Across the 21 bridges that connect Manhattan to the world, none is so beloved as the Brooklyn Bridge, a triumph of engineering that stands the test of time a century and a half later. With over 1,500 feet at its central span, the New York and Brooklyn Bridge was the longest suspension bridge in the world when it opened in 1883, the culmination of years of grueling work that nearly halted the project.

This specimen is a piece of original suspension cable from the Brooklyn Bridge, replaced in 1988 during refurbishment efforts.

All specimens are enclosed in an acrylic specimen jar with a removable top which arrives in a handsome, glass-topped riker box case measuring 4x3x1". It comes complete with a 3x4" display card with photos of the Brooklyn Bridge and the specimen, as well as information about the construction. The larger cards also serve as the certificate of authenticity and feature the official Mini Museum Seal of Authenticity.

In addition to the larger card, we have also included our standard photo card, in case you wish to keep a unified look with the other Mini Museum items in your collection.

In the mid-nineteenth century, civil engineer John Augustus Roebling was a master architect of countless aqueduct and bridge projects, helming the construction of the Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge, Roebling's Delaware Aqueduct, and many more. While conducting surveyor work for what would become the Cincinnati-Covington Bridge, Roebling reported that suspension bridge technology had advanced to the point that a bridge 1,500 feet in length at its span could be realized.

With the Ohio River Bridge’s record-breaking success at 1,057 feet in span, Roebling won the contract to construct a bridge spanning the East River, connecting Manhattan to Brooklyn. Roebling set to work, drawing up plans for a bridge with an advanced steel cable design, gothic revival towers, and a pedestrian promenade. It was during his work surveying the Brooklyn project that Roebling’s foot was crushed by a boat docking along the river, leading to an infection that killed the man a few weeks later, on July 22, 1869. The designs already made, construction passed to Roebling’s son, Washington and the younger Roebling set to work later that year.

The first step of construction required placing two massive air-tight caissons along the bottom of the river to provide the base of the bridge’s towers. They were towed into place by boats, then sunk and securely embedded in the earth. Workers would travel through an airlock and down a metal tube to reach the airtight chamber at the bottom of the river, then digging out the earth to secure the structure.

Work in the caissons could only be described as hellish. Because the chamber was airtight and there was a danger of explosion or fire, no proper lighting was possible. The work, already back-breaking, was made all the worse by the fiery temperatures that could reach 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Explosions and fires were not uncommon in the airtight space. In all, at least 20 workers died during construction, while those who lived were paid just two dollars a day for their work.

With all the dangers of the work, the sinking of the caissons was no simple task and the workers progressed only six inches every week in the summer of 1870. To speed things along, Roebling resorted to explosives to blast through the earth and set the caissons. Later, while supervising work in the airtight chambers, Roebling became sick from decompression sickness and had to resign from the project. He was one of many on the project who suffered from “the bends,” but the condition was not understood at the time.

The mighty project had struck two Roeblings, leaving it to Washington’s wife Emily Warren Roebling to oversee the project. Emily acted as Washington’s eyes and ears while construction continued, but she became a self-taught engineer in her own right as the mammoth undertaking continued. With the caissons embedded, the bridge’s towers were built over a period of four years, drawn from 20 quarries that ferried massive granite blocks to the construction site. The Brooklyn tower was finished in 1875, with the New York tower following the next year, both of them standing 276.5 feet tall.

Next came the bridge’s anchorages, which held four iron plates that each weighed 23 tons. These anchorages were the anchors for the four main cables that connected the two towers, providing a base from which all the other cables would be connected. The house-bound Washington Roebling returned to the site in 1876 to supervise the spinning of the bridge’s cables. This process involved spinning wheels carrying the cables back and forth along the bridge on the four main cables.

Bureaucratic delays and fighting between New York and Brooklyn’s municipal governments delayed work, but by 1879 steel suspenders were laid along the cable, ready to support the bridge’s floor beams. In the home stretch, the bridge’s board of trustees attempted to fire Washington Roebling from the project after he requested approval for another thousand tons of steel to reinforce the bridge. Rumors swelled around the reclusive engineer, but he and Emily eventually won out, and the bridge was finally completed. 

Under the name of the New York and Brooklyn Bridge, the structure opened on May 24, 1883, accompanied by massive parties in the two linked cities. Nearly a century and a half later, the Brooklyn Bridge still stands strong, contending with traffic and weight demands unknown to the nineteenth-century. The bridge’s gothic towers remains an unforgettable part of the New York skyline, a triumph of style and function all in one.