Tragedy At The Walnut Lane Bridge
The Walnut Lane Bridge has a history of tragedies and deaths since construction began in 1906. In December 1907, the falsework (used to support the forms for pouring concrete) collapsed and sent about 20 workers plunging 150 feet (46 m) into the Wissahickon Creek. Martin Simpson was listed as the only worker to die during the tragedy while Bernard Mers lost an arm and James Lawson had both of his hands crushed. The crash drew neighbors out of their homes, as the sound could be heard throughout the valley.
Throughout the rest of the 20th century, stories of car crashes and suicides abound for the Walnut Lane Bridge. It was a common occurrence to see pictures of the bridge in the newspapers with a dotted line showing the path of a person's fall.
Read more about this topic: Walnut Lane Bridge
Famous quotes containing the words tragedy, lane and/or bridge:
“A tragedy is a representation of an action that is whole and complete and of a certain magnitude.... A whole is what has a beginning and middle and end.”
—Aristotle (384–323 B.C.)
“The dusk runs down the lane driven like hail;
Far off a precise whistle is escheat
To the dark; and then the towering weak and pale....”
—Allen Tate (1899–1979)
“It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.
And you O my soul where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O, my soul.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)