the future with the cruelty that has been inflicted
on the community in the name of progress."
Governor Nelson Rockefeller of New York had been invited to attend the ceremony in Staten Island, but he sent a telegram expressing
regret that a prior engagement made it impossible for him to be there. He designated Assembly Speaker Joseph Carlino to read
his message. But Mr. Carlino did not show up. Robert Moses had to read it.
As Mr. Moses expressed all the grand hope of the future, a small airplane chartered by the Staten Island Chamber of Commerce
circled overhead with an advertising banner that urged "Name it the Staten Island Bridge." Many people opposed the name Verrazano—which
had been loudly recommended by the Italian Flistorical Society of America and its founder, John N. La Corte—because they could
not spell it. Others, many of them Irish, did not want a bridge named after an Italian, and they took to calling it the "Guinea
Gangplank." Still others advocated simpler names—"The Gateway Bridge," "Freedom Bridge," "Neptune Bridge," "New World Bridge,"
"The Narrows Bridge." One of the last things ever written by Ludwig Bemelmans was a letter to the New York Times expressing the hope that the name "Verrazano" be dropped in favor of a more "romantic" and "tremendous" name, and he suggested
calling it the "Commissioner Moses Bridge." But the Italian Historical Society, boasting a large membership of emotional voters,
was not about to knuckle under, and finally after months of debate and threats, a compromise was reached in the name "Verrazano-Narrows
Bridge."
The person making the least amount of noise about the bridge all this time was the man who was creating it—Othmar H. Ammann,
a lean, elderly, proper man in a high starched collar, who now, in his eightieth year, was recognized as probably the greatest
bridge engineer in the world. His monumental achievement so far, the one that soared above dozens of others, was the George
Washington Bridge, the sight of which had quietly thrilled him since its completion in 1931. Since then, when he and his wife
drove down along the Hudson River from upstate New York and suddenly saw the bridge looming in the distance, stretching like
a silver rainbow over the river between New York and New Jersey, they often gently bowed and saluted it.
"That bridge is his firstborn, and it was a difficult birth," his wife once explained. "He'll always love it best." And Othmar
Ammann, though reluctant to reveal any sentimentality, nevertheless once described its effect upon him. "It is as if you have
a beautiful daughter," he said, "and you are the father."
But now the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge presented Ammann with an even larger task. And to master its gigantic design he would
even have to take into account the curvature of the earth. The two 693-foot towers, though exactly perpendicular to the earth's
surface, would have to be one and five-eighths inches farther apart at their summits than at their bases.
Though the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge would require 188,000 tons of steel—three times the amount used in the Empire State Building—Ammann
knew that it would be an ever restless structure, would always sway slightly in the wind. Its steel cables would swell when
hot and contract when cold, and its roadway would be twelve feet closer to the water in summer than in winter. Sometimes,
on long hot summer days, the sun would beat down on one side of the structure with such intensity that it might warp the steel
slightly, making the bridge a fraction lower on its hot side than on its shady side. So, Ammann knew, any precision measuring
to be done during the bridge's construction would have to be done at night.
From the start of a career that began in 1902, when he graduated from the Swiss Federal Polytechnic Institute with a degree
in civil engineering, Ammann had made few mistakes. He had been a careful student, a perfectionist. He had
on the community in the name of progress."
Governor Nelson Rockefeller of New York had been invited to attend the ceremony in Staten Island, but he sent a telegram expressing
regret that a prior engagement made it impossible for him to be there. He designated Assembly Speaker Joseph Carlino to read
his message. But Mr. Carlino did not show up. Robert Moses had to read it.
As Mr. Moses expressed all the grand hope of the future, a small airplane chartered by the Staten Island Chamber of Commerce
circled overhead with an advertising banner that urged "Name it the Staten Island Bridge." Many people opposed the name Verrazano—which
had been loudly recommended by the Italian Flistorical Society of America and its founder, John N. La Corte—because they could
not spell it. Others, many of them Irish, did not want a bridge named after an Italian, and they took to calling it the "Guinea
Gangplank." Still others advocated simpler names—"The Gateway Bridge," "Freedom Bridge," "Neptune Bridge," "New World Bridge,"
"The Narrows Bridge." One of the last things ever written by Ludwig Bemelmans was a letter to the New York Times expressing the hope that the name "Verrazano" be dropped in favor of a more "romantic" and "tremendous" name, and he suggested
calling it the "Commissioner Moses Bridge." But the Italian Historical Society, boasting a large membership of emotional voters,
was not about to knuckle under, and finally after months of debate and threats, a compromise was reached in the name "Verrazano-Narrows
Bridge."
The person making the least amount of noise about the bridge all this time was the man who was creating it—Othmar H. Ammann,
a lean, elderly, proper man in a high starched collar, who now, in his eightieth year, was recognized as probably the greatest
bridge engineer in the world. His monumental achievement so far, the one that soared above dozens of others, was the George
Washington Bridge, the sight of which had quietly thrilled him since its completion in 1931. Since then, when he and his wife
drove down along the Hudson River from upstate New York and suddenly saw the bridge looming in the distance, stretching like
a silver rainbow over the river between New York and New Jersey, they often gently bowed and saluted it.
"That bridge is his firstborn, and it was a difficult birth," his wife once explained. "He'll always love it best." And Othmar
Ammann, though reluctant to reveal any sentimentality, nevertheless once described its effect upon him. "It is as if you have
a beautiful daughter," he said, "and you are the father."
But now the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge presented Ammann with an even larger task. And to master its gigantic design he would
even have to take into account the curvature of the earth. The two 693-foot towers, though exactly perpendicular to the earth's
surface, would have to be one and five-eighths inches farther apart at their summits than at their bases.
Though the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge would require 188,000 tons of steel—three times the amount used in the Empire State Building—Ammann
knew that it would be an ever restless structure, would always sway slightly in the wind. Its steel cables would swell when
hot and contract when cold, and its roadway would be twelve feet closer to the water in summer than in winter. Sometimes,
on long hot summer days, the sun would beat down on one side of the structure with such intensity that it might warp the steel
slightly, making the bridge a fraction lower on its hot side than on its shady side. So, Ammann knew, any precision measuring
to be done during the bridge's construction would have to be done at night.
From the start of a career that began in 1902, when he graduated from the Swiss Federal Polytechnic Institute with a degree
in civil engineering, Ammann had made few mistakes. He had been a careful student, a perfectionist. He had
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