7 Wonders Of The Industrial World
I: Great Eastern Ship
It all began in the year 1852, Isambard Kingdom Brunel was lobbying for financing the Great Eastern Ship he had composed in his mind in a pub in London. The project raised their eyebrows: As the largest of its kind of that time, the ship that could carry over 4000 passengers was a floating city that cost 15000 tons of coal and over 200 men to power the stem engins that were higher than 4 floors and could produce 800+ horsepower. Though Brunel was so convinced that he presented it without fail compromise, many of those would-be investers thought it's beyond what men could achieve and 6 of them were out. Having built many bridges which were all great, Brunel was famous for the public not popular among the financers. At the end, the financers gambled the ship migt get them rich.
So the ship enterred the design phase, and the designer was John Russel who, together with Brunel, were moving into the uncharted water.
They, however, had something in disagreement--how to launch the vehical.
Another obstacle occurred soon after the construction. A fire swept through the shipyard. In 2 hours, the fire engulfed the yard. Russel was in despair because no insurrance coverred the yard. By the help from Brunel, the yard was repaired in few months.
5 months later, Brunel demonstrated how the hollowed bars, for the sake of easing the weight of the ship, were rigid and solid enough to stand such weight. There were many crownheads attended.
After the first year of constraction, things were not going well. It's the tight finacial issue. At the board meeting, Russel was accused of stealing the iron to repair the shipyard burned down during that fire. Plus the deteriorating health--the kidney failour of Brunel, the building went into the deadlock.
4 months later, they restarted the work. Bank gave back the confiscated yard,but demanded that the ship must launch at the time written in the contract.
The race was on. The tension between Brunel and Russel increased: Russel thought the ship should have a free launch; Brunel demanded the launch beside the shore.
With the launch was less than a week to go, Brunel wanted the launch to be a public one and he had skld 3000 tickets for the launch. Consequently, the lanch was totally a chaos: A broken chain was lashing into the workers caused 5 men critically injured. While the ship was only 4 feet moved. A month later, there was another 30 feet moved. Suddenly, the anger of the world suspened the launch. The newspaper was headlined:"It's the engineer of folly!"
Another 2 months later,there still were 100 feet between the water and the ship. Brunel had to work on site all day and night and only to catch time to sleep. Even in that case, the pushing and pulling went on for 90 days.
Finally, on Janurary 31st 1858, the ship floated for the first time. Brunel deeply believed that this ship could circumnavigate the globe.
While till then, the whole project was four times over budget. Brunel had to sell almost everything in inventory at hand. At the mainwhile, Russel started working on the interior of the ship.
18 months passed from then, the Great Eastern was ready!!!
The ship was equipped with the largest engins ever built at that time--the colossals of the engins of that time. Brunel was so proud of his workwhich was the one he ever built before at such immense cost. Not soon after his tramph, Brunel collapsed at strokes and this time it took his toll. He died at the age of 53. Russel never built another ship after this one.
In 1859, the ship kicked off her maiden voige towards maryland with Brunel on board. When passing Heistings, one of the engins exploded.
Equipped with the avantguard technology at that time--the translantic cable and built 50 years ahead Titanic, the Great Eastern was racked on the first day of 1889. It was labled as the commercial disaster!!!
II: The Brooklyn Bridge
The Brooklyn Bridge looms majestically over the east river linking Brooklyn and Newyork. Its constraction created the morden Newyork!!!
It's the vision of its original designer--John Augustus Roebling; his son, Washington A Roebling's tradgic inheritence; and it's the duty of the woman of Washington--Emily to unvail the story behind its construction based upon her papercutting.
John was an German immigrant who built marvalous bridges as a way of telling that nothing is impossible. In his vision, the Brooklyn Bridge would be the longest steel cable-suspension bridge with two gigantic towers in the world at that time. It also would be the tallest, strongest and most dangerous to be built one.
Just three days after its start, John injured his toe. He insisted that he could heel himself by a therapy created by himself--the water-dropping. Unfortunately, the original designer died after 10 days' sufferring from tetanus.
His son--Washington took over the job after he persuaded those board members with three reasons: first, he holded shares in the cable company created by his father; second, he spended a year of studying the mathod of caisson filled with pressed air; third, he assisted his father in the design of the bridge and he had the duty to finish it.
It's a work required deligence, sacrefice, and loyalty.
To achieve a solid foundation for the bridge, workers excavated the riverbed in massive wooden boxes called caissons(160 feet ×100 feet) These airtight chambers were pinned to the river's floor by enomormous granite blocks and pressuraze air was pumped in to keep water out. It's a very hard work for those immigrant "sandhogs" who only earned 2 dollars a day to work in the mixture of heat and compressed air. They used dynamite to clear away the mud and boulders to sink the caissons deeper into the bottom of the river, which was very dangerous because the fire would distroy everything. But they found it's only the smoke that bothered their work.
In its process, Washington was always with them on site. He was a more approachable man when compared with his father. If he set his mind on something, he does it. One day in December, a fire occured in the wooden roof of the caisson. It's devastating because if the roof failed, tons of granite would fall upon workers. In order to extinguish the fire, Washington standed side by side with those workers for 20 hours inthe compressed air, which leaded to his sufferring of the bends.
Their work progessed slowly by only down a foot and a half a week. It cost 5 months to get down to the bottom of the river. When they reached a sufficient depth-44 feet on the Brooklyn side and 78 feet on the Manhattan side-they began laying granite, working their way back up to the surface.
Not very soon later, the desease bends cost Washington more than he could imagine. He was partially paralized and had to move to a quiete place for recovery. During that period of time, his wife delieved him massages back and forth from the construction site.
When the construction reached the phase of cable suspension, someone cheated Washington by replacing the cables from Boelbing company by ones with lower quality. This scandal deteriorated the already-seriously-illed Washington.
On May 24th, 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge over the East River opened, connecting Newyork and Brooklyn for the first time in history. Thousands of residents there turned out to witness the dedication ceremony. Emily Boeling, on behalf of her husband, was given the first ride over the completed bridge, with a rooster, asymble of victory, in her lap. On that day, an estimated 250000 people walked across the bridge, using a broad promenade above the roadway that John Boebling designed solely for the enjoyment of pedestrians.
The Brooklyn Bridge was dubbed the "Eighth Wonder of The World".
III: The BellRock Light Tower
11 miles from the coast of Scotland (the Angus coast). For centuries, this area of water claimed thousands of lives; ships were torn apart. There was a warning bell given by local monks which was sank within a year by the torrential waves. That's how the name "BellRock" came from.
After December 1799(another tradgedy occurred), a young man named Robert Stevenson whose architectural knowledge was self-taught decided to build a lighthouse on those rockes to tame the monster. His plan was inspired by the one 50 years previous--a stone tower.
1800's summer, Robert completed his survey and made a plan for the lighthouse. But it was rejected by the authority.
1804, another severe lost--all 500 crew lost and the ship sank. The authority finally approved Robert's plan. But they appointed another man--John as the chief engineer, and let Robert be his assistant.
Anyway, Robert enlisted 60 men to do this tough job.
August 17th, 1807, the team sailed to the rocks for the construction. Considerin the condition there--the rocks would be submerged into the waves for 20 hours per day, they could work only during that 2 months of summer. So the task required the moral improvement and technology advancement went hand in hand.
The work was regulated by the tide. The time was tight. So Robert decided to build a beacon house for resting first. And he suggested if they could work on Sabbath--the God's day for rest. He thought that God will bless their endeavours even to the point they had to work on His Day. But it's refused by several of the men.
On 2ed September, 1807, one of the shuttle boat that carried the workers back and forth between the rocks and the land was drift away by the wave. Soon the rock would be hnder 12 feet of the water, and one boat was not enough to carry them back. Luckily, the supply boat appearred from the mainland that day to save them. Then they eagered to finish the beacon house quickly.
Raising the beacon legs marked their first year's work. Still, the men had less faith in whether the beacon house could stand after thaf winter and in Stevenson as their leader.
During the winter months, workers cut the fundation stones--one ton of granite.
Well, Stevenson revieled the design for the lights which was inspired by a french man. To put a glass tube over a flame will magnify the light; to place it behind can focus the light. Additionally, Robert wanted his light house be the very distinguish one that he designed the light in the alternation of red and white flash.
In the spring of the next year, the workers returned and fohnd the beacon lags survived the harsh winter. Foundation stones were shipped by a horse to the rock. The beacon house soon was done. It could house 50 men. At the beacon house'refugee, the men hoped they would safe on the rocks. But there was still a young man carried away by the strong current during a stormy night. Three days later, his brother took his place.
At the second year of work, only three shelves of stones had been laid.
22ed of August 1809, Robert called a hault to that season due to the tight budget issue. And to provent John' inspection on set, he wrote minute things in letters which got equal long, detailed letters in return. Robert disregarded those letters.
During that winter, Robert's own faith got tested: he lost his twins in January, and two weeks later, his daughter died from disease.
1810 was the final season. Anogher man lost during that summer's storm.
When it was done, many people travelled great distance to marvel this achievement which stands about 100 feet high, and 24 alternative lenterns shining.
The controversy of the designer of the this light house went on for centuries. It was Robert Stevenson who, after this achievement, built a dynesty of light house builders. His sons and grandsons were all light house builders.
IV: The Sewer King Of London
London--the world first matropolitics whose population more than doubled in 50 years. However, the city was on the brim of abyss. Cholera, the desease acclaimed thousands of lives and the city was full of human waste and filthy air. The worse point was no one knew the cause of the desease and how to cure it.
"Without sanitaion, we are beasts!!!" Joseph Bazalgette put it in this way. August 1849, Joseph set himself the task of building the sewer system.
Together with other 55 people, Joseph pleaded to build a drainage system. Well the authority turned to TIMES for advice.
Some thought it was the "Miasma" caused the desease and believed that by fleshing the sewer into the river Thimes, the desease would disappear.
At the same time, another man called John Snow did his research just one sweet apart and had a different idea. He thought the cholera was a water-born desease. By meticulously spot black dots of the outbreak, he found the pumpwater was contagious. He suggested the pumpwater supply must be cut. Many doubted this, but the desease disappeared after the pomp removed for a short period of time. In 1853, the desease returned.
Against all odds, Joseph planned to build slopes of villey so that sewage could be washed by gravity. He calculated the speed of the river, sited the outpoint on Thimes according to the tide's ebb and flow which would take away the waste.
February 18th 1856, Joseph began his first draft of the plan. There would be three sewers which were like three great boulevards last 1100 miles beneath London. He beljeved the plan would save lives and money. But the plan was rejected.
After seven years of planning, five times of re-draw the plan. In the summer of 1858, the smell was the worst ever. Finally, the pens, ink and debates let the authority give Joseph a go-ahead with three million pounds, and the plan started.
During the constraction, there was an explosion occurred which brought the deathtoll of 6 on June 25th 1862. And plasterer demanded six shillings a day.
Therefore, Joseph required the highest safety standards and quality control. Taken the risk of failour that would let him be crusified by the newspaper, he invited a reporter, one of those vilified him, to join him to witness the joint of two sections of the turnnels. Well, the triumphant moment of the handshake of two workers from each side brought Joseph "No tribute of praise is not deserved!!!"
On 4th April 1865, the engines that pomped the sewer went on a public start. It's another test for Joseph, after the joint of the two tunnels, because "in our haste to be prepare for the day", it's not tested beforehand.
Politicians started to applaud his achievement, and it's an ubiquiter and dramatic improvement in health across the whole city.
While, it's too early to celebrate. It didn't work jn the east part of London. And less than three months after the sewer started, the cholera returned.
However, it's clear this time to nail the true cause of the desease as the sewer system worked and the smell venished. They found stinky eals in the resovior which leaded to the explosure that the East Water Company supplied the unflitered water. It's 8 years after Dr Snow's death that came the tribute that he was right--water purification is the priority for public health improvement.
July 26th 1876, two mknths of rainfall tested Joseph's work, and it coped it well.
Part of Joseph's system has become the underground railway in north part of London. After the sewer system, Joseph built bridges cross rivers, turned small allies into boulevards, and parks. It's Joseph who built the modern London.
V: The Panama Canel
Since Columbus, men has the dream of explore. When explorers set their foot on the land of America, they though they could do something to it. The Panama Canel is one of the greatest of the morden world. Great ocean of the world devided the continant and civilization.
The concept of building a canel accrossing the Artilatic and the Pacific was first concieved by a Frenchman called Ferdinand dd Lesspes who built the Sueze Canel in Egypt in 1869. He was alagend. Although reaching to his 80s, De Lasspes wanted another one to proof himself.
To build such a canel that last 8000 miles cutting through central America, he raised 60 million dollars. Well there was a mighty mountain range called Kulabula, snake in spanish, blocked their way. The mountain Kulabula became their cutting point.
During the project, another tough issue emerged--the tropical desease, say miasma, which claimed 6000 lives in the first five years of constraction. The cost to tackle this desease was innomous, so De Lasspes chimed his investorsto quaterope the investment. And the Panama area had become the fever coast, which brought his faith to the edge. Apart from that, the torrential rainfall allowed the sealevel up, which prolonged the constraction 15 years longer than it's promised. The frenchman was in crisis.
The yellow fever let the death toll souring. At the end of 1885, one in tens kf the workers died. Many thought he was the grave digger, instead of the canel digger.
Due to the anxiety, De Lasspes was ailing. Even in that case, he refused to change his orignal design. In December 1888, he went bankrupt, which was the biggest financial crisis in human history at that time. He was detetiorated both by reputation and in health. Soon, he died.
Till that there had been over 2000 people perished in digging thus bloody ditch. The project was infamous for curruption and disgrace.
17 years eloipsed. Then President Roosevelt appointed John Stevensto ckntinue this task. Roosevelt did this because he wanted the US Navy to dominate the ocean.
1903, the once bloody canel had become the ocean highway--John built a train system so that viecles could move quickly.
But the yellow fever feared lots away. Dr. Gorgus believed the mosquetal was the cause. He found the hospital worked as the encubator for the desease. He suggested isolation cages were needed. John assigned a blank check and 4000 men to battle the mosquetals. Then, cool and comfortable houses were built in Panama, along with all the stores, post-offices, and entertaining facilities. After 6 months, the yellow fever was completely wiped out.
Back to the battle with the mighty mountain. John used tons of dinamites to break it. But the rainfall caused flooding and landslides. New machines were no match to the natural force.
Then there came the long forgotten plan--the dam. There were many critics about it, which, mainly, ckuld be put into two points: I. it's an earthquake hotspot; II. the concret couldn't battle the water.
November 1906, an unexpected visit of Roosvelt convinced the plan.
March 1907, without a word of explanation, John left the project. Rumers said that he got some other lucrative jobs.
Roosevelt appointed someone who couldn't resign--the one from army.
It's still the desease rouse the issue. The Doctor believed cutting budget would lose the control on mosquetals. For 6 months, the army man and the doctor fight for the budget. "The tiny insrcts could derail the might army!!!"
The building of the dam went on for anither 6 years. In June 1913, they got to the first test. A flip of the switch could open the door. The dam was completed. It required three years to fill the dam with water.
In October 1913, the mountain was finally conquered.
In August 1914, the whole thing was done. It cost 28000 lives and nearly 3 billion dollars. Irronically, the first viecle chosen to cross the canel was a humble tugboat.
VI: The World First Transcontinetal Railway
1863 was the year that American Civil War broke. President Lincon ordered a railway constracted to cross ranges of mighty mountains and vast prairie.
It began in a carlifornia township. August 1st,1863, four carlifornia shopkeepers shovelled the first piece of earth.
Till 14000 feet was achieved on that railway, the weather went so cold. Workers had no food to eat, and they started to resort to cannibalism. Most of they fleed and joined the dig of gold. In spring time 1864, herds of chinese emmigrants who were sufferred famine arrived for a new life. They were not only worked hard but also required less pay. Soon thousands of them were hired. They cracked rocks, laid track.
In the summer of 1865, govenment unlocked millions of dollars as the financial aid to this task. In 2 years, 40 miles of track was laid. And the civil war ended.
1866, 200 miles to the east, exsoldiers came into the new war. Within a month, the army led by Grandle Dudge were advanced the west 14 miles.
Well, what came with the army were drinks, gamble, and women, almost everything that catered to every need of those workers. Thoses women magnitized gunmen. In a word, there was the hotbed for vice, vile, and death. Having heared of such stuation, Dudge paid a secret visit there, and soon, the linch law appeared.
Therefore, less than 6 months, Dudge's army laid 250 miles.
Far to thw west, after 3 years, shopkeepers still stucked in the mluntains. Only 80 miles from where they started. They trid gunpowder to get through the rocks, but it's not powerful enough. Shopkeepers had to force the pace. An English chemist suggested the nitro-gasline which was not so stable but nine times powerful than gunpowder.
There were two Indie tribes lived that area--Sioux and Cheyenne. They took the railway a threat to their way of life. They thought they should do something. September 27th, 1867, a supplytrain was heading west. A fire occured on the track. Out of the smoke, two men running towards the rescurers shouting "the Indie men did this!!!" During that fire, 12 died and 7 missing. After that, workers were allowed to wear guns. That brought the bloodiest charpter in US history--a war of annialation. The wods were:No mercy, No compremise to tribes.
The east and west agreed a post in Utah where two routs would be converging. It was the race for prestidge. Two teams were setting remarkable pace and went neck amd neck. It's not clear who would win the race.
On April 30th,1869, after 6 years of digging and 700miles of tracklying, the shopkeepers reached their goal. They were the first to get to the post. Two days after, the other end reached.
On May 10th, 1869, the task was done!
This railway cost 6 years' hard work; claimed more than 2000 lives; amd changed the cause of America!
Lincon was dead but his dream was a reality. From the on, it's truely the United States!!!
VII: The Dam Of Colarordo River
In the early 20th century, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation devised plans for a massive dam on the Arizona-Nevada border to tame the Colorado River and provide water and hydroelectric power for the developing Southwest. Construction within the strict timeframe proved an immense challenge, as the crew bored into carbon monoxide-choked tunnels and dangled from heights of 800 feet to clear canyon walls. The largest dam in the world at the time of its completion in 1935, this National Historic Landmark stores enough water in Lake Mead to irrigate 2 million acres and serves as a popular tourist destination.
At the turn of the 20th century, farmers sought to divert the Colorado River to budding Southwestern communities via a series of canals. When the Colorado broke through the canals in 1905, creating the inland Salton Sea, the job of controlling the raging river fell to the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
Bureau director Arthur Powell Davis in 1922 outlined a plan before Congress for a multipurpose dam in Black Canyon, located on the Arizona-Nevada border. Named the Boulder Canyon project, after the original proposed site, the dam would not only control flooding and irrigation, it would generate and sell hydroelectric power to recoup its costs. Still, the proposed $165 price tag concerned some lawmakers, while representatives of six of the seven states in the river drainage area—Colorado,Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada —worried that the water would primarily go to California.
Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover brokered the 1922 Colorado River Compact to divide the water proportionally among the seven states, but the legal wrangling continued until outgoing President Calvin Coolidge authorized the Boulder Canyon Project in December 1928. In honor of the new president’s contributions, Secretary of the Interior Ray L. Wilbur announced the structure would be called Hoover Dam at a 1930 dedication ceremony, though the name didn’t become official until 1947.
As the Great Depression unfolded, hopeful laborers descended on Las Vegas and set up camp in the surrounding desert for the chance to work on the project. Those who were hired eventually moved to Boulder City, a community specifically built six miles from the work site to house its employees. Meanwhile, the U.S. government set about finding a contractor to build the proposed 60-story arch dam. The contract was awarded in March 1931 to Six Companies, a group of construction firms that had pooled its resources to meet the steep $5 million performance bond.
The first difficult step of construction involved blasting the canyon walls to create four diversion tunnels for the water. Facing strict time deadlines, workers toiled in 140-degree tunnels choked with carbon monoxide and dust, conditions that prompted a six-day strike in August 1931. When two of the tunnels were complete, the excavated rock was used to form a temporary coffer dam that successfully rechanneled the river’s path in November 1932.
The second step of involved the clearing of the walls that would contain the dam. Suspended from heights of up to 800 feet above the canyon floor, high scalers wielded 44-pound jackhammers and metal poles to knock loose material, a treacherous task that resulted in casualties from falling workers, equipment and rocks.
Meanwhile, the dried riverbed allowed for construction to begin on the powerplant, four intake towers and the dam itself. Cement was mixed onsite and hoisted across the canyon on one of five 20-ton cableways, a fresh bucket capable of reaching the crews below every 78 seconds. Offsetting the heat generated by cooling concrete, nearly 600 miles of pipe loops were embedded to circulate water through the poured blocks, with workers continually spraying the concrete to keep it moist.
As the dam rose, block by block, from the canyon floor, the visual renderings of architect Gordon Kaufmann took form. Electing to emphasize the imposing mass of the structure, Kaufmann kept the smooth, curved face free of adornment. The powerplant was given a futuristic touch with horizontal aluminum fins for windows, while its interior was designed to pay homage to Native American cultures.
With the body of water that would become Lake Mead already beginning to swell behind the dam, the final block of concrete was poured and topped off at 726 feet above the canyon floor in 1935. On September 30, a crowd of 20,000 people watched President Franklin Roosevelt commemorate the magnificent structure’s completion. Approximately 5 million barrels of cement and 45 million pounds of reinforcement steel had gone into what was then the tallest dam in the world, its 6.6 million tons of concrete enough to pave a road from San Francisco to New York City. Altogether, some 21,000 workers contributed to its construction.
Hoover Dam fulfilled the goal of disseminating the one-wild Colorado River through the parched Southwest landscape, fueling the development of such major cities as Los Angeles, Las Vegas and Phoenix. Capable of irrigating 2 million acres, its 17 turbines generate enough electricity to power 1.3 million homes. The dam was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1985 and one of America’s Seven Modern Civil Engineering Wonders in 1994. It receives some 7 million visitors annually, while Lake Mead, the world’s largest reservoir, hosts another 10 million as a popular recreation area.
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