Michael O Shaughnessy: The Construction Of The Golden Gate Bridge

The Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge

Imagine being a teenage kid and getting out of bed at 6:00 AM every morning to feed the your family’s animals before breakfast begins. After eating breakfast, you go to school in a horse and buggy passing people on foot that are not as affluent as you are. You get to school and begin all of your classwork, but once your studies have been completed, you don’t get to to to basketball practice, watch TV or text your friends because you have to go work on the farm...again. This is what life was like in the early 1900’s. For many Americans who lived during the time of The Great Depression, enduring each day seemed to be a hardship, and simply getting by was all that they could focus on. The people of America needed some iconic symbol of hope to help remind them of the strength of their

Soon after, he started an editorial campaign for a bridge, which sparked the attention of Michael O’Shaughnessy, an engineer of the time. O’Shaughnessy was so captivated by the idea that he began asking other engineers what the cost of such a project would be. The way that most engineers responded was not promising. Most of them believed that a bridge such as the one he was describing could not be built, and they estimated it would cost over 100 million dollars ("Construction Information”). One man, however, Joseph Strauss, had confidence that the bridge would succeed. He believed not only that such a bridge was a reasonable idea, but could easily be built for about 30 million dollars. On June 28, 1921, Strauss gave rough sketches to O’Shaughnessy, estimating the cost of the bridge to be 27 million dollars. Then, Strauss began pursuing his mission to convince other civic leaders that the bridge was indeed feasible and would end up paying for itself through tolls alone (“Construction Begins on the Golden Gate