National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior

Resource History and Description of Existing Conditions
as the choice of basic plumbing fixtures, the absence of a washing machine, the choice of a
hand-powered elevator, and reliance on a single and somewhat limiting power source. 1106
The Rustic Bridge has two arches. The longer, with a span of fifty-three feet, has five 7inch
steel I-beams embedded in the concrete. The shorter twenty-six foot span has five 5-inch
steel I-beams. It is seventeen feet wide and is faced with unhewn field stone and boulders. The
Rustic Bridge employed Mannheimer Portland cement as did the abutments of the White
Bridge. The rest of the White Bridge, including the railing, was cast from Germania Portland
cement. The Engineering News article also states that the bridges were designed and their
construction was superintended by the Melan Arch Construction Co. of New York City, who
owned the U.S. patents on the system.
The Poughkeepsie Sunday Courier reported on October 3, 1897, that "A large force of
men is at work day and night on the new bridge on the Vanderbilt avenue, in order to get in the
concrete before the frost comes." 1107 The Engineering News article explains that, indeed, work
continued day and night during the pouring of the concrete arch, but was done so in order to
make the work monolithic and to avoid any lines that might mark one day's pouring from the
next. Once the abutments were complete, the pouring of the arch began simultaneously from
both sides and continued until the arch was finished. Each of the four wing walls was poured
continuously as well, for the same reasons.
The article also discusses the finish, another question raised by the 1994 report. Quoting
again from Engineering News:
In all exposed faces, for a thickness of about 1 1/2 in., mortar was used without the broken
stone, but in all cases deposited at the same time as the concrete backing. In order to get a
very fine finish, the lagging of the centers and all molds for spandrel and wing walls were
neatly covered on the inside with a thin coat of plaster, which was oiled before any concrete
was deposited.
In addition, the balusters and top rails were molded or cast in iron or wooden forms and set in
place in the same manner as cut stone.
As the 1994 report suggests, the Vanderbilt bridges were not the first American
executions of the Melan system. The system first found favor in Europe as a floor system for
office buildings and was used extensively. At the time of the Railroad Gazette article (1894) the
author could account for over one million square feet of Melan type floor and three bridges, all
in Europe. Carl Condit, in American Building, names three American bridges: a highway span in
Rock Rapids, Iowa (1894); a footbridge in Stockbridge, Massachusetts (1895); and the Franklin
Bridge in Forest Park, St. Louis (1898). Condit attributes the spread of the Melan system to
German-born engineer Fritz von Emperger, who designed the Eden Park Bridge in Cincinnati,
Ohio (1895). Emperger was awarded two patents in 1897 for additions to the Melan system. 1108
1106
These choices will be addressed in subsequent sections.
1107
Historian's Research Notes File, 268.
1108
Carl W. Condit, American Building, Materials and Techniques from the First Colonial Settlements to the
Present, 2d ed. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982), 174-5. See also Fr. Von Emperger, "A Melan
Concrete Arch in Eden Park, Cincinnati, O," Engineering News 34 (October 3, 1895): 214-5; Fr. Von
Emperger, "Melan Concrete Arch of 100-Ft. Span, Stockbridge, Mass.," Engineering News 34 (November
7, 1895): 306-7; and on the introduction of Monier's system of concrete arch bridges to the United States,
"Concrete Arch Highway Bridge, Philadelphia, PA.," Engineering News (September 7, 1893): 189-90.
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