Unbuilding the Grace and Pearman Bridges


For Sparky and myself, curiosity drives passion which in turn fuels our life's engine. Our passion was capturing the story of both unbuilding the Grace (1929 - 2007) and Pearman (1966 - 2007) Bridges and discovering the unbuilders. It takes a lot of passion to track a project from July 2005 until April 2007 - rain, shine, hurricanes or moving to Singapore. We discovered the joy of discovery learning. Ken Canty opened the front door for us - then Steve Testa, Ponch Billingsley and Mickey Rogers opened many side doors. Below are the highlights of what we discovered, who we met and what we learned.

And a reminder from T.S. Eliot (East Coker from the Four Quartets)

Home is where one starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.

April 18, 2006:
Drilling P-8 and C-2

Mickey and his guys are drilling P-8 and C-2 (from the jackup barge). Here is the worksite with cousin Arthur watching

From the Mt. Pleasant side. Mickey's team working on the Pearman and our ironworker acrobats working on unbuilding Grace

and a closer view

The John Henry in the resting position

and drilling P-8

more drilling of P-8

and drilling C-2 from the jackup barge

From the side

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C. Frank Starmer

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