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.

January 30, 2007: The last Grace pier

Sparky's computer died but nothing stops Michael from working. The middle of the Grace pier is being removed and later Mickey and Ken will bring the supports down.

The worksite: From left to right, port-o-potty, Grace pier, the Ravenel Bridge in the background and Chris (or Jimmy?) hammering away on the T-1 base

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A good view of the Grace pier

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and Chris's breaking up the T-1 base

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Chris's handiwork

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A good view of the Grace pier and the I-beam foundation for the Grace mid-span supports.

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Look what Michael did - see the moon in the central hole?

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The evening worksite

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

C. Frank Starmer

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