Greetings Vern,

"Any city gets what it admires, will pay for, and, ultimately, deserves. Even when we had Penn Station, we couldn't afford to keep it clean. We want and deserve tin-can architecture in a tinhorn culture. And we will probably be judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed." Farewell to Penn Station, New York Times editorial, October 30, 1963

Vern Mesler 2024

I found this New York Times editorial while reading about the 1963/1966 demolition of New York City’s Pennsylvania Railroad Station. There is a lot here for preservationists to think about and to remember those historic structures in our cities that were destroyed in the name of progress. Historic neighborhoods, buildings and cultural heritage records disappeared. Lansing, Michigan, the city I grew up in, developed a Comprehensive Master Plan that led to the construction of I-496 in 1963, the Big Ditch, an expressway through Lansing and the destruction of hundreds of homes and businesses. What has Lansing, Michigan, gained from the Big Ditch, other than providing travelers and truckers easy access through downtown? These travelers and truckers are not going to see much of the capital city of Michigan driving at the bottom of a twenty-foot ditch. How was the future impact of this project determined? Ada Louise Huxtable, an architectural historian, was the author who wrote “judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed" and led the effort to establish the Landmarks Preservation Commission for New York City in 1965 “to preserve, protect, and perpetuate buildings, structures, sites, works of art, and other objects having special historical, community or aesthetic interest or value.” 

To preserve and protect requires a knowledgeable community of professionals skilled in historic construction methods and the industrial tools used in the fabrication and erection of historic structures. Kyle C. Kopper, P.E., Michigan Department of Transportation Chief Structure Design Engineer, recognizes the need for a robust knowledge of available rehabilitation and preservation techniques.

“As a result of relatively constant funding and a reduction in MDOT’s buying power, it is likely that the number of rehabilitation projects in the foreseeable future will significantly outnumber the projects where existing structures are removed and replaced. Because of this, I believe that providing our designers with a more robust knowledge of available rehabilitation and preservation techniques would be a benefit to MDOT as we move into the future.” 

With a reduction in purchasing power, the high cost of new construction, and more structures of every design needing attention, a renewed interest in the rehabilitation of existing infrastructure becomes important. This could be beneficial for historic structures, including riveted buildings and bridges.

Michigan Department of Transportation personnel participated in a Field Rivet Demonstration with a Boyer pneumatic field rivet hammer at Lansing Community College’s West Campus, Lansing, Michigan, on August 12, 2024. Vern Mesler (Welding Instructor) introduced the rivet demonstration; Scott Poe (Lead Welding Instructor) led the MDOT participants in driving rivets; Jeff Haynes (Welding Instructor) was the rivet heater, with Kevin Schraft (Professional Support, Welding Technology) and Jeff Seelye (Welding Instructor) operating the pneumatic holder-on. MDOT participants were Kyle Kopper (Chief Structure Design Engineer), Doug Nelson (MDOT Bridge Unit Design Leader), Aaron McDowell (Bridge Engineer), Mike Wakley (Statewide Bridge Supervisor), and Christopher Idusuyi (Bridge Emergency Coordination Engineer).

MDOT Field Rivet Demonstration

Kyle C. Kopper, P.E., MDOT Chief Structure Design Engineer, a long-time subscriber to the Iron & Steel Preservation Chronicle, invited me to present to personnel from the Bureau of Bridges and Structures at MDOT’s Horatio S. Earle Learning Center in Dimondale, Michigan. Due to MDOT’s funding priorities related to rehabilitating existing highway infrastructure, Kopper believed increased knowledge of available rehabilitation and preservation techniques would benefit MDOT personnel. At the end of the presentation, a drawing was conducted for a nineteenth century wrought iron rivet, etched and polished to show the long strands of siliceous slag and iron.

MDOT Bureau of Bridges and Structures Presentation

I often write about the industrial riveting process and the lack of knowledge within the professional community of engineers and industrialists about the riveting process; even knowing the difference between field riveting and shop riveting can have a significant impact on preservation.

What the construction and engineering communities have in documentation about the industrial riveting process are books, journals, and research papers that seem only to advance the position that the riveting process is defective and rivets should all be replaced. I was confronted with this argument when I was invited in 2014 to inspect a historic riveted truss bridge in California and I was informed by a Caltrans engineer that “it’s a scientific fact rivets are defective and should be replaced with bolts.” Point Reyes Station Bridge still stands.

Residual clamping force, clamping force in the rivet difficult to control, shear loading, tensile strength, the shear strength…. are among the words and phrases I read over and over in connection with a skepticism about riveted structures. This is a bit difficult for me to comprehend because I’ve driven and walked across Michigan’s magnificent, riveted Mackinac Bridge, San Francisco’s riveted Golden Gate Bridge, Othmar Ammann's George Washington Bridge between New York and New Jersey, and many other well-maintained USA riveted truss bridges. They are all as impressive as often described in the engineering literature.

Ammann’s last bridge was the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge, which opened in 1964. Amman used riveting in the design of all six of his New York area bridges, 1933 to 1964, including his last. For the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge, at a time when welding and bolting was already a common practice, Ammann chose riveting.

I learned of the George Washington Bridge through my collection of bridge books and my library of photographs. The Design Engineer for the GWB, which opened in 1933, was Othmar H. Ammann. He went on to design five more of New York City’s famous riveted bridges. Ammann’s last riveted bridge was the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge, which opened in 1964. One might wonder why such a magnificent steel bridge as the Verrazzano Narrows would be designed and fabricated as a riveted structure at a time when welding and bolting in the steel fabrication of buildings and bridges was well-established. A few biographical fragments from some exceptionally well-written books describing Ammann’s bridges may provide a clue.

At university he found he was exceptionally gifted in mathematics and chose to study engineering but pursued no particular specialty. He became confirmed in his career of bridge engineering during a summer spent working in a bridge fabrication plant. [Reier, Sharon. The Bridges of New York. New York: Quadrant Press, 1977. p. 97 in Dover reprint, 2000]

 The Pennsylvania Steel Company quickly took notice of this intense, soft-spoken spoken foreigner who chose to spend his lunch hours walking through the workshops observing the company’s manufacturing and assembly techniques. [Rastorfer, Darl. Six Bridges, The Legacy of Othmar H. Ammann. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000. p. 4]



Ammann would have observed the operation of large shop pneumatic riveters, the assembly of riveted sections for buildings and bridges, and the value of shop-driven rivets. There seems to be nothing written on what Ammann observed on the fabrication shop floor or what communication he had with the shop fabricators that led him to use riveting in his design of all six bridges, 1933 to 1964. However, it seems likely that Ammann’s interest in shop operations and knowledge of fabrication processes would have influenced his work. 

Recognition of the importance of knowledge of riveted connections in the engineering and industrial community was cited in the 2001 American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) publication Guide to Design Criteria for Bolted and Riveted Joints:



3.1 RIVET TYPES

Riveting is among the oldest methods of joining materials, dating back as far as the use of metals in construction practice.1.8 Rivets were the most popular fasteners during the first half of this century, but their use has declined steadily since the introduction of the high-strength bolts. At the present time they are rarely used in either field or shop connections; either high-strength bolts or welds are used almost exclusively in new work. Nevertheless, the increasing importance of evaluation and retrofitting of existing structures will require that the designer be knowledgeable about riveted connections.

During any presentation about rivets, someone will repeat the claim that faulty rivets sank the Titanic. What I see is a fifty-thousand-ton mass of steel traveling twenty-five miles an hour through icy waters hitting an almost immovable two-million-ton chuck of ice. The ship sank. Rivets, welds, or bolts, I’m not sure would have made much difference. If the ship was welded or bolted it might have sunk faster.

In Awe of This Experience

Historic Bridge Postcard Collection

Click on the image to view a video about the Calhoun County Historic Bridge Park, produced by Central Michigan University for Destination Michigan, a program aired through PBS.

May 2024, ISP Chronicle

December 2023, ISP Chronicle

May 2023, ISP Chronicle

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Iron and Steel Preservation Program Fund

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