The iron father
Washington's father, John Roebling, was - in the language of the day - a man of iron. He was born in Prussia, studied engineering and philosophy in Berlin under Hegel, and had moved to America to escape the stifling constraints and bureaucratic thinking that characterised the old stiff European cultures.
'John Roebling saw America as a place without limits ... where he could live out his dreams ...'
He saw America as a place without limits, a place where he could live out his dreams and build new towns and structures. His first venture had been a utopian farming community. Then he pioneered the manufacture of wire cable, and finally he put the wire cable to good use by building highly stable and very beautiful suspension bridges in Pittsburgh, Cincinnatti and over the rapids at Niagara.
The Brooklyn Bridge was to be John Roebling's crowning achievement, and his son Washington was to work with him on the project. John Roebling proposed a revolutionary design, with two 300ft towers that would dominate the New York skyline.
The towers were to have sunken foundations out in the East River, and would have to support two thick steel cables. These cables would be spun in place, strand by strand, across the river.
It was steel that made a bridge on this scale possible. It was still, however, a novel and untested material, and at the time it was still illegal to use it in public building projects in Britain. However, John Roebling was confident that its lightness and strength would make a mile-long bridge possible, for the first time.
His plan was approved, but just three days into construction, disaster struck. In July 1869 John Roebling was injured, before even one stone of the new bridge had been laid. He was surveying the site for the Brooklyn Tower when a ferry hit the Brooklyn waterfront pilings, and his foot was badly crushed.
His toes were amputated - without anaesthetic - and he was soon settled in Washington and Emily's house in Brooklyn Heights. He dismissed his doctor and took charge of his own case, insisting water be poured onto the wound night and day.
John Roebling's belief in hydrotherapy was powerful, but the unsterilised water did him more harm than good. Within two weeks he had contracted lockjaw, and he died in agony. Washington Roebling had cause to feel a little responsible:
'I feel that I perhaps made a mistake in not taking my father to a hospital at once. But my father had very decided beliefs, and looked upon hospitals as the abode of the devil - and upon doctors as criminals.'
Published: 2003-09-02