Today, obviously, is the start of the Brooklyn Bridge 125th Anniversary Celebration (and will feature our favorite event, fireworks from the Grucci family). Here’s an interesting account of “opening day,” which was officially May 24, 1883:

Fourteen long years of anticipation, observations of daily progress, and spectacles, including mechanic E.F. Farrington’s 1876 trip across the river on a boatswain’s chair attached to a rope, would have secured a considerable crowd for the Brooklyn Bridge’s opening day (McCullough 337-340). However, the New York Bridge Company officially deemed May 24, 1883, “The People’s Day”: the federal courts shut down, businesses closed at noon, and few children made it to school. Shortly before one o’clock Governor Grover Cleveland and New York-born President Chester A. Arthur left Fifth Avenue Hotel in a carriage—the seventh regiment, a band, and police escorts in tow. Near the New York tower, Kingsley met the delegation and escorted them across the span, via the elevated promenade, to the Brooklyn contingent, headed by Mayor Low, waiting to greet them at the opposite tower. The afternoon included a plethora of speeches—from Kingsley, Low, and others—as well as renditions of the “Star-Spangled Banner,” “Yankee Doodle,” and “Hail to the Chief.” One speaker even compared John Roebling to Leonardo da Vinci and showered similar, if not greater, accolades on Washington.

Once darkness enveloped the bridge, spectators watched as the electric lights lining the promenade sprang to life and cheered the firework display …Washington, of course, watched most of the festivities from his window, but even he partook of the celebration for Emily ensured that her husband was not overlooked. While Mayor Low planned a reception for the president, Emily planned her own, more exclusive, reception at the Roebling home, where President Arthur made sure to stop and congratulate the tireless chief engineer.

From the beginning, the bridge was established as more than a roadway or pedestrian walkway. Here people came together to celebrate, to congregate, to commute, to ogle, to admire man’s strength and abilities. Here, occasionally, man tested this strength. A week after opening day, for example, with an estimated 20,000 people swarming the bridge, twelve people were trampled to death. The swell overcrowded a narrow staircase leading up to the promenade at the New York approach. People could move neither up nor down and panic ensued…

Yes, the good old days.