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.

December 1, 2005: From SCDOT - a view from above What a difference looking from above makes. Starting around America Street and working our way around the Cooper River.

Here is the area between Meeting and East Bay St.

The East Bay Stonehenge - looking south

And Chris Vocci lifing sections of the Grace supports

The Grace and Pearman approaches to the Town Creek crossing

The Grace Town Creek mainspan after the October 11 Pearman blast

The Grace skeleton crossing Drum Island

And here is Pio and Richie and Jackie - removing the Grace roadway

The Ravenel, Grace and Pearman main spans

Looking north up Town Creek and the Grace main span

back at the port, here is Chris

East Bay and Line 14 ramp to the Ravenel Bridge

The Pearman ramp approaching East Bay

Around America St

The Town Creek crossing

The Town Creek crossing

The Ravenel and Town Creek

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

C. Frank Starmer

_