Rating: 
Summary: Detailed but dry story of engineering marvel
Review: After "Truman" and "Johnstown Flood", both superb works, I was naturally atrtacted to the bridge. Unlike these first two, the Brooklyn Bridge is first and foremost a technical triumph, hatched from the mind of a father and son. The father did not live to see the bridge built. The son, for a variety of reasons, suffered so much from the physical and mental demands of the job that he might qualify as the "mad" bridgebuilder in the minds of many. McCollough offers extensive detail of the people, the politics, and the history. The science and engineering is a lot harder to follow, unless you have the mathematical and analytical rigor to follow along. Perhaps some more charts and figures would have helped. This is a long, hard read. The bridge was a longer, harder act. At times I felt like I was going to take as long to read the book as it took to build the bridge.
Rating: 
Summary: Masterful tribute to visionaries.
Review: Although finished over a hundred years ago, Mr. McCullough reminds us not to take the Brooklyn Bridge for granted. By interweaving hundreds of key participants and placing the events in the context of their times, Mr. McCullough reveals how hard it was to build, but how a determined few persevered. In fact, with all of the political opposition and in-fighting, it's a miracle that it did get finished during the height of the "Gilded Age." Mr. McCullough accomplishes one of the historian's hardest tasks by explaining why something we take for granted should be important to us living a century later; in other words he puts the struggle for the bridge in its proper backdrop with all of the colorful charactors who either contributed to or tried to prevent the bridge's construction. I have never been to the Brooklyn Bridge, but after reading this book, I plan on seeing it soon. Although the Bridge's story is unique to its turbulent time, it does transcend that context by celebrating the will and genius of men and women who know they are right. The story is universal in its testimony to the importance of following your beliefs. Washington Roebling and his wife Emily stand as true heroes who are still making a difference. Mr. McCullough is one of our best historians, as this book so ably proves. Highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: I Never Thought This Bridge Would Be Built !!!
Review: As a native New Yorker and having walked over the Brooklyn Bridge many times, I still wasn't sure if Roebling would be able to do it ! Mr. McCullough takes you right to 19th century New York and makes you realize what a struggle the building of this landmark actually was. I appreciate my engineer buds more now than ever. This is a testament to the human spirit over adversity. An amazing book that chronicles all the forces that came together to build a bridge : political, financial, technical, and spiritual. David McCullough at his story-telling best !
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating
Review: As someone born and raised in Brooklyn I was fascinated by this book. The history of the borough, the lives of important people who shaped the City of new York. It was written like a novel.
Rating:
Summary: McCullough's other epic construction project
Review: Before David McCullough wrote his classic epic "Path Between the Seas" about the Panama Canal, he took on the story of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. Today we tend to forget what a historic feat the building of the great bridge actually was. At the time of its construction, it was twice as large as the next largest suspension bridge in the world and it used plenty of never before tested construction methods. Hard to believe today, but its huge brick towers were at the time the tallest structures anywhere in New York. McCullough tells the story of the genius immigrant engineer John A. Roebling who designed the bridge and died horribly as the result of an accident during the planning phase. Roebling's son, Washington Roebling, took over his father's grandiose dream and suffered horrible physical torment from a little known ailment that would come to be officially known as "Cassion's Disease" after the huge cassions that Roebling sunk into the East River to support his bridge. Today we know the malady more popularly as "The Bends." McCullough is a first rate history author who knows how to convey his story with all the power of a great novel. Like Stephen Ambrose, he makes history come alive on the printed page. McCullough touches upon every event remotely connected to the bridge's construction, including the politics, backdealing and second guessing that the construction team faced every step of the way. "The Great Bridge" is a great work of history worthy of its subject.
Rating:
Summary: An amazing engineering marvel that stands to this day
Review: David McCullough has done it again. Along with The Path Between the Seas, this is one of his best works. The book comes alive with a truly marvelous story about early engineering and (mostly) failed bridges and how one man, John Roebling, and his legacy did it right. A spectacular feat that will make you appreciate bridges and their builders. It is amazing to read how it was done especially considering the tools of the time. My next trip to New York will undoubtedly include a trip to the Brooklyn Bridge.
Rating:
Summary: Masterful History of Complex Engineering & New York Politics
Review: For those who wonder just how good written histories can be, David McCullough's "The Great Bridge" sets the bar incredibly high. He takes what could be an exceedingly dull tale of draftsmen and construction contracts and tells a spell-binding narrative of heroism, pioneering vision, and hard-ball politics. "The Great Bridge" is a book for the ages.
McCullough reminds the reader that before the Space Race or the mania to build the world's fastest computer, Americans were fascinated by mammoth construction projects. A bridge was much more than a means to improve transportation -- it was a statement of man's ability to conquer obstacles through mastering scientific principles. Following the carnage and chaos of the Civil War, Americans craved the certainty of science and worshipped the men who could prove that science did, in fact, conquer all.
John Roebling and his son, Civil War hero Washington, were two such men. "Thinking outside the box" is too limiting a cliche to apply to these two driven men. Pioneers in both construction and the cable-building fields, both men combined a spartan existence and a single-minded pursuit of their goals to push the Brooklyn Bridge forward despite overwhelming obstacles.
"The Great Bridge" tells a tale that is often bitter despite the glorious result. John Roebling dies a horrible death before he sees the completion of the bridge. Many of the workers in the 'caissons,' which were the underwater (and therefore highly pressurized) work chambers that allowed the men to sink the foundations to the required depths, experienced the terrors of a new phenomenon called the "bends." Washington Roebling, perhaps due to too many hours spent personally supervising work in the caissons, was left a nervous wreck by the stress of overseeing construction and spent many years watching from his distant bedroom window, incapable of visiting the work site.
Thrown against this devotion to duty is the greed of so many in the New York political establishment . . . including the notorious Boss Tweed. Without going over the top, McCullough depicts the stranglehold a few individuals could exercise over the dynamic New York society. The craven efforts to win contracts and slander the Roeblings are infuriating and make the Roeblings' accomplishment that much more noteworthy.
Several passages are particularly moving. There's the guy who actually guesses what causes the bends but doesn't quite "get it," so nobody involved in the bridge gets the benefit of his speculations. There's Washington Roebling nervously taking side trips to see if he can withstand the stress of making bridge-related public appearances. Then there's the "little guy," leaving from a day's work in the caissons to drink away his meager day's salary. To say that these scenes capture the "human drama" involves is an understatement.
Again, McCullough presents these stories alongside the complex engineering details of the bridge, which drives the story forward while informing the reader. While not a page-turner in the Dan Brown sense, "The Great Bridge" is nevertheless captivating because McCullough captures the essence of these real people so well. By the end, the reader feels like an honorary Roebling!
Such a magnificent construction as the Brooklyn Bridge (it makes you smile when, decades after completion, the city commissions an engineering review of the bridge to determine how the bridge needs to be shored up and the conclusion is a sheepish, "needs new paint") demands a magnificent historical treatment. McCullough has given us just that.
For devotees of Ken Burns' amazing "Civil War" PBS series, you can easily hear McCullough narrating this book with his bourbon-smooth tenor -- it adds something special.
As an additional aside, reading this book will greatly enhance your enjoyment of the Meg Ryan romantic comedy "Kate and Leopold," which opens with an imagined scene where Washington Roebling presides over the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, which he calls "the greatest erection on the planet!" (Fortunately, watching "Kate and Leopold" is not required to enjoy the book on its own merits.)
A must for any student of American history.
Rating:
Summary: Great History of The Bridge, New York, Brooklyn and America
Review: I received this book as a gift, and it turned out to be one of the greatest books I've read in a long time. The descriptions of the era and the people involved are fantastic and truly attach you to the bridge and it's Chief Engineer, Washington Roebling. The author also had a knack for making even the most complex aspects of engineering interesting. If you enjoy reading history, or the history of NYC or Brooklyn, you will really enjoy this book. The only book that I have read that can compare to "The Great Bridge" is Luc Sante's "Low-Life" for information and entertainment value. I was actually bummed when I was finished with it.
Rating:
Summary: Detailed
Review: I recently read this work via Books on Tape, in a 1990 recording by Grover Gardner. (17 CDs) I felt that he did a fine job of reading this text. At first glance I thought the book would be one about engineering, etc. While this work does include some of these data, the book is largely about the people and times surrounding the construction of this "8th" wonder of the world. McCullough does wonderfully to bring into focus the various problems which faced those 19th century personalities involved in this project. Good reading for anyone liking more insights into this interesting area of American history.
Rating:
Summary: Detailed
Review: I recently read this work via Books on Tape, in a 1990 recording by Grover Gardner. (17 CDs) I felt that he did a fine job of reading this text. At first glance I thought the book would be one about engineering, etc. While this work does include some of these data, the book is largely about the people and times surrounding the construction of this "8th" wonder of the world. McCullough does wonderfully to bring into focus the various problems which faced those 19th century personalities involved in this project. Good reading for anyone liking more insights into this interesting area of American history.
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