fishing the
day before, after school, and had dumped his catch in the dumbwaiter. He denied it, and the next night, when the odor became
worse, she telephoned the police. They soon discovered that the elderly man living on the first floor, the only other tenant
in the house, had three days before murdered his wife with shotgun bullets and now, dazed and silent, he was sitting next
to the corpse, empty whiskey bottles at his feet.
"Lady, do me a favor," the police sergeant said to Florence Campbell. "Get out of this block, will ya?"
She said she would, but she still could not find an apartment during her searchings. She had no relatives she could move in
with, no friends within the neighborhood, because they had all moved. When she came home at midnight from apartment hunting,
she would find the hall dark—somebody was always stealing the light bulb—or she might stumble over a drunken derelict sleeping
on the sidewalk in front of the downstairs door.
A few nights after the sergeant's warning she was awakened from sleep by the sounds of shuffling feet outside her door and
the pounding of fists against the wall. Her son, in the adjoining bedroom, jumped up, grabbed a shotgun he kept in his closet,
and ran out into the hall. But it was completely dark, the light bulb had been stolen again. He tripped and Florence Campbell
screamed.
A strange man raced up the steps to the roof. She called the police. They came quickly but could find no one on the roof.
The police sergeant again told her to leave, and she nodded, weeping, that she would. The next day she was too nervous to
go to work, and so she went to a nearby bar to get a drink and told the bartender what had happened, and, very excited, he
told her he knew of an apartment that was available a block away for sixty-eight dollars a month. She ran to the address,
got the apartment—and the landlord could not understand why, after she got it, she began to cry.
CHAPTER THREE
SUR VIV AL OF
THE FITTEST
The bridge began as bridges always begin—silently. It began with underwater investigations and soil studies and survey sheets;
and when the noise finally started, on January 16, 1959, nobody in Brooklyn or Staten Island heard it.
It started with the sound of a steam pile driver ramming a pipe thirty-six inches in diameter into the silt of a small island
off the Brooklyn shore. The island held an old battered bastion called Fort Lafayette, which had been a prison during the
Civil War, but now it was about to be demolished, and the island would only serve as a base for one of the bridge's two gigantic
towers.
Nobody heard the first sounds of the bridge because they were soft and because the island was six hundred feet off the Brooklyn
shore; but even if it had been closer, the sounds would not have risen above the rancor and clamor of the people, for when
the drilling began, the people still were protesting, still were hopeful that the bridge would never be built. They were aware
that the city had not yet formally condemned their property—but that came three months later. On April 30, 1959, in Brooklyn
Supreme Court, Justice J. Vincent Keogh—who would later go to jail on charges of sharing in a bribe to fix another case—signed
the acquisition papers, and four hundred Bay Ridge residents suddenly stopped protesting and submitted in silence.
The next new noise was the spirited, high-stepping sound of a marching band and the blaring platitudes of politicians echoing
over a sun-baked parade ground on August 14, 1959—it was groundbreaking day for the bridge, with the ceremony held, wisely,
on the Staten Island side. Over in Brooklyn, when a reporter asked State Senator William T Conklin for a reaction, the Bay
Ridge representative snapped, "It is not a ground-breaking—to many it will be heartbreaking." And then, slowly and more emotionally,
he continued: "Any public official attending should always be identified in
day before, after school, and had dumped his catch in the dumbwaiter. He denied it, and the next night, when the odor became
worse, she telephoned the police. They soon discovered that the elderly man living on the first floor, the only other tenant
in the house, had three days before murdered his wife with shotgun bullets and now, dazed and silent, he was sitting next
to the corpse, empty whiskey bottles at his feet.
"Lady, do me a favor," the police sergeant said to Florence Campbell. "Get out of this block, will ya?"
She said she would, but she still could not find an apartment during her searchings. She had no relatives she could move in
with, no friends within the neighborhood, because they had all moved. When she came home at midnight from apartment hunting,
she would find the hall dark—somebody was always stealing the light bulb—or she might stumble over a drunken derelict sleeping
on the sidewalk in front of the downstairs door.
A few nights after the sergeant's warning she was awakened from sleep by the sounds of shuffling feet outside her door and
the pounding of fists against the wall. Her son, in the adjoining bedroom, jumped up, grabbed a shotgun he kept in his closet,
and ran out into the hall. But it was completely dark, the light bulb had been stolen again. He tripped and Florence Campbell
screamed.
A strange man raced up the steps to the roof. She called the police. They came quickly but could find no one on the roof.
The police sergeant again told her to leave, and she nodded, weeping, that she would. The next day she was too nervous to
go to work, and so she went to a nearby bar to get a drink and told the bartender what had happened, and, very excited, he
told her he knew of an apartment that was available a block away for sixty-eight dollars a month. She ran to the address,
got the apartment—and the landlord could not understand why, after she got it, she began to cry.
CHAPTER THREE
SUR VIV AL OF
THE FITTEST
The bridge began as bridges always begin—silently. It began with underwater investigations and soil studies and survey sheets;
and when the noise finally started, on January 16, 1959, nobody in Brooklyn or Staten Island heard it.
It started with the sound of a steam pile driver ramming a pipe thirty-six inches in diameter into the silt of a small island
off the Brooklyn shore. The island held an old battered bastion called Fort Lafayette, which had been a prison during the
Civil War, but now it was about to be demolished, and the island would only serve as a base for one of the bridge's two gigantic
towers.
Nobody heard the first sounds of the bridge because they were soft and because the island was six hundred feet off the Brooklyn
shore; but even if it had been closer, the sounds would not have risen above the rancor and clamor of the people, for when
the drilling began, the people still were protesting, still were hopeful that the bridge would never be built. They were aware
that the city had not yet formally condemned their property—but that came three months later. On April 30, 1959, in Brooklyn
Supreme Court, Justice J. Vincent Keogh—who would later go to jail on charges of sharing in a bribe to fix another case—signed
the acquisition papers, and four hundred Bay Ridge residents suddenly stopped protesting and submitted in silence.
The next new noise was the spirited, high-stepping sound of a marching band and the blaring platitudes of politicians echoing
over a sun-baked parade ground on August 14, 1959—it was groundbreaking day for the bridge, with the ceremony held, wisely,
on the Staten Island side. Over in Brooklyn, when a reporter asked State Senator William T Conklin for a reaction, the Bay
Ridge representative snapped, "It is not a ground-breaking—to many it will be heartbreaking." And then, slowly and more emotionally,
he continued: "Any public official attending should always be identified in
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