McKee's death. Work was again suspended
on the bridge. But since nobody had seen how McKee had gotten off the cable, nobody knew whether he had jumped onto the catwalk
and bounced off it or whether he had tripped—and they still do not know. All they knew then was that the morale of the men
was shot, and Bay Corbett, business agent for Local 40, began a campaign to get the bridge company to string nets under the
men on the bridge.
This had not been the first death around the bridge. On August 24, 1962, one man fell off a ladder inside a tower and died,
and on July 13, 1963, another man slipped off the approach road and died. But the death of Gerard McKee was somehow different—
different, perhaps, because the men had watched it, had been helpless to stop it; different, perhaps, because it had involved
a very popular young man, the son of an ironworker who had himself been crippled for life.
Whatever the reason, the day of Gerard McKee's death was the blackest day on the bridge so far. And it would have made little
difference for any company official to point out that the Verrazano-Narrows' safety record—just three deaths during thousands
of working hours involving hundreds of men—was highly commendable.
McKee's funeral, held at the Visitation Boman Catholic Church in Bed Hook, was possibly the largest funeral ever held in the
neighborhood. All the ironworkers seemed to be there, and so were the engineers and union officials. But of all the mourners,
the individual who seemed to take it the worst was Gerard's father, James McKee.
"After what I've been through," he said, shaking his head, tears in his eyes, "I should know enough to keep my kids off the
bridge."
CHAPTER SEVEN
STAGE IN
THE SKY
Gerard McKee's two brothers quit the bridge immediately, as their father had requested, but both were back within the month.
The other ironworkers were a bit nervous when the McKees climbed up that first day back, but the brothers assured everyone
that it was far more comfortable working up on the bridge, busy among the men, than remaining in the quietude of a mournful
home.
Though nobody could ever have imagined it then, the death of Gerard McKee was just the beginning of a long, harsh winter—
possibly the worst in Hard Nose Murphy's career. There would be a tugboat strike and a five-day ironworkers' strike to force
management to put nets under the bridge; there would be freezing weather, powerful winds that would swing the bridge, careless
mistakes that would result in a near disaster while the men were lifting a four-hundred-ton piece of steel; and, hovering
over everything else, there would be the assassination on November 22 of President Kennedy, an event that demoralized men
nowhere in the world more than it did on the bridge, where the majority of workers were of Irish ancestry.
All of this would occur while Hard Nose Murphy and the American Bridge engineers were facing their greatest challenge— the
span across the sea.
If construction was to remain on schedule, permitting the bridge to open in late November of 1964, then the steel skeleton
of the span would have to be linked 6,690 feet across the sky by spring— a feat that now, in the winter of 1963, seemed quite
impossible.
The task would involve the hoisting off barges of sixty separate chunks of steel, each the size of a ten-room ranch house
(but each weighing four hundred tons), more than 220 feet in the air. Each of these steel pieces, in addition to several smaller
ones, would then be linked to the suspender ropes dangling from the cables and would finally be locked together horizontally
across the water between Brooklyn and Staten Island.
If one of these pieces dropped, it would set the bridge's schedule back at least six months, for each piece was without a
duplicate. The sixty larger pieces, all of them rectangular in shape, would be about twenty-eight feet high, 115 feet wide,
almost as long,
on the bridge. But since nobody had seen how McKee had gotten off the cable, nobody knew whether he had jumped onto the catwalk
and bounced off it or whether he had tripped—and they still do not know. All they knew then was that the morale of the men
was shot, and Bay Corbett, business agent for Local 40, began a campaign to get the bridge company to string nets under the
men on the bridge.
This had not been the first death around the bridge. On August 24, 1962, one man fell off a ladder inside a tower and died,
and on July 13, 1963, another man slipped off the approach road and died. But the death of Gerard McKee was somehow different—
different, perhaps, because the men had watched it, had been helpless to stop it; different, perhaps, because it had involved
a very popular young man, the son of an ironworker who had himself been crippled for life.
Whatever the reason, the day of Gerard McKee's death was the blackest day on the bridge so far. And it would have made little
difference for any company official to point out that the Verrazano-Narrows' safety record—just three deaths during thousands
of working hours involving hundreds of men—was highly commendable.
McKee's funeral, held at the Visitation Boman Catholic Church in Bed Hook, was possibly the largest funeral ever held in the
neighborhood. All the ironworkers seemed to be there, and so were the engineers and union officials. But of all the mourners,
the individual who seemed to take it the worst was Gerard's father, James McKee.
"After what I've been through," he said, shaking his head, tears in his eyes, "I should know enough to keep my kids off the
bridge."
CHAPTER SEVEN
STAGE IN
THE SKY
Gerard McKee's two brothers quit the bridge immediately, as their father had requested, but both were back within the month.
The other ironworkers were a bit nervous when the McKees climbed up that first day back, but the brothers assured everyone
that it was far more comfortable working up on the bridge, busy among the men, than remaining in the quietude of a mournful
home.
Though nobody could ever have imagined it then, the death of Gerard McKee was just the beginning of a long, harsh winter—
possibly the worst in Hard Nose Murphy's career. There would be a tugboat strike and a five-day ironworkers' strike to force
management to put nets under the bridge; there would be freezing weather, powerful winds that would swing the bridge, careless
mistakes that would result in a near disaster while the men were lifting a four-hundred-ton piece of steel; and, hovering
over everything else, there would be the assassination on November 22 of President Kennedy, an event that demoralized men
nowhere in the world more than it did on the bridge, where the majority of workers were of Irish ancestry.
All of this would occur while Hard Nose Murphy and the American Bridge engineers were facing their greatest challenge— the
span across the sea.
If construction was to remain on schedule, permitting the bridge to open in late November of 1964, then the steel skeleton
of the span would have to be linked 6,690 feet across the sky by spring— a feat that now, in the winter of 1963, seemed quite
impossible.
The task would involve the hoisting off barges of sixty separate chunks of steel, each the size of a ten-room ranch house
(but each weighing four hundred tons), more than 220 feet in the air. Each of these steel pieces, in addition to several smaller
ones, would then be linked to the suspender ropes dangling from the cables and would finally be locked together horizontally
across the water between Brooklyn and Staten Island.
If one of these pieces dropped, it would set the bridge's schedule back at least six months, for each piece was without a
duplicate. The sixty larger pieces, all of them rectangular in shape, would be about twenty-eight feet high, 115 feet wide,
almost as long,
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