával, vasvillával kezeikben.
Megtámadja őket?
– Bogota! – kiáltott az egyik. – Bogota! Hol vagy?
Még jobban megmarkolta ásóját és megindult lefelé a mezőn a
falu felé.
Abban a pillanatban valamennyien megindultak feléje.
– Nekik megyek, ha hozzám nyúlnak! – fogadkozott magában. –
Istenemre, nekik megyek.
– Nézzétek! – szólt most hangosan üldözőihez. – Azt fogok
csinálni ebben a völgyben, amit akarok. Halljátok? Azt fogok csinálni,
amit akarok és oda megyek, ahová akarok!
Gyorsan közeledtek feléje és az egész jelenetnek olyan
színezete volt, mintha szembekötősdit játszanának és csak egyetlen
ember látna a játszók közül.
 – Fogjátok meg! – kiáltott az egyik.
Mire Nunez föleszmélt, már félköralakban körül is fogták a vakok.
Érezte, hogy határozottnak és erélyesnek kell lennie.
– Nem értitek? – kiáltott rájuk előtte erősnek és határozottnak
tetsző hangon, amely azonban már a mondat közepén megtörött. –
Ti vakok vagytok, én pedig látok! Hagyjatok békén!
– Bogota! Tedd le az ásót és ne taposd össze a füvet!
Ez az utolsó parancs a maga hallatlan polgáriasságában olyan
groteszk volt, hogy Nunezt elöntötte a düh.
– Bántani foglak! – kiáltotta haragtól remegő hangon. –
Istenemre, bántani foglak! Hagyjatok békén!
Futni kezdett, anélkül, hogy tudta volna, hova is fut. Futott a
legközelebbi vak ember elől, mert borzadt tőle. Megállott, majd még
gyorsabban kezdett rohanni, hogy kiszabaduljon az egyre jobban
körülzáródó gyűrűből. Arrafelé futott, amerre a legnagyobb volt a rés
az üldözők láncán, de a kétoldalt álló vakok meghallották léptei zaját
és rohanva állták el útját. Nunez előreugrott, látta, hogy feltétlenül
elfogják, ha nem csinál semmit és abban a pillanatban lesújtott az
ásó. Érezte, amint a kemény acél hangosan csattan a puha húson
és a következő pillanatban hangos jajkiáltással terült el a vak ember
a fűben.
Áttörte az üldözők láncát! Egészen közel volt a faluvégi
házakhoz, melyekből csak úgy rajzottak elő az ásót, kapát forgató
vak emberek.
Éppen idején hallotta meg, hogy háta mögött rohanva közeledik
feléje egy magas férfi. Egészen elvesztette a fejét és egy lépésről
feléje dobta ásóját, majd sarkon fordult és elrohant az ellenkező
irányba. Ott is szembe találta magát egy vak emberrel, akit hangos
kiáltással lökött fel.
Pánik fogta el. Vadul szaladgált össze-vissza, lökdösődve ott is,
ahol nem volt arra szükség és miután félelmében folyton jobbra-
balra forgatta fejét, minduntalan csetlett-botlott. Egyszer el is esett
és a vakok tüstént észreveték, hogy mi történt vele. Messze, távol a
körfalon az egyik kis ajtó nyitva állott és mintha csak mennyei
üdvösség várna ott rá, Nunez vad iramban arra felé rohant. Ügyet
sem vetett többé üldözőire mindaddig, míg el nem érte az ajtót és
keresztül nem haladt a csatornán átvezető hídon. Még ekkor sem állt
meg, hanem még egy darabon tovább rohant a sziklák között egy
békésen legelésző láma nagy meglepetésére.
Így végződött Nunez államcsínye.

A falakon kívül maradt két napon és két éjszakán át. étlen-

szomjan és egyre csak a történteken járt az esze. Tépelődései
közben minduntalan visszatért agyába az ostoba közmondás:
„A vakok országában az egyszemű a király.“
Egyre azon gondolkodott, hogyan tudná a vakokat harcban,
küzdelemben leigázni és lassanként rájött, hogy erre semmi
lehetőség nincsen. Nem volt fegyvere és most már nem is
szerezhetett magának többé.
A civilizáció mételye elérte Nunezt még az Andesek vad
hegyláncai között is és nem tudta elszánni magát arra, hogy orvul
legyilkoljon egy vak embert.
Persze, ha ezt meg tudná tenni, akkor könnyen rájuk tudná
kényszeríteni akaratát, azzal a fenyegetéssel, hogy lassan-lassan
valamennyiüket orvul legyilkolja.
De előbb-utóbb mégis csak aludnia kell!…
Megpróbált élelmet keresni a magas fenyőfák között és
megpróbált hajlékot találni a hideg éjszakára, sőt megpróbálkozott
azzal is, – bár eleve kevés reménnyel – hogy megfogjon egy lámát,
hogy azután leölje – talán úgy, hogy egy nagy kővel addig kalapálja,
míg nem végez vele – és így talán végül is élelemhez jusson. De a
lámák elejétől fogva gyanakodtak és nagy, barna, bizalmatlan
szemeket meregettek rá, amikor pedig közeledett feléjük,
egyszerűen elvágtattak előle. Félelem fogta el a második napon és a
hideg is kirázta éjszaka. Végül is leereszkedett a körfalhoz és
megpróbált békét kötni a vakokkal. A patak medrében haladt lefelé,
egyre kiabálva, míg végre is két vak ember kijött a kapun és szóba
állott vele.
– Bolond voltam, – mondotta Nunez – de még csak ujonnan
formált vagyok.
Azt felelték rá, hogy ez már jobban hangzik.
Közölte velük, hogy most már okosabb és megbánta mindazt,
amit tett.
Azután akaratlanul is könnyekre fakadt, mert nagyon beteg és
gyenge volt és ezt a vakok kedvező jelnek vették.
Megkérdezték tőle, hogy még mindíg hiszi-e, hogy „lát“.
– Körülbelül száz ember magasságban a világot sziklatető fedi…
amely nagyon… nagyon… sima… – felelte Nunez megadással.
Ismét hisztérikus könnyekbe tört ki.
– Mielőtt tovább faggatnátok, adjatok ennem, mert különben
éhen veszek.
Azt hitte, szigorúan megbüntetik, de ezek a vakok nagyon
türelmes emberek voltak. Lázadását csak gyengeelméjűsége újabb
jelének vették és miután megostorozták, a legegyszerűbb és a
legnehezebb munkát jelölték ki a számára. Nunez látta, hogy nem
tud másképen megélni, így engedelmesen megtett mindent, amit
mondtak neki.
Néhány napig betegen feküdt és a vakok nagyon gyengéden
ápolták. Ez könnyebbé tette számára az engedelmességet. Ezzel
szemben viszont a vakok ragaszkodtak ahhoz, hogy sötétben
feküdjön és ez nagy szenvedés volt.
 Vak filozófusok jöttek betegágyához és magyarázták, milyen
gonosz is a gondolkodása és olyan meggyőződéssel magyarázták a
sziklatetőt, amely kozmikus fazekukat beborítja, hogy már-már
Nunez is kételkedni kezdett abban, vajjon nem hallucináció-e, hogy
mindezideig nem látta még a sziklatetőt maga fölött?

Így vált Nunez a Vakok Völgyé-nek polgárává és a vakok

megszüntek előtte egyszerű tömegnek lenni: ismerte már őket
egyenként, összebarátkozott velük és a hegyeken túl elterülő világ
mind távolabbinak és valószínűtlenebbnek tetszett előtte. Ott volt
Yacob, a tanítómestere, aki nagyon kedves volt, semmi nem hozta ki
sodrából, ott volt Pedro, Yacob unokaöccse és ott volt végül Medina-
saroté, Yacob legfiatalabb leánya.
Medina-sarotét kevésre tartották a Vakok Völgyében, mert arca
tiszta metszésű volt és hiányzott róla az a jellemző símaság, amely a
vakok előtt a női szépség ideálja, de Nunez rögtön gyönyörűnek
látta, később pedig őt tartotta a világ legszebb teremtésének.
Lehunyt szemhéjai nem voltak vörösek és nem voltak beesettek,
mint a völgy többi lakóié, hanem egészen úgy festettek, mint hogyha
bármelyik pillanatban kinyilnálnak. Medina-saroténak hosszú
szempillái voltak, amit a Vakok Völgyében csúfnak tartottak és
hangja is erősebb volt, mint a többié, így azután a finom hallású
vakok nem szívesen tűrték beszédét. Így történt azután, hogy nem
volt udvarlója.
Volt idő, amikor Nunez arra gondolt, hogy ha el tudná nyerni
kezét, még arra is képes volna, hogy egész életét a Vakok
Völgyében élje le.
Állandóan szemmel kísérte és kereste az alkalmat, hogy apró
szolgálatokat tehessen neki. Végül is csendes udvarlása
eredménnyel kezdett kecsegtetni Medina-saroté elkezdett érdeklődni
utána. Az egyik pihenőnap estéjén egymás mellett ültek a csillagok
enyhe fénye mellett és édes zene hangzott a távolból. Nunez keze
találkozott a lányéval és Nunez meg merte szorítani Medina-saroté
balját. A leány végtelenül gyengéden viszonozta a szorítást. Egy
szép napon, amikor a sötétben vacsorához ültek, Nunez érezte,
hogy a leány keze keresve nyúl az övé után. A tűz éppen akkor
lobbant fel egy pillanatra és Nunezt valósággal elbűvölte a leány
arcának végtelen bája.
Kereste az alkalmat, hogy egyedül beszélhessen vele
Egy szép éjjelen véletlenül rábukkant, amikor a nyári holdvilág
által megvilágított kis udvarban rokkáját pörgette. A holdfény
titokzatos ezüst fénnyel sugározta be. Nunez lábaihoz ült és
elmondotta, hogy szereti és hogy milyen gyönyörűnek találja. A
szerelmes hangján szólott és szavai majdnem áhitatosak voltak.
Medinasarotéhoz még senki sem közeledett odáig szerelemmel.
Nem adott végleges választ, de szavaiból félreérthetetlenül
kiviláglott, hogy Nunez udvarlása tetszik neki.
Ettől fogva Nunez mindig fölkereste, valahányszor alkalma nyílott
rá. A Vakok Völgye lett a világa és a világ, amely a hegyeken kívül
terült el, ahol az emberek napfényben élnek, már csak mint
tündérmese maradt meg az emlékezetében, amely legfeljebb csak
arra jó, hogy Medina-saroténak meséljen róla. Nagyon tartózkodóan
és félénken, a látás ezer csodájáról mesélt neki.
A látás a legköltőibb kitalálásnak tetszett a leány szemében, így
Nunez leírását a csillagos égboltról, a hófödte hegyekről, sőt saját
völgye holdsütötte szépségeiről is csupán – szerinte vétkes –
türelemmel hallgatta. Nem hitte Nunez egyetlen szavát sem és félig
értette meg csak, mit is akar vele elhitetni. Mégis el volt ragadtatva
beszédétől, úgyhogy Nunez azt hitte, hogy Medina-saroté
mindenben megérti őt.
Szerelme lassan elvesztette az áhitat jellegét és Nunez egyre
több bátorságot merített. Váratlanul kijelentette, hogy elmegy a leány
apjához, Yacobhoz és megkéri Medina-saroté kezét, de a leány
aggodalmaskodott és lebeszélte róla.
 Medina-saroté egyik nővére volt aztán az első, aki elmondotta
apjának, hogy Medina-saroté szereti Nunezt.
Elejétől fogva a legnagyobb ellenzésre talált Nunez és Medina-
saroté házasságának terve. Nem annyira amiatt, mintha a leányról
túlságosan jó véleménnyel lettek volna, hanem mert Nunezt féleszű,
tökéletlen lénynek tartották, aki nem üti meg az emberrel szemben
felállított mérték legalacsonyabbját sem. A leány hugai
elkeseredetten ellenezték a házasságot, mert szerintük az szégyent
hozna az egész családra és az öreg Yacob, aki valami különös
módon ugyan szerette ügyetlen, de engedelmeskedő munkását,
egyszerűen a fejét rázta a gondolatra és kijelentette, hogy az
lehetetlen. A fiatalemberek valamennyien dühösek voltak már annak
a gondolatára is, hogy Nunez elvegye a leányt, mert ez szerintük az
egész fajt megfosztaná tisztaságától és egyikük annyira ment
dühében, hogy megütötte Nunezt.
Nunez visszavágott és ekkor érezte először azóta, hogy a Vakok
Völgyébe jutott, a látás nagy előnyeit. A verekedés után már senki
sem emelt rá többé kezet, de azért a házasságot mégis
lehetetlennek tartották.
Az öreg Yacob legjobban legfiatalabb leányát szerette és
elszomorodott, amikor Medina-saroté vállán elsírta bánatát.
– Tudod, drágám, Nunez gyengeelméjű. Folytonosan
értelmetlenségeket hajtogat és semmit sem végez rendesen.
Tudom – sírt tovább Medina-saroté – de Nunez azóta sokat javult
és még egyre javul. Drága atyám, Nunez erősebb és kedvesebb,
mint bármely más férfi a földön. Aztán meg szeret engem atyám és
én szeretem őt.
Az öreg egészen kétségbeesett, amikor látta, hogy leánya
vigasztalhatatlan, amellett pedig – s ez volt a legkétségbeejtőbb –
sok apróság miatt ő maga is nagyon megkedvelte Nunezt. Így aztán
fogta magát és elment az ablaktalan tanácskozóterembe, hogy
hallgassa a többi öreg beszélgetését. Gondosan figyelt a beszéd
folyására s az első alkalmas pillanatban megszólalt:
 – Nunez állapota egyre javul. Fölöttébb valószínű, hogy ő is
olyan ép lesz, mint mi vagyunk.
Ekkor az egyik aggastyánnak, akinek mélyen szántottak a
gondolatai, nagyszerű ötlete támadt. Ő volt a vakok törzsének
leghíresebb orvosa. Gondolkozása filozófikus, amellett azonban
találékony is volt. Így erősen foglalkoztatta Nunez
meggyógyításának ideája. Egyszer, amikor Yacob is jelen volt az
öregek ülésén, a beszélgetést Nunezre fordította.
– Megvizsgáltam Bogotát – szólalt meg – és most már világos az
egész dolog előttem. Azt hiszem, meg lehet gyógyítani.
– Ez az, amit mindíg reméltem, – válaszolta Yacob egyszerűen.
– Agy meg van támadva, – fűzte tovább a gondolatot a vak
orvos.
Az öregek helyeslően mormoltak.
– Dehát, mi támadta meg az agyát?
– Ah! – szólt az öreg Yacob.
– Azok a furcsa dolgok, amelyeket szemeknek mond s amelyek
arra valók, hogy az arcban kellemes bemélyedést okozzanak,
Bogota esetében megbetegedtek, még pedig annyira, hogy ez az
agyára ment. Bogota szemei nagyon ki vannak fejlődve, szempillái
vannak és szemhéjai mozognak, minek következtében agya
állandóan izgalomban van.
– Igen? – kérdezte az öreg Yacob. – Igen?
– Azt hiszem, felelősségem teljes tudatában kijelenthetem, hogy
teljesen ki tudom gyógyítani betegségéből és ehhez nincs is másra
szükség, mint egy könnyű kis sebészi beavatkozásra, – tudniillik,
ezeknek az idegizgató testeknek az eltávolítására.
– És akkor meggyógyul?
 – Teljesen egészséges lesz és egészen tiszteletreméltó polgár
válik belőle.
– Adassék hála Istennek a tudomány áldásaiért! – kiáltott fel az
öreg Yacob és sietett Nunezhez, hogy minél gyorsabban értesítse őt
boldog reményeiről.
De Nunez viselkedése a jó hír hallatára hidegnek és elutasítónak
tetszett előtte.
– Még azt hihetné valaki – szólt Yacob – abból a
hanghordozásból, ahogyan a hírt fogadod, hogy nem is szereted a
lányomat.
Medina-saroté volt az, aki rábeszélte Nunezt arra, hogy
fölkeresse a vakok sebészét.
– Te csak nem kívánod, – mondotta Nunez – hogy elveszítsem a
szemem világát?
Medina-saroté bólintott fejével.
– A látás a világot jelenti számomra – fűzte tovább szavait
Nunez.
Medina-saroté feje csüggedten hanyatlott alá.
– Olyan gyönyörű dolog látni… látni a tarka virágokat, a mohát a
sziklák közt, a nevető égboltot fehér bárányfelhőivel, a napnyugtát
és a csillagokat. Azután meg itt vagy te is. Már csak azért is jó látni,
hogy mindíg előttem lehet édes, komoly arcocskád, meleg piros
ajkad, drága összekulcsolt kezed… A szemeim azok, melyek először
foglyoddá tettek, a szemeim fűznek hozzád örökre… a szemeim,
amelyeket ezek az eszeveszettek ki akarnak oltani… Azután már
csak tapinthatnálak, hallhatnálak, de sohasem láthatnálak többé…
Nekem is be kellene vonulnom a komor sziklatető alá, a szomorúság
és sötétség sziklateteje alá, az alá a rettenetes tető alá, amely
szárnyát szegi minden képzeletnek! Csak nem akarod, hogy erre
vállakozzam?
 Kellemetlen kétség ébredt benne. Megállt és nyitva hagyta a
kérdést továbbra is.
– Sokszor úgy szeretném… – mondotta Medina-saroté.
– Igen? – kérdezte Nunez egy kicsit szemrehányólag.
– Sokszor úgy szeretném… – ha nem beszélnél így.
– Hogyan?
– Tudom, hogy szép… a képzeleted játéka. Imádom hallgatni, de
most…
A hideg futott végig Nunez hátán.
– Most? – kérdezte elhalón.
Medina-saroté nem felelt semmit.
– Azt hiszed… úgy véled… talán jobb volna?… – A szavak alig
akarták elhagyni Nunez ajkát.
Hirtelen ráeszmélt a dolgok igazi állására. Haragudott, valóban
haragudott a sorsra ostoba játékáért, de egyben együtt is érzett
Medina-sarotéval amiatt, hogy nem tudja megérteni a dolgok állását,
és ez nagyon közel állt a sajnálathoz.
– Drága, – mondotta, amikor a lány sápadtsága elárulta, hogy
milyen harc dúl belsejében. Átölelte, megcsókolta a fülét és egy ideig
csendben ültek egymás mellett.
– Mi volna, ha beleegyeznék? – szólalt meg végül Nunez
végtelenül gyengéden.
Medina-saroté kitörő örömmel ölelte át:
– Ó, ha beleegyeznél! – mondotta könnyek között – Csak
beleegyeznél!
Az operációt megelőző héten Nunez nem hunyta le a szemét és
a meleg napsütötte délelőttökön, mialatt a többiek boldogan aludtak,
egyre tépelődött és gondolatai ezerfelé vándoroltak. Hiába próbálta
agyát egy dologra koncentrálni, sehogyan sem sikerült. Megadta
válaszát, megadta hozzájárulását és még mindíg nem volt biztos a
dologban. Végre végetért a munkaidő, a nap teljes pompájában kelt
fel a hegyormok felett és elérkezett látásának utolsó napja. Néhány
percig még együtt volt Medina-sarotéval, mielőtt az lefeküdt volna.
– Holnap – mondotta – nem látok többé!
– Drága szivem! – válaszolta a leány és teljes erejéből
megszorította a kezét.
– Csak kicsit fog fájni, – próbálta megnyugtatni Medina-saroté –
és ezt a kis fájdalmat is én értem viseled el… Drágám, ha egy
asszony szíve és élete képes arra: mindenért kárpótolni foglak.
Egyetlen drága barátom, mindenért kárpótolni foglak!
Határtalan sajnálkozás fogta el Nunezt érte is, magáért is.
Karjába kapta a leányt, ajkát ajkára tapasztotta és utóljára
tekintett édes arcába.
– Isten veled! – suttogta meghatva a drága látványtól. – Isten
veled!
Aztán csendben elfordult tőle. A leány hallotta távozó lépteit és
azok ritmusában volt valami, ami könnyekre fakasztotta.
Nunez valójában csak egy elhagyatott helyre akart elvonulni, ahol
a mezőket gyönyörű nárciszok tarkították, hogy ott maradjon
egészen az áldozat órájáig, de amikor mentében feltekintett az égre
és látta a hajnalhasadást, amint a reggel aranyfegyverzetébe öltözve
lassan leereszkedik a meredek lejtőn… úgy érezte, hogy ezzel a
pompával szemben ő és ennek a völgynek egész világa, szerelme
és mindene elenyésző semmiség.
Nem kanyarodott jobbra, ahogyan először tervezte, tovább haladt
megkezdett útján, kilépett a körfalon, és egyszerre ott volt a sziklák
között. Tekintete egyre csak a napsütötte hó- és jégmezőket járta.
 Fenséges szépségük elkábította és gondolatai lassan
visszavándoroltak róluk azokra a dolgokra odalent, amelyeket örökre
el szándékozott most hagyni.
A nagyvilágra gondolt, amelytől most el van zárva, a nagyvilágra,
amely az ő világa. Maga elé képzelte a nagy hegyek túlsó oldalán
elterülő lejtőket, a többi hegyeket és végül Bogotát, ezt a gyönyörű
életteljes várost, amely ragyogó nappal és titokzatos éjjel. Bogotát, a
paloták és szökőkútak városát, a szobrok és a fehér házak
metropolisát.
Arra gondolt, hogy egy-két nap alatt keresztül tudná magát
küzdeni a sziklákon, hegygerinceken és hágókon keresztül,
Bogotába. Arra gondolt, hogy milyen szép a nagy folyókon hajózni,
majd a nagy Bogotáról a világ egyéb szépségeire gondolt, városokra
és falvakra, erdőrengetegre és sivatagokra, a széles folyamokra,
melyek óriás gőzösöket hordanak hátukon és a tengerre… a
végtelen tengerre, számtalan szigetével és ezernyi hajójával,
amelyek szakadatlan utazásban keringenek a föld körül. És azután
fent a hegytetőn nem vonnak az ember látása elé áthághatatlan
akadályokat a hegyek és az égbolt… az égbolt, onnan nézve nem
egyszerű korong csupán, mint innen a völgyből, hanem mérhetetlen
kék bura, a mélységek mélysége, amelyben a körbenforgó csillagok
uszkálnak…
Hirtelen közelebbről vette szemügyre a meredek hegygerincet.
Például, ha az ember azon a meredélyen keresztül eljutna ahhoz
a sziklakürtőhöz, akkor feljuthat egészen addig a kis törpefenyő-
bozótig, amely annak a barlangnak a szájánál kezdődik, onnan
pedig már könnyen lehetne magasabbra és egyre magasabbra jutni.
És azután? Azt a meredek sziklafalat meg lehetne mászni. Ott aztán
talán már lehetne találni egy megmászható lejtőt, amely elvinné
egészen a hómező szélén nyíló szakadékig. És ha az első
sziklakürtőn nem is sikerülne mindjárt a magasba jutni, akkor
távolabb, kelet felé akad bizonyosan egy másik, amely biztosan
felvinné a szakadékig. Akkor az ember már ott volna az alabástrom
színű hómezőn, fele úton a hegytetőig.
 Visszapillantott a falura, azután egészen megfordult és
csöndesen szemügyre vette.
Medina-sarotéra gondolt és a leány alakja egyszerre kicsinek és
távolinak tünt fel előtte.
Visszafordult megint a sziklafal felé, amelyen csak nemrégiben
ereszkedett alá a Vakok Völgyébe.
Azután nagyon körültekintően hozzákezdett a meredély
megmászásához.
Napnyugtakor abbahagyta a mászást, de ekkor már messze
magasan fent volt a hegyekben. Volt már magasabban is, de még
mindig nagyon magasan járt. Ruhái rongyokra tépve lógtak le róla,
keze, lába vérzett, ezer seb boritotta testét, de úgy feküdt a mezőn,
mint aki legjobban érzi magát és ajkára mosoly ült ki.
Onnan, ahol feküdt, a falut úgy látta, mintha valami kút mélyén
feküdne mérföldekkel alatta. Már elborította az árnyék, pedig a
hegycsúcsok még gyönyörű verőfényben ragyogtak és a körülötte
heverő sziklák a legszebb napsütésben pompáztak. Az egyik sziklán
zöld ércér szaladt végig, a másikon szebbnél-szebb kristályok
ragyogtak és ott a fenyőfa alatt pompás narancsszínű moha tapadt a
kövekhez. Rejtélyes mély árnyékok ülték meg a szakadékot, bíborba
játszó sötétkék árnyékok, feje fölött pedig az égbolt határtalan
magasságokig engedett ellátni.
Nunez már nem törődött mindezzel, mozdulatlanul, teljes
tétlenségben feküdt a puha hótakarón és mosolygott, mintha már
egyedül az a tény, hogy megszabadult a Vakok Völgyéből, ahol
valamikor király akart lenni, végtelen megelégedéssel töltené el.

Lassan leáldozott a nap, eljött az éjszaka és Nunez ott feküdt

mindennel kibékülve a tisztafényű hideg csillagok alatt…
 A Dinamók Ura

A három dinamónak, amely a villamosvasutat árammal látta el

James Holroyd volt a fölvigyázója, aki Yorkshireből került
Camberwellbe. Ügyes villanyszerelő volt, de nagyon szerette a
whiskyt. Sűrű, vörös, sörteszerű haj borította nemcsak az arcát,
hanem kezeit és meztelen karjait is és baromi arcából szabálytalan,
csorba fogai úgy álltak ki, mint a vaddisznó agyarai. Nem hitt Isten
létezésében, de olvasta Shakespearet, akiről azt találta, hogy
nagyon gyönge kémiában.
Segéde a titokzatos keletről jött és Azuma-Zi-nek hívták. De
Holroyd csak Pooh-Bahnak nevezte. Holroyd örült, hogy négert
kapott maga mellé segédnek, mert az nem bánta, hogy rugdossák –
ez volt Holroyd kedvenc szokása – és nem kukucskált a gépekbe,
hogy eltanulja természetüket. Holroydnak soha még csak eszébe
sem jutott az a lehetetlen lehetőség, hogy egy néger agyveleje
hirtelen a civilizáció koronájával kerüljön érintkezésbe, habár a vége
felé valami kóstolót kapott ebből.
Őszintén szólva, Azuma-Zi etnológiai rejtély volt. Talán leginkább
még negroidnak lehetett mondani, ha mindjárt haja inkább hullámos
volt, mint göndör és orra is nyerges orr volt. Sőt mi több, a bőre nem
is annyira fekete volt, mint inkább barna, a szemefehérje pedig
sárga. Széles pofacsontja és keskeny álla arcának egészen olyan
formát adott, akár a vipera V-alakú feje. A feje is hátul volt széles,
elől keskeny és alacsony, mintha csak agya pontosan fordítva foglalt
volna benne helyet, mint az európaiaké. Termetre alacsony volt és
angol tudása még termeténél is kisebb. Beszéd közben időnként
ismeretlen hangokat hallatott és ritkán ejtett szavai groteszkül
csengtek. Holroyd megpróbálta felvilágosítani vallási kérdésekben
és – különösen ha whiskyt ivott – valósággal előadásokat tartott neki
a babonák és a misszionáriusok ellen. Azuma-Zi állhatatosan kitért
istenei megvitatása elől, bárha rugások is jutottak ki neki ezért
osztályrészül.
Azuma-Zi öltözete fehér volt, ha mindjárt nem is egészen tiszta
fehér, amikor a Lord Clive kazánházából hirtelen felbukkant a Straits
Settlementsekről jövet Londonban. Már gyerekkorában sokat hallott
London kincseiről és nagyságáról, ahol az asszonyok szőkék és
karcsúk és még a sarki koldusok is fehérek. Zsebében jókedvűen
csörgette a nehéz munkával szerzett aranyakat.
Megérkezése napja nem volt éppen a legszebb. Az ég borúsan,
szürkén terült el London felett és a sáros uccákat szakadatlanul
csapkodta a zuhogó eső, de Azuma-Zi merészen belevetette magát
a kikötő lebujainak örömeibe, hogy aztán hirtelen, megrongált
egészséggel, ruházatában kifinomodva, fillér nélkül tünjön fel ismét
csak azért, hogy James Holroydnak legyen kivel játszania és legyen
kit kínoznia a camberwelli villanytelepen, hiszen Holroyd legnagyobb
gyönyörűsége a kínzás volt.
Három dinamó állott Camberwellben és kettő közülük a telep
felállítása óta dolgozott. Ezek kis gépek voltak, de a nagy gép
egészen új volt. A kis gépek nagy lármát csaptak, szíjaik búgva
keringőztek a kerekek fölött és a kefék időről-időre sisteregtek és a
levegőt állandó huhogás töltötte meg. Egyiknek úgylátszik
meglazulhattak a csavarai, mert az egész termet állandó rezgésben
tartotta.
A nagy dinamó elnyomta ezeket a kisebb zajokat állandó
búgásával. A látogató feje egészen belekábult a gépek állandó
lüktetésébe, a nagy kerekek szédítő forgásába, a biztonsági
szelepek golyóinak keringésébe, a gőzgépek köpködésébe és
mindenek felett a nagy dinamó soha meg nem szünő, mély
búgásába. Ez az utolsó zaj talán mérnöki szempontból hiba volt, de
Azuma-Zi ezt a szörnyeteg büszkeségének és hatalmának tudta be.
Azt szeretném a legjobban, ha az a folytonos zaj, amely
megtöltötte a géptermet, állandóan ott zümmögne az olvasó körül,
mialatt ezt a történetet olvassa. A különböző zörejek és lármák
összetételéből minduntalan ki-kihallatszott a nagy dinamó mély
búgása és a padló állandóan reszketett az ember lába alatt.
Zavarbaejtő, nyugtalan hely volt a gépterem és igazán nem volt
csoda, ha benne az ember gondolatai különös cik-cakban
ugrándoztak. Az alatt a három hónap alatt, míg a nagy gépész-
sztrájk tartott, Holroyd, aki feketelistás volt és Azuma-Zi, aki csak
egyszerű fekete volt, pillanatra sem hagyták el a villanytelepet,
hanem ott aludtak és még ott is ettek abban a kis fészerben, amely a
gépterem és a bezárt vaskapu között feküdt.
Holroyd rögtön, hogy Azuma-Zi a keze alá került, teológiai
leckében részesítette a dinamóról. Ordítania kellett, hogy meg
lehessen hallani szavát az állandó zajban.
– Van-e vajjon a te pogány isteneid között egy is, aki fölvehetné
ezzel a versenyt? – kérdezte Holroyd.
Azuma-Zi csak ránézett, Holroyd szavát egy pillanatig nem
lehetett hallani, azután így folytatta:
– Ölj meg akár száz embert, de fizess tizenkét percentet a
részvények után – mondta Holroyd. – Ez egészen olyan, mintha
valami Isten volna.
Holroyd nagyon büszke volt dinamójára és addig magyarázta
Azuma-Zi-nek a gép hatalmát és erejét, mig istentudja milyen
különös uton-módon, egy gondolat vert tanyát a néger göndör
fejében. Holroyd nagyon szemléltető előadást tartott arról, hogy
hányféleképen tudná a nagy gép megölni azt, aki a közelébe kerül
és egyszer Azuma-Zit meg is villanyozta vele, hogy kóstolót adjon
neki a gép erejéből.
A magyarázatok után, a pihenés rövid perceiben – Azuma-Zi
nagyon sokat dolgozott, mert nemcsak a maga munkáját végezte el,
hanem tetejében még Holroyd munkájának nagy részét is. – Azuma-
Zi leült és a nagy gépet bámulta. Egyszer-másszor a kefék szikrázni
kezdtek és apró kék lángokat köptek. Ilyenkor Holroyd vadul
káromkodott, de csak ritkán fordult elő és általában a gép olyan
símán és ritmikusan dolgozott, mint egy kronométer.
Így élt a dinamó a tágas, szellős gépteremben, Holroydot és
Azuma-Zit szolgálatában tartva. Azuma-Zi úgy érezte, hogy nincs
többé bebörtönözve, mint volt a hajón, nem rabszolgája többé a
kazánháznak, hanem a hatalmas gép alázatos szolgája csupán. A
két kis dinamót Azuma-Zi egyszerűen lenézte, de a nagyot titokban
elkeresztelte a Dinamók Urának. A kis dinamók makacsak és
akaratosak voltak, minduntalan rendetlenkedtek, ám a nagy gép
nyugodtan és méltóságteljesen forgott közöttük. Milyen komolyan és
mégis milyen egyszerűen végezte munkáját! Nagyobb és
méltóságteljesebb volt még azoknál a Buddha-szobroknál is,
amelyeket Rangoonban látott és hozzá még ez nem is volt
mozdulatlan, hanem élt és dolgozott! A nagy fekete hajtószíjak
forogtak, forogtak, egyre csak forogtak, a gyűrűk pillanatig nem álltak
meg a kefék alatt és a hatalmas gép búgása mégis nyugodttá
varázsolta az egész zűrzavart.
Azuma-Zire egészen különös hatással volt a gép.
Azuma-Zi nem szerette a munkát. Ott ült és bámulta a Dinamók
Urát, mialatt Holroyd kiment, hogy rábeszélje a portást, hogy hozzon
whiskyt, jóllehet Azuma-Zi rendes helye nem is a dinamóteremben
lett volna, hanem hátul a gőzgépeknél és ha Holroyd rajtakapta,
hogy a nagy dinamóra bámészkodik, rögtön megismerkedett Holroyd
cipőjének sarkával. De azért Azuma-Zi valahányszor csak tehette,
megint csak oda-odalopózkodott egészen közel a kolosszushoz és
egyre nézte, hogy fut körbe a nagy bőrszíj a hajtókeréken.
Különös gondolatok ébredtek agyában a gép zúgásával. A
tudósok azt mondják, hogy a vademberek lelket adnak a szikláknak
és a fáknak, már pedig egy nagy gép ezerszer elevenebb, mint egy
szikla vagy egy fa. És Azuma-Zi alapjában véve még mindíg
vadember volt. A civilizáció nála igazán nem jelentkezett másban,
mint olajos ruhájában, össze-vissza zúzott arcában és a vastag
szénporrétegben, amely egész testét ellepte. Atyja egy
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