My Favorite Story - On A Bridged Version

My great-grandfather was a civil engineer who designed bridges. Impressively, he designed the Wrightsville-Columbia bridge in Pennsylvania, which at the time was the longest concrete bridge in the country. If the fact that the bridge is currently listed on the National Register of Historic Places AND is a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark doesn't do it for you, maybe knowing that it has its own Wikipedia page would.

Despite it being an engineering landmark now, I'm thinking that back in the day people may have been less sure about my great-grandfather's capabilities and/or the soundness of the bridge based on the fact they made him get in his car and drive across it before anyone else would.

My great-grandfather would occasionally go out to the site to perform inspections while it was under construction. One time during such a visit, a worker was riveting some metal together. He missed his mark and a hot rivet arced through the air, hitting Great Daddy right in the head. As is so often the case with head wounds, it bled profusely. The main contractor was horrified and worried about my great-grandfather, who insisted he was fine. Ultimately, they decided that the contractor would put Great Daddy up in a hotel for the night so he wouldn't have to drive. This part of the story has frankly never made sense to me. As in, why not a doctor or hospital visit instead? I can only assume that (sorry) men + 1930 = it doesn't make sense.

The contractor went to pick him up from the hotel the next morning and asked the front desk clerk how my great-grandfather seemed. The clerk said he was indeed very concerned that Great Daddy had suffered a brain injury and pointed to the registration book he had signed when checking in. He had written "James B. Long, King Of Prussia" Now, if you know that King Of Prussia is a town in Pennsylvania, and where my great-grandfather lived, you understand that he was perfectly fine. These men alas did not know that, so they thought he thought he was a king. Of Prussia. Well, hilarity ensued.

I'm the only one of my generation to have been alive when Great Daddy was, and I have such fond memories of him. I was quite little, and he was quite old, so we were on the same nap and snack schedule. Perhaps we bonded over that. Or maybe it was that he called me Princess (which I have to assume the contractor would have understood was just a term of endearment) or that he'd let me sit on his lap when he read the newspaper. Sounds boring but he used a magnifying glass which seemed like the coolest thing ever to me. I'm so fortunate to have these personal memories to go with this great piece of family lore.

Great Daddy lived a long life. My family said they knew when his end was near because he wore a self winding watch and at a certain point he wasn't even active enough to keep it wound. You can only imagine the fear that gripped my heart when my own self winding watch stopped working a few years ago. Luckily it turned out it was broken. No one has ever been more grateful to pay for a repair.