Niagara Falls Suspension Bridge - Legacy

Legacy

As a border crossing between two large growing countries, the Suspension Bridge had throngs of travelers passing over it. Furthermore, it was the intersection of three major railroads. Coupled with its vicinity to a natural wonder, the Niagara Falls, the bridge brought a lot of railroad traffic into the region once it was opened. The towns at the ends of the bridge benefited greatly from this heavy movement of people and goods. The village of Suspension Bridge, United States, grew quickly within a few years after the opening of the bridge, acquiring shops, factories, and a hotel. Its tourism and commerce soon rivaled the town of Niagara Falls, New York; eventually, the village was merged into the town in 1892. Similarly, Clifton on the Canadian end of the bridge was integrated into the town of Niagara Falls, Ontario. The two Niagara Falls cities boasted commerce that surpassed neighboring settlements. Around the time of its official opening, the bridge was one of the busiest points of trade on the United States–Canadian border, carrying $12 million of transitory goods and $2 million of bonded materials into Canada. To handle the large amount of goods exchanged over the border, the Lewiston customs house—the primary customs for the Niagara region—was relocated to the Niagara Suspension Bridge in 1863.

The bridge's depiction as an engineering marvel and beautiful sight lured many visitors to the Falls. Travelers could, while crossing the bridge, enjoy a view of the Falls enhanced by the sensation of standing 250 feet (76 m) in the air. The Falls, however, proved distant and indistinct to some when there was overcast weather. On the whole, the Suspension Bridge was considered as an attraction that must be seen by visitors to Niagara Falls. In paintings and prints of the bridge, the Suspension Bridge became the focus, pushing the Falls into the background. Unlike paintings of the Falls that capture the viewer's eye with their majestic views of the natural wonder, pictures of the bridge impressed viewers with the utilitarian design of the structure. By 1897, the inbound trains to Niagara Falls brought 276,900 visitors during the months of May to August. A streetcar system was established in 1882 to handle the increasing cross-border pedestrian traffic. Initially pulled by horses, the trolleys were converted to run on electricity in 1892. The Suspension Bridge was the pride and symbol of the Great Western Railway, which touted it as the "only Route via Niagara Falls & Suspension Bridge".

Travelers on the Suspension Bridge witnessed several death-defying stunts performed across the Niagara Gorge. On June 30, 1859, they saw Charles Blondin's feat of becoming the first man to cross the chasm on a tightrope. In mid-crossing Blondin sat down on the rope and lowered a line to retrieve a drink from the deck of the Maid of the Mist below. In his later tightrope acts at the same spot, the acrobat would perform a different stunt on each occasion. One time he cooked and ate an omelette in mid-crossing; another time he carried his manager Harry Colcord on his back. While giving Colcord a piggyback ride, Blondin stopped five times on the tightrope to rest and recover his strength; each time Colcord gingerly got off Blondin's back and stood on the tightrope, climbing back on after the acrobat had enough rest. Blondin's success inspired other acrobats, such as William Leonard Hunt ("The Great Farini"), Samuel Dixon, Clifford Calverly, and Signorina Maria Spelterini, to emulate and try to surpass his acts at the same spot. The Signorina, the only woman to walk across the Niagara on a tightrope, once crossed while blindfolded and another time with her hands and legs in manacles.

Another group of people in America had their own risky crossings over the Niagara Gorge as they fled over the border into Canada. They were enslaved African-Americans who sought freedom by escaping to a country that declared the liberation of any slave who entered it. The bridge was part of the Underground Railroad, a network of routes designed to smuggle slaves in the United States to freedom in Canada. Before the American Civil War, fleeing slaves had only four main routes into Canada, of which one was crossing the Niagara River. Slaves who escaped along the Niagara route had help from several quarters. The state of New York generally favored granting freedom to slaves; this attitude emboldened African-American workers in Niagara, who frequently helped slaves flee to Canada. Before the Suspension Bridge was completed, fugitives either crossed the raging river on a boat or risked their lives by swimming at calmer points of the river. The Suspension Bridge made escape across the river easier and safer, although there was still risk. To avoid getting caught and sent back to their owners, slaves had to sneak across on foot or hide aboard trains and oxcarts. Antislavery activist Harriet Tubman guided fugitives at night and bribed custom officials to turn a blind eye. As a result, many slaves crossed the Suspension Bridge to freedom before the United States was engulfed in civil war.

When the war ended and the United States turned its focus toward rebuilding, Roebling started building his Brooklyn Bridge. As the monumental task could affect naval navigation, it required state approval, and the government wanted a thorough review of the engineer's credentials; hence, a Bridge Party was organized. Comprising Roebling and his son, as well as their fellow bridge engineers, generals, businessmen, and high society figures, the party toured the country to review four bridges Roebling had built before the civil war. The final item on their itinerary was Roebling's Niagara Suspension Bridge. At the dinner to commemorate the end of the bridge tour, civil war veteran General Henry Warner Slocum gave a toast and called the Suspension Bridge a symbol of inspiration for the United States in its rebuilding efforts. This sentiment was shared by the guests and was expressed at later dinners across the United States. The achievement of building a large suspension bridge over a gorge in the face of overwhelming adversity—constant put-downs by the professional community, American and European—gave the United States a sense of pride. Nationalism rose as the country lauded the bridge. The completion of the bridge that had been deemed impossible by the Western world gave Americans, who had lesser technical accomplishments than Europe at that time, a trophy that stood above any other. The Suspension Bridge became the American symbol to brave the toughest of challenges and do the impossible, pushing their drive for industrialization even harder. Charles W. Woodman specifically drew attention to the Suspension Bridge in his 1865 address to the United States Senate for approval to build a rail system to transport a ship out of the water and up around the Niagara Falls.