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 15, 2006: One span of the Pearman ramp remains

Sparky captures the progress with the Pearman ramp and Mt. Pleasant observation platform.

A view of the worksite

as seen from the Grace - two support pier stubs for the observation platform

The jackup barge has been moved to the base of C-3 - which supports the end of the Pearman cantilever span

The last span of the Pearman ramp

and the piers being converted into the Mt. Pleasant observation platform foundation

as seen from below

and from the south

the red marks indicating the top of the observation platform support

a closer view

a fun view of the Pearman worksite through Jackie's grapple

and residual rebar in the Coleman recycle center

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

C. Frank Starmer

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