Readers of this list might be interested in the 7th Historic Bridges Conference to be held Sept. 19-22 at Cleveland. This may be profitable to you if you're one of the many tourist lines or museums with relic bridges to maintain (remember a turntable is a bridge, too). The conference is oriented toward highway agencies charged with preserving historic bridges, but much of the subject matter is provided by railroad bridges.

This conference is interesting in its own right. Two Project 1225 members attended the last of these, and had very big fun. That one was at Wheeling, and focused on suspension bridges. It was there that I learned that there are such people as wire foamers who came to the meeting with samples of historic cable strands. I also learned the meaning of the specification of "f*goted iron" for the staybolts on PM 1225, and why wire guage numbers increase as the wire gets smaller. (It's the number of dies the strand is drawn through. Get it? And f*goted iron is hammered out of strands laid next to each other in the die. The Lima specification called for "iron laid up in f*g*ts," but I discovered this bulletin board's censor program won't let me post that.)

It is a good opportunity for intellectual cross-pollination, and to meet others involved with preserving big steel artifacts with lots of rivets and rust, and pick up a little on preservation techniques. Some problems are universal. At Wheeling, one consultant talked about how the Wheeling bridge was almost destroyed by a previous consultant who departed from the historic anti-corrosion method of wrapping the cables in iron wire soaked in linseed oil. Neoprene sheathing has to be better, right? Sounded very familiar - much like the guy who wants to re-engineer your museum trains with modern parts.

This year's meeting will be preceded by a half-day workshop with demonstrations on cutting, welding, and straightening. Following two days of historic and engineering papers is a day's tour of Cleveland's bridges. Papers will cover the movable bridges of Chicago, vertical lifts, the Duluth transporter, cathodic protection of concrete bridges, Cleveland bridges including the fabulous rehabilitation of the Superior Street road and trolley bridge, and Tang Dynasty cast-iron bridges. Don't know if there will be anything as wild as the tests to destruction of historic masonry arch bridges that was described by Englishmen at 1999's meeting.

Full conference registration is $218 until August 15, $250 thereafter. Each day's sessions can be bought separately, at $65 for the welding workshop and $30 for the Saturday tour. Hotel is $99/night.

Get information from

Special Collections
Cleveland State University Library
7HBC Office, RT324
Cleveland, OH 44114

Aarne H. Frobom
The Steam Railroading Institute
Michigan State Trust for Railway Preservation, Inc.

froboma@mdot.state.mi.us