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 12, 2006: Building a rainbow

Sometime when you are with Sparky - good things suddenly stop and something great starts. Today was no exception. Watch God build a rainbow while driving down Morrison with Sparky

The start

dec_12_sparky_010.jpg

to the right of the Ravenel Bridge

dec_12_sparky_024.jpg

Passing the Grace skeleton

dec_12_sparky_033.jpg

Now just sit back and watch

dec_12_sparky_034.jpg

dec_12_sparky_036.jpg

dec_12_sparky_038.jpg

dec_12_sparky_039.jpg

dec_12_sparky_040.jpg

just visible to the right of the east tower

dec_12_sparky_041.jpg

then to the right of the last right cable

dec_12_sparky_045.jpg

and now some serious rainbow growing

dec_12_sparky_047.jpg

on the home stretch

dec_12_sparky_052.jpg

dec_12_sparky_057.jpg

and growing

dec_12_sparky_059.jpg

Now half a rainbow

dec_12_sparky_068.jpg

Then on the other side

dec_12_sparky_076.jpg

On the left

dec_12_sparky_088.jpg

and on the right - a double rainbow

dec_12_sparky_089.jpg

and the center

dec_12_sparky_090.jpg

and the end of the line

dec_12_sparky_092.jpg

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

C. Frank Starmer

_