San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge

California

A self-declared emperor ordered this bridge built, then threatened to have the city councils arrested for ignoring him.

engineeringhistoricaldisaster

In eighteen seventy-two, a man calling himself Emperor Norton issued three decrees demanding a suspension bridge across San Francisco Bay. Nothing happened. So in September of that year he wrote that the citizens of San Francisco and Oakland had neglected to notice his decree, that his authority would be fully respected, and that he was commanding the arrest by the army of both Boards of City Fathers if they kept ignoring him. He signed it under his royal hand and seal. Most of Norton's ideas were dismissed as eccentric. This one wasn't. The bridge decree had broad public and political appeal. The trouble was the water. The bay was too wide and too deep at that point for anything then buildable. Norton died without seeing it. In nineteen twenty-one, more than forty years later, engineers looked at running a tube under the bay instead, and concluded a single tube couldn't handle the traffic. Construction on the bridge finally began in nineteen thirty-three.

This is the first of 3 parts. The rest runs about 3 minutes and is read to you as you drive past. Hear the whole piece.

What this was written from
we do hereby command the arrest by the army of both the Boards of City Fathers if they persist in neglecting our decrees

Written from Wikipedia, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.

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