engineering, and solved them as easily as a boy subtracts two from six.
While this is true, it must not be forgotten that he had not the
school-training of an engineer. Nothing is more untrue than the
statement that he was, like de Lesseps, only a contractor. He was a
very unusually brilliant engineer, and his ignorance of the higher
mathematics served to show his brilliancy the more clearly. Some
persons have said that his chief talent was in explaining abstruse
reasonings simply; but an engineer has told me that he thought Eads's
chief talent was his ability to arrive by some rough means at a certain
conclusion to a given problem, which conclusion would in every instance
be approximately the same that better trained mathematicians would
reach by mathematics.
By the time the bridge was finished, indeed from the time (1868) when
his first report for it made a decided stir in the scientific world,
both at home and abroad, Eads was a very well-known engineer. In that
same year a visit to Europe for his health's sake gave him the
opportunity to interview a French steel company, through whom he met a
famous bridge-builder, and was led to examine the piers of the bridge
then being constructed at Vichy; and it was there that he found his new
ideas for caissons. Going home, by way of England, he explained his
plans to the engineers there, and was by them proposed as a member of
the Royal Society. Even at home, in his own adopted State, he was not
without recognition; for in 1872 the University of Missouri conferred
upon him the honorary degree of LL.D. From the general of engineers he
received a request for suggestions for improvements in guns; and from
his work on the subject of Naval Defenses it is plain that his mind
still found time to run on this favorite topic.
In 1874 the bridge was finished. After it had satisfactorily stood the
severe tests put upon it, it was formally opened on the 4th of July.
The celebrations of that day were the first public outburst of approval
given to Eads's work. And to-day the strong and graceful bridge stands
as his most beautiful and lasting monument. And as even the great
tornado of 1896 was unable to do the piers any serious damage, they are
likely to last indefinitely, and thus make the bridge "endure," as its
builder said, "as long as it is useful to man."
To Saint Louis it has been so useful that while on the one hand the
growth of the city was the cause of its being built, on the other it
has been one great cause of the continued growth and prosperity of the
city. But it had even broader results than that. "It made a radical
change in the conditions of transportation East and West, and it made
possible the Memphis bridge and the future New Orleans bridge."
And in another direction yet it is peculiarly important. In
bridge-building it marks an era, not only because of its strength and
beauty and the daring of its design, but also because of its many
labor-saving devices, the inventions of a thoroughly practical mind. A
distinguished engineer calls it "a great pioneer in the art of sinking
deep foundations and building spans over wide stretches of space, that
astonished in its construction the entire civilized world." London
"Engineering" chose it, while building, as preeminently the "most
highly developed type of bridge;" and says, "In that work the alliance
between the theorist and the practical man is complete." In Eads it
finds its long-sighed-for dream, combining the highest powers of modern
analysis with the ingenuity of the builder.
IV
THE JETTIES
The Mississippi River is a great antimonopolist. As more and more
railways have been built it has been less and less used. And yet,
because it drains almost every corner of a valley which comprises over
one third of the whole United States, it affords means of
transportation to an immense area; and since it cannot be controlled by
any one company or group of companies, its freight rates can hardly be
arbitrarily fixed. Still, so long as there are impediments to its free
navigation in the shape of floods and bars, it cannot be depended on
for shipping, and the magnificent opportunities it should offer to
commerce are lessened. The vastest river system in the world, it shows
in its various parts great contrasts. One large tributary flowing from
the Alleghanies, one from the Rockies, one from the north, others from
the southwestern plains, are each able to contribute their various
products of grain, lumber, cattle, cotton, fruits, and so on. Some
branches freeze every winter; others never do. Some are clear, others
silt-bearing. From about Cairo it flows southward through the greater
delta, or land built up by its own action in ages past, and in all this
part of its course both banks and bottom are of yielding alluvion. For
some hundreds of miles "the crookedest of great rivers," it varies
frequently in width and velocity and is full of shoals; then for
hundreds more, though uniform in width, it often rises higher than its
shores, and is confined in artificial levees, which it continually
breaks down. Finally, below New Orleans, growing more sluggish, and
dividing into several mouths, or "passes," it wanders through tracts of
waste marsh-lands into the gulf, which it colors brown for miles
around. Blocking the end of each shallow mouth there was formerly a
sand-bar; and these obstructions to navigation were the despair of the
river commerce, and no less the despair of the government in its
attempts to remove them.
Every one interested in trade or shipping realized what a very serious
hindrance to the usefulness of the Mississippi these choked-up mouths
were, but no one realized it better than Eads. Understanding that the
great valley is capable of supporting 400,000,000 people, and intent on
doing all in his power for good, even before he had completed the
bridge he was studying the problem of opening the river. Its
improvement and the welfare of its millions of people were cherished
objects of his life. For some men one great undertaking at a time is
enough, but Eads's energies were such that his works overlapped one
another. It is hard to see how one man can have time, even if he has
brains, to do all he did. But apparently he never lived an idle day.
The bridge, with its many extraordinary solutions of new problems, made
its builder's permanent reputation. At the particular request of West
Point he had supplied that institution with writings, diagrams, and
models. And so far afield had his fame spread that on one of his many
trips abroad, he made plans, at the request of the Sultan's grand
vizier, for an iron bridge over the Bosphorus. A change in viziers,
however, prevented its being built.
It seems as if the river-mouth problem had not always been so
difficult. Still, Eads showed that the bars were inevitable; and it is
probably only because, with the growing population and trade of the
central States, the need for an outlet was greater, that the problem
seemed more complicated. Moreover, ocean vessels were increasing in
size and draught, which also made an adequate channel more desirable.
Although the blockade had forced the construction of several expensive
lines of railway, yet it was impossible to carry all the products of
the valley by rail. Millions of dollars' worth of merchandise were
delayed at the bars. As early as 1726 attempts had been made to deepen
the channels through the river's mouths by harrowing. But the first
government effort was in 1837, when an appropriation was made for a
survey and for dredging with buckets. Again in 1852 another
appropriation was made; and a board, appointed by the War Department,
recommended,--
1. Stirring up the bottom.
2. Dredging.
3. If both these methods failed, the construction of parallel
jetties "five miles in length, at the mouth of the South West Pass,
to be extended into the gulf annually, as experience should show to
be necessary."
4. "Should it then be needed, the lateral outlets should be
closed."
5. Should all these fail, a ship canal might be made.
Dredging by stirring the bottom was tried, and produced a depth of
eighteen feet. Three years later this depth had entirely disappeared.
In 1856 an appropriation was entered into, but the jetties were never
completed. Later than that dredging was tried again. Up to 1875 more
than eighteen feet of depth had never been obtained, and even that
could not be steadily preserved. Channels, opened in low water, were
quickly filled up with sediment in high water, and sometimes a severe
storm would wash in enough sand from the gulf to undo the result of
months of dredging.
As early as 1832 a ship canal near Fort Saint Philip, which should cut
through the river bank out to the gulf, had been planned, and this
solution had been approved of by the Louisiana legislature. That idea
had been revived from time to time. And there had also more than once
been new recommendations made for jetties, which by narrowing the
channel should deepen it. Finally Congress ordered surveys and plans
for the canal, and then appointed a board not only to report on them,
but also to ascertain the feasibility of improving the channel of one
of the natural outlets of the river. In 1874 this board reported in
favor of the canal, and against the idea of jetties, which, in its
opinion, could hardly be built, could not be maintained, and would be
excessively costly.
This, then, was the situation when Eads appeared on the scene:
"scratching and scraping" were going on in South West Pass, but were
doing little real and no lasting good; the government engineers had
declared themselves in favor of a canal; and though in some quarters
jetties had been advocated, scarcely any one thought they could be
built, or that if they were they would last, or that they would do any
good. Eads, however, understood the river like a book, and he had
studied this particular subject. He now came forward publicly, offering
not only to build and to maintain jetties which would insure a
twenty-eight foot channel, but to do all this for less than half the
cost the board had estimated, and on a contract which should provide
for his being paid only in case he succeeded. From this remarkable
offer his own confidence in his plans may be inferred. A purpose which
he had reasoned out as practical became an inspiration to him which
nothing could shake, for his courage equaled his convictions.
But so bold was his proposition that he was considered a wild
enthusiast. Never at a loss to solve any problem, again, as when he
planned the bridge, he undertook to do what was commonly held to be
impossible. Of course, all the backers of the canal scheme opposed him
bitterly. New Orleans was of that faction. Saint Louis, on the other
hand, upheld him because of his personal popularity and his signal
success with the bridge. The army engineers were against him as a civil
engineer. Thus the controversy was sectional, personal, and
professional. Up to this time the government had invariably intrusted
all works of river and harbor improvement to the military engineers;
and to hand over the most important one it had ever undertaken to a
private citizen, and to permit him to apply a method that had just been
condemned in a report signed by six out of seven of the most
distinguished army engineers, met with decided opposition. So the
government hesitated. Certainly this was a proposal to make them
consider, promising, as it did, an open river mouth, at a cost much
lower than that of the canal, and in case of failure leaving the total
loss to fall upon the contractor. Besides, several eminent civil
engineers supported Eads's theory. The House, nevertheless, passed the
canal bill; but the Senate, more thorough, after calling Eads and two
of his principal opponents to state their views before a committee,
passed a bill appointing a commission to reconsider the entire subject
once more. The discussion before the Senate committee was one of the
crises in Eads's life. The fate of the jetty enterprise hung on the
outcome of it. Fortunately for himself and for the good of the country,
he was a most magnetic and persuasive man. His theories and arguments
were sound and logical, his experience of the river was vast; and
beyond his aptitude for making technical reasoning simple and clear,
his skill as a diplomatist was equal to his ability as an engineer.
So the commission was appointed; and, ultimately, on account of the
far-reaching importance of the question of river-mouth improvement, its
members decided to go to Europe to inquire into the matter. About the
same time, and for the same purpose, Eads also went abroad, and while
there he made a careful study of the works at the mouths of the Danube,
the Rhone, and several other European rivers. What he saw there served
only to strengthen his confidence in his own plans. When he returned
home, there had been a noteworthy change in public sentiment. Though
there still remained many either prejudiced or honest enemies to his
plan, and although the newspapers were still noisy with their cheap and
ignorant opposition, the country at large and Congress were inclined to
accept the offer, which promised them so much at no risk at all.
The commission, returning too from Europe, where it had made as careful
investigations as those of Eads, reported, by a majority of six to one,
in favor of trying jetties in the South Pass. This pass, the smallest
of the three mouths, had a depth of only eight feet on its bar, and had
besides a shoal at its head. The South West Pass, the one which Eads
had proposed to use, is not only two or three times as big, both in
width and in volume of water, but it had fourteen feet on the bar, and
no shoal at its head. Eads argued and implored with all his strength to
be allowed to use the larger pass, as the only one adequate to the
demands of commerce; and so convincing were his reasons that the House
passed a bill which called for jetties in the larger pass. But the
Senate, again more conservative, was cautious in this experiment, and
insisted on the small pass. Finally, the bill went through, and the
grant was made for the improvement of South Pass. And notwithstanding
the considerable difference in size, as well as preliminary conditions
altogether less promising than in the pass Eads had asked for, still,
the depth of thirty feet was to be obtained,--the same result under
harder circumstances. The payment promised, however, was not increased
with the difficulty; but on the contrary was to be a good deal less
than the estimate of the commission. The terms, which required certain
specified depths and widths of channel to be obtained and then
maintained during twenty years, were so arranged that Eads should not
receive any part of his payment till after the work covered by that
part had been finished and approved.
Hard as these conditions were, they were based on his own proposal, and
he was glad even on such terms to undertake the great work he had
longed to do. He at once busied himself in raising money for beginning
the Jetties, and here again his peculiar talents helped him. One of his
friends has said, "His powers of persuasion, his charm of address, and
the magnetism of his personality opened the hearts and purses of
whomever he pleaded with in support of his engineering devices. He was
a most lovable man." Moreover, he was an excellent business man. He had
indeed a marvelous faculty for obtaining funds with which to carry on
his works; and in that time of financial distress such a faculty was
very necessary.
The theory on which he based his jetties was really extremely simple.
He said that, other things being equal, the amount of sediment which a
river can carry is in direct proportion to its velocity. When, for any
reason, the current becomes slower at any special place, it drops part
of its burden of sediment at that place, and when it becomes faster
again it picks up more. Now, one thing that makes a river slower is an
increase of its width, because then there is more frictional surface;
and contrariwise, one of the things that make it faster is a narrowing
of its width. Narrow the Mississippi then, at its mouth, said Eads, and
it will become swifter there, and consequently it will remove its soft
bottom by picking up the sediment (of which it will then hold much
more), and by carrying it out to the gulf, to be lost in deep water and
swept away by currents; and thus, he said, you will have your deep
channel. In other words, if you give the river some assistance by
keeping its current together, it will do all the necessary labor and
scour out its own bottom.
Today, since this theory has been proved, it seems as simple as A B C.
And it is almost impossible to believe what opposition it then aroused.
People were not only set on blocking the undertaking, but they were
actually ignorant enough to deny that the velocity of water had any
connection with its sediment-carrying power. Even if the narrowing
process should happen to give a channel through the present bar, they
said, a new one would presently form beyond, and so the jetties would
have to be extended every year.
However, Eads had his contract and his backers and his ideas and his
faith in them; and he set to work on the little pass. The actual delta
of the Mississippi consists of nothing but water, marsh, and some sandy
soil bearing willows. At the sea end of South Pass Eads extended the
low banks out over the bar, by driving rows of guide-piles and sinking
willow mattresses close alongside them on the riverside. The mattresses
were sunk in tiers, and each tier was weighted well with rock, put in
as soon as each mattress was in position. As usual he invented many of
the requisite mechanical appliances and contrivances himself, and
generally such good ones that his methods came to take the place of
earlier ones. The South Pass was not only the smallest and shallowest
of the mouths, but it was besides more difficult than the other two in
having a bar at its head as well as at its sea end. And although by his
contract Eads was not required to remove that bar, by the exigencies of
the case he was. Like the other it had to be attacked with water,
guided by dikes and dams, which were similar in construction to the two
parallel banks, the jetties proper. The scheme was always to force the
river itself to do all the real work; and though there was, to be sure,
a good deal of planning and building, the main idea, as already
explained, is exceedingly simple. Eads never pretended to have
originated this idea. He had studied many jetties in Europe. He had had
the eye to see that they could be adapted to the Mississippi, and the
skill to adapt them. For simple as the bald theory is, there was need
of the nicest appreciation of laws and forces in applying it, and the
result has been called the greatest engineering feat ever accomplished.
The problem of making the quantity of water needed run _up_ into the
smallest pass "through a narrow, artificially contracted channel,
located immediately between two great natural outlets,"--this problem
being complicated by many "occult conditions,"--has been called, by no
mean engineer, perhaps the most difficult problem ever dealt with
successfully. "There is no instance, indeed, in the world where such a
vast volume of water is placed under such absolute and permanent
control of the engineer, through methods so economic and simple."
To the non-mechanical mind the control of such a multitude of abstruse,
minute, and exact details as combine in the making of a bridge seems
perhaps more marvelous than the mere bending of nature's forces to
serve the ends of man. In Eads the power to do both existed.
On piles in the marsh houses were built for the engineers and the
workmen, and the Jetties were begun. Eads was not able to be there in
person all the time, but as usual his choice of competent and faithful
lieutenants was noteworthy. His plans were approved by an advisory
board of very eminent engineers; and by the end of one year the value
of the work began to show. As yet it was not very strong or solid, but
it had deepened the water on the bar from nine to sixteen feet.
None the less the storm of detraction continued. There were enough
difficulties to meet without this, but none of them was met more
forcibly. It was never Eads's way to attack other people in a malicious
spirit, for he was never jealous; nor did he often deign to answer
purely personal attacks. But in defense of his undertakings, to protect
them and the people who had put money into them, he was ready to fight.
His defense commonly took the form of criticism of his critics, and in
such writing his pen was decidedly trenchant. Probably no man ever
incurred more foolish criticism, and probably none ever pointed out
more plainly how foolish it was. Even "the ablest of his adversaries
confessed themselves afraid of his pen." Besides this parrying of
attack, he was continually writing and talking to show the simplicity
and feasibility of his method; and one man phrased what it is likely
many exemplified, that a few minutes' conversation with Eads had done
more to convert him to the Jetties than any amount of writing and of
talking with other people could have done. Always modest and
unassuming, he was so thoroughly in earnest that he convinced others by
his own conviction.
Never was a man less afraid to work. Years before, in the diving-bell
days, he had set himself the precedent of never asking an employee to
do what he himself would fear to do. And, on the other hand, he did not
hesitate to ask an employee to do as much work as he himself would have
done. His former confidential clerk has told me that sometimes, after
evenings of discussion, Eads on starting to bed, perhaps at midnight,
would say to him, "Now, have that figured out for me in the morning,"
which meant three or four hours of scrupulous figuring or writing to be
done by eight the next morning.
Undoubtedly he could not have worked so hard as he did himself had he
not been able to throw aside his cares and problems when he was not
actively engaged with them. A very sociable man, he liked not only to
be with people, but to be making them enjoy themselves. Thus he was
both generous and jovial. No one loved more to give presents; no one
knew more droll stories and more poetry. Nor was his joviality by any
means a descent; for not only before royalty was he dignified, but in
the most democratic assembly. His was not, however, a forbidding
dignity. Simple-hearted as a child, he was fond of children, and they
were fond of him.
Of course, he kept up his miscellaneous reading. He was specially
devoted to poetry; and loved not only to recite verse upon verse aloud,
but also to read to his friends and associates. As usual, his
enthusiasm spread to others. One old lady has told me that she never
had thought much of poetry till she heard him read it. Burns and Edwin
Arnold and Tennyson were favorites; and there is a letter written by
Eads to Tennyson, apparently to send him a clipping in which the one
was described reciting from the other's poems. Eads excuses himself for
intruding with his tribute, and remarks that both of them have built
works destined to outlive their authors. He says it quite modestly and
candidly, "as equal comes to equal; throne to throne."
Yet despite the confidence of their builder, despite his cheerfulness,
the Jetties were not getting along well. To be sure, they were steadily
deepening the channel, and thereby proving to all ingenuous persons who
were undeceived that jetties were what had long been needed, and that
they should be helped along and finished. But the Jetties were situated
far off in a remote marshland where few people saw them; consequently
nearly everybody was either deceived or was disingenuous. People who
had no business to interfere did interfere. Every hitch was shouted
abroad, every success was concealed or twisted. Concrete difficulties
were enormous. Sudden storms at just the wrong time delayed and undid
the work. The need for more money was pressing, and it could be
borrowed only at exorbitant rates of interest. The newspapers were
clamoring that the rash experiment was a failure; and though, of
course, it was not a failure, still it might have fallen through, when
one day the Cromwell liner, Hudson, drawing over fourteen feet of
water, came in through the Jetties, and they were saved.