The fascinating history of the St. Louis Bridge, the first steel structure in the world.
In Spanning the Gilded Age, John K. Brown tells the daring, improbable story of the construction of the St. Louis Bridge, known popularly as the Eads Bridge. Completed in 1874, it was the first structure of any kind—anywhere in the world—built of steel. This history details the origins, design, construction, and enduring impact of a unique feat of engineering, and it illustrates how Americans built their urban infrastructure during the nineteenth century.
With three graceful arches spanning the Mississippi River, the Eads Bridges twin decks carried a broad boulevard above a dual-track railroad. To place its stone piers on bedrock, engineer James Eads pioneered daring innovations that allowed excavators to work one hundred feet beneath the river. With construction scarcely begun, Eads circulated a prospectus—offering a 500 percent return on investment—that attracted wealthy investors, including J. Pierpont Morgan in New York and his father, Junius, in London. This record-breaking design, which employed a novel method to lay its foundations and an untried metal for its arches, was projected by a steamboat man who had never before designed a bridge.
By detailing influential figures such as James Eads, the Morgans, Andrew Carnegie, and Jay Gould, Spanning the Gilded Age offers new perspectives on an era that saw profound changes in business, engineering, governance, and society. Beyond the bridge itself, Brown explores a broader story: how America became urban, industrial, and interconnected. This triumph of engineering reflects the Gilded Ages grand ambitions, and the bridge remains a vital transportation artery today.
John K. Brown is the author of The Baldwin Locomotive Works, 1831-1915: A Study in American Industrial Practice. He taught history, applied ethics, and writing in the Department of Science, Technology, and Society at the University of Virginia.
Preface
Money Then and Now
Leading Figures
Prologue: The Celebration
1. Captain Eads
2. Advances from War
3. Conventional or Radical
4. The Art of a Promoter
5. To Bedrock
6. London and Real Money
7. Troubles with Steel
8. Arches Over the River
9. Foreclosure and a Pool
10. Successes Across Time
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Notes
Bibliography
Index
The fascinating history of the St. Louis Bridge, the first steel structure in the world.
Well written and exhaustively researched, John K. Browns book is about a builder, a bridge, money men, and the greed, ambition, confidence, and vision that made possible the engineering marvels of Americas Gilded Age.
— David Nasaw, author of Andrew Carnegie
In Spanning the Gilded Age, one of Americas most monumental pieces of engineering has finally found the historian it deserves. While writing a first-rate treatment of the physical and technical challenges Eadss bridge overcame, Brown also highlights the financial creativity required for such achievements in the age of high capitalism.
— Robert Friedel, University of Maryland
A century and a half after the completion of the Eads Bridge, we have the first comprehensive history of the remarkable James Buchanan Eads and his extraordinary civil-engineering achievement. Spanning the Gilded Age engagingly connects the stories of the engineers, financiers, politicians, and railroaders who united two halves of a continent.
— Albert Churella, Kennesaw State University
Brown serves up a rich slab of American history, from sweaty workers digging to bedrock below the Mississippi River to the rarified heights of transatlantic finance. Fabulous insights on city growth, bold engineering, railroad tangles, and classic robber barons like Andrew Carnegie and Jay Gould.
— Thomas J. Misa, author of Leonardo to the Internet
Skullduggery, robber baron intrigue, and engineering genius on the shores of the Mississippi River after the Civil War: John Brown tells the gripping, many-sided genesis story of Eadss graceful, steel-arched bridge at St. Louis, set in an era when steel was still an experimental material and no one knew quite what to do with it.
— Robert Kanigel, author of The One Best Way: Frederick Winslow Taylorand the Enigma of Efficiency
