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A Monumental Dream Motto: The Gateway Arch rises from a “small forest set on the edge of a great river” to invoke the memory of westward expansion. Word count: 3470

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The Gateway Arch’s graceful architectural lines, stainless steel skin, and daunting

630-foot height make it prominent in the St. Louis skyline. The perilous curve that cuts

through the Midwestern sky is the result of bold ingenuity and stout workmanship. Over

the last four decades, the Arch has become a heroic symbol of courage and vision, while

memorializing the decades of western expansion. The Arch testifies deeply to the

character of men and women. The few who carried the project from its idealistic

beginning in the 1930s, to an auspicious reality in the late 1960s, exemplified the spirit of

the pioneers who developed the west.

In the year 1803, Thomas Jefferson, the third president of the United States,

bought all the land between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains for 5 cents an acre.

The event became known as the Louisiana Purchase and hastened the development of the

“Great West.” Hearty and stalwart pioneers traversed across the vast plains with “no

wealth except for their own labor.”1 These men and women dreamed of a hard fought life

in a land they had never before seen.

Many years later, on the western bank of the Mississippi River, the St. Louis

Gateway Arch was constructed to commemorate the history of westward expansion. The

Arch stands in honor of the “hunters, trappers, frontiersmen and pioneers who contributed

to the territorial expansion and the development of these United States.”2 It also serves as

an “integral part of the community’s life, and revive(s) the adjacent downtown area in

terms of beauty and vigor.”3

1 Story of the Gateway Arch, Jefferson National Expansion Historical Association, from original works by Mike Capps, Paul McElroy, Bob Moore and Ellis Richard, Edited by David A. Grove, printed by Nies/ Artcraft, 1992, p 22. 2 Excerpted from Pro Forma Decree of Incorporation of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Association, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Archives (hereafter referred to as JNEMA), 11 June 1934. 3 Architectural Competition for the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Program, St. Louis, Missouri 1947, p. 4 JNEMA

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A few years ago, on the bank of the Mississippi, I visited the Arch as a traveler

heading west for the first time. The Arch’s strength and beauty evoked deep emotion in

me; its message still resonates. It spoke to me of the virtue of heroic courage:

We salute [man's] vintage Fashioned in daring, Skill and art. And trust that men Who come to view this shape May grasp and hold Its spirit, Noble, Bold,4

Luther Ely Smith was a St. Louis lawyer and prominent city leader. In 1933, after

returning from Vincennes, Indiana he took notice to the decaying St. Louis riverfront.5

The area adjacent the Old Courthouse,

and bounded by the Mississippi River,

was severely dilapidated. He realized

that much of St. Louis’ history was

part of the larger heritage of the United

States. There in the city of St. Louis

had occurred the transfer of the Upper

Louisiana Purchase from the Spanish, the Dred Scott trial—which spurred the start to the

civil war, and the planning of Lewis and Clark’s exploration of the west. He noted that

many of the trails the pioneers traveled began in St. Louis.6 It was here, along the

riverfront, that Smith conceived of a lasting memorial to the nation’s westward expansion.

4 Warren Wilder Towle, "A Might Purpose," published in the Story of the Gateway Arch, Jefferson National Expansion Historical Association, Edited by David A. Grove, printed by Nies/ Artcraft, 1992. 5 Brown, p 2. 6 Ibid, p 6.

Fig. 1 Riverfront property cleared for memorial

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Fig. 2 Architect Eero Saarinen

Smith approached Bernard Dickmann, the St. Louis mayor, who agreed to the idea

of an expansion memorial. With the addition of seven others, the two formed a committee

known as the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Association. The committee drafted

legislation to present to congress for federal appropriation. On June 14, 1934 President

Roosevelt approved a bill that established a Commission.7 Later that year he personally

telegrammed St. Louis lauding their efforts: “All good wishes for the success of your

Commission’s efforts to recall and perpetuate the ideals, the faith and courage of the

pioneers who discovered and developed the great west.”8 The years of World War II

would halt work on a national memorial; progress would ensue after the war.

In August of 1946, Smith appointed George Howe, a fellow of the American

Institute of Architects, as the advisor to a national competition.9 The competition

encouraged a pool of talented designers to submit entries for the proposed federal

memorial. By the deadline September 1, 1947, Howe

received 172 submissions. After extensive work to

reduce the number of entries, $125,000 in prize money

was awarded, and a single winner was chosen.

The winning design belonged to the

architectural firm Saarinen, Saarinen and Associates of

Bloomfield, Michigan.10 The committee congratulated

the wrong architect. Both the distinguished architect

Eliel Saarinen and his son Eero entered designs.

7 Ibid, p3. 8 Ibid, p 4. 9 Ibid, p 7. 10 Ibid.

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However, the elder Saarinen was mistakenly identified as the winner. For three days the

firm celebrated in Eliel’s honor until they were notified of the mistake.11 Ironically, the St.

Louis Arch marked the first project in which Eero Saarinen was able to work outside of

the shadow of his highly regarded father.12

The design was described by its creator Eero Saarinen as “a mathematically

precise catenary curve in which the thrust forces are kept within the center of the Arch

legs.” Saarinen believed that the arch was the right form for the place, purpose and time

and that it could be a “triumphal arch for our age.”13 He chose stainless steel and concrete

to emphasize the memorial’s permanency; Saarinen wanted his design to last for 1000

years.

Luther Ely Smith congratulated Saarinen after a dinner held in the architect’s

honor: “We are still breathless at the vision you have opened up for us by your

marvelously fine design. The more we gaze upon it, the more wonderful and gripping it

11 Ibid. 12 Ibid. 13 Temko, Eero Saarinen, pp. 18-19; St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 7 March 1948.

The curve can be described by the mathematical function:

Fig. 3 Catenary Curve

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grows.”14 Saarinen responded, “When the project someday becomes a reality, we will

remember this and by refinement of detail, we will try to gain some of what has been lost

by stepping down from a great dream to reality.” Apropos to Smith’s declaration, Eero

Saarinen understood that great vision must be reduced to practical design.15

In 1962, after years of delay to relocate major passenger rail lines, four bids were

received for the construction of the Gateway Arch and visitor center. All four bids were

considerably higher than the engineer’s estimate of $8,067,000. National Park Service

officials established a committee to consult with the four firms and determine if they were

reasonable.

The committee, headed by Park Superintendent George Hartzog, concluded that

the bids were reasonable. The

National Park Service, under federal

regulations, must either accept the

low bid of MacDonald Construction

Company at $12,332,667 or send the

project out for re-bidding. Director

Conrad Wirth of the National Park

Service worried that funds would be

insufficient. But Wirth accepted MacDonald’s low bid after the company agreed to lower

their bid by $500,000.16

14 Smith to Saarinen, 25 February 1948, JNEMA. 15 Saarinen to Smith, 1 March 1948, JNEMA. 16 Jensen, J.E.N., The Construction of the Arch, United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, 11 N. Fourth St., St. Louis, Missouri 63102, unpublished internal document dated, August 1968/ February 1994, p18.

Fig. 4 Arch construction begins

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The first above ground section of the arch was placed on February 12, 1963.

Several members of the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Association

commemorated the start of the memorial to westward expansion by pouring water from

the Columbia River into the concrete.17 Lewis and Clark’s Oregon outpost marked the

furthest point of exploration westward. Construction moved in assembly line fashion as

each section was assembled, transported and erected.

The Arch was designed in 142 carbon and stainless steel sections with no keystone

section. Pittsburgh-Des Moines (PDM) was contracted to fabricate and erect the steel. The

Arch sections were shipped in three pieces from facilities in Pittsburgh and Warren, PA.

The walls traveled to the Arch site on gondola cars.18 Their stainless steel faces were set

against each other and protected by neoprene and wood buffers. When the section walls

arrived each was unloaded and placed under shelter on a 56’ x 125’ concrete platform. A

corrugated steel roof and canvas sides protected the sections as they were assembled.

Walt Mallory, the Pittsburgh Des Moines field superintendent, adapted a

conventional creeper crane to meet the unique requirements of the Arch.19 The moving

crane, known as a creeper derrick, traveled upward on the outside of the Arch. PDM

placed the first four sections of each leg from cranes on the ground but used two creeper

derricks, one on each leg of the Arch, to place the remaining sections.20

17 Brown, p 19. 18 Jensen, p 4. 19 Rennison, Charles E. “Ted”, unpublished internal document: Oral History Interview, Interviewed by Lead Park Technician Don Haake, Jefferson National Expansion Memorial, March 24, 25, 26 and May 6, 13, 14 1981, p 18. 20 Jensen, p 5.

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Fig. 5 Creeper Derricks and stabilizing strut

The creeping derricks were impressive

feats of engineering. The derricks traveled on two

12 WF beams and contained tool sheds, sanitary

facilities and communications equipment.21 Four

sections of the Arch could be placed before the

creeper derrick had to be moved. Each section took

a half an hour to be lifted from the ground and

placed. As the derricks climbed upward they had to

be leveled through the use of telescoping steel legs to compensate for the Arch’s greater

inward lean. 22

The sections were welded together by specially trained welders. Each welder had

to undergo a series of tests to be qualified to weld on-site. It was extremely important that

all be experts because welding would be the primary means of assembling the Arch.

Construction manager Ted Rennison recalls the assessment: “The tests were quite rigid;

there was a vertical and horizontal and overhead and all of these things that are required to

do a good job.”23 In a recorded history of the Arch’s construction, Rennison remarked that

only men accustomed to the confined spaces and intense heat could stand to weld on the

Arch’s interior. These men, he recalled, were usually veterans of oil and gas lines.24

On June 17, 1965, the Arch reached the height at which the stabilizing strut was

needed. A 225 ft long, 40 ft wide, and 14 ½ ft high strut was placed between the two legs.

Despite the load of the cranes and the massive strut, the Arch deflected only 5/8 of an

inch. Seeking to take advantage of the conspicuous bracing, Pittsburgh-Des Moines placed 21 Ibid. 22 Ibid. 23 Rennison, p 5. 24 Ibid.

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a sign with 12 foot high letters reading “PDM.”25 Immediately, the media took notice as

the National Park Service ordered the letters removed; advertising was restricted by

contractual agreement. PDM responded by taking the east facing letters down, but insisted

that the letters on the west city side were hard to reach, and left them up for over a

month.26 The NPS told the contractor that they would be heavily charged for “advertising

space seen by half a million people every day.”27 When PDM failed to respond, the

government deducted $225,000 from MacDonald’s pay, citing inappropriate use of federal

property by one of their subcontractors.28 The letters were promptly removed and

construction continued.

The local community anxiously anticipated the day the Arch would be finished.

Civic leaders chose the week of October 24, 1965 to dedicate the Arch but were uncertain

about the day and time.29 Some wanted to delay placing the last section until Saturday

morning to attract a larger crowd. But engineers worried about the sustained loads on the

Arch. Both legs stood rather precariously. On October 26th workers refused to work

believing another safety check was needed. Engineers insisted that the Arch structurally

safe though vulnerable to wind and earthquakes. The topping out crew returned to work.30

Engineers and civic leaders chose Thursday, October 28 at 10:00 a.m. because of

the cool early morning conditions. The St. Louis fire department came and sprayed water

on the south leg to counteract expansion from the sun’s heat. 700 feet of hose were used to

pump water onto the structure from 9:30 until the Arch was completed.31 Vice President

25 Brown, p 21 26 Ibid. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid. 29 Brown, p 22. 30 Ibid. 31 Ibid.

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Hubert Humphrey watched from an overhead plane while Superintendent Leroy Brown

served as master of ceremonies. At 11:00 a.m., the final section of the Arch was placed.

By 2:00 p.m. the hydraulic jacks used for the placement of the last section were released.

The Arch supported itself under crown thrust.

The Gateway Arch is a 630 ft. tall

catenary Arch. Its base measures 630 feet from

the north to the south outer edge.32 A catenary

arch is the most structurally sound of all the

arches. In other arches the thrust forces tend to

spread the legs apart. But a catenary arch

transmits loads vertically through the arch’s legs

to its massive foundations.33

The 60-foot concrete foundations were prestressed with groups of steel tensioning

bars. After a period of about 7-10 days, the bars were post-tensioned in an exact sequence

specified by the engineers.34 A center hole hydraulic jack with a 100 ton capacity applied

a load of 71 tons per bar or a total load of 18,000 tons per leg. The bars had to be inclined

at two distinct angles because of the angle of inclination of each leg. The Arch was

secured to the foundation with 252 alloy-steel tensioning bars that extend 34 feet below

the top of the concrete foundation.35

32 Jensen, p 1. 33 Jensen, p 3. 34 Jensen, p 2. 35 Ibid.

Fig. 6 Last section being lifted into place

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Fig. 7 Reinforced concrete, outer and inner skin shown in cross section

Each leg of the arch is an equilateral

triangle in cross section with sides measuring 54

feet at the bottom and tapering to 17 feet at the

top. At ground level, the core space measures 40

feet and reduces to 15 ½ at the top. The Arch’s

outer skin is polished stainless steel and its inner

skin is 3/8” thick A-7 carbon steel.36 The space

between the outer and inner skin is filled with

reinforced concrete and prestressed up to an

above ground elevation of 300 feet. Beyond 300

feet, steel stiffeners are employed between outer and inner skin. The carbon steel stiffeners

are spot-welded to avoid the intense heat of arc welding that might wrinkle the skin when

it cools and contracts.37

The Arch’s inner and outer walls combine to form a composite structure that

transfers winds and gravity loads to the ground; the Arch has no “real” structural

skeleton.38 Engineers designed the Arch with an induced crown thrust. A two-foot gap was

expanded to eight before the final section could be placed. Hydraulic jacks exerted 100

tons of pressure against the two legs of the arch. When the load was released, a net

compressive force remained. The crown thrust minimizes tension in the Arch when it

deflects under a wind load. The structural engineering firm Severud, Elstad, Krueger and

Associates carried out wind tunnel testing on scaled models. The firm insists that the Arch

would deflect 18” in an east-west direction under a sustained wind load of 55 psf or the

equivalent of a 150 mph wind. 36 Ibid. 37 Jensen, p 1. 38 Jensen, p 2.

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The day the Arch was completed was bittersweet for some; civic leaders and park

officials had lost several dear friends. Luther Ely Smith, who had conceived the project,

hoping to restore the decaying St. Louis riverfront, died walking to work in April, 1951 at

the age of 77. 39 At the time of his death, the project remained a dream described only on

paper. Eero Saarinen, who conceived of the majestic Arch while playing with ribbon and

string two decades prior, died in 1961 from a brain tumor. At just 55 years, his life was

tragically short. Neither Smith nor Saarinen lived to see the Arch “rise majestically from a

small forest set on the edge of a great river.”40

The Arch's unique shape made it difficult to conceive of a transportation system

that would carry visitors to the top. The steep angle of the Arch above 300 feet and the

triangular cross section made a series of

conventional elevators impractical because a

waiting and mechanical rooms were

constrained by limited space. Eero Saarinen's

office needed a unique, unconventional

transportation solution. Eero Saarinen and his

partners called upon Dick Bowser, a self-

described second generation "elevator man.”41

39 Brown, p 15. 40 Capps, Michael, Eero Saarinen- Architect with a Vision, Arch History and Architectural Information, published on the NPS website at www.nps.gov/jnema 41 Moore, Bob, JNEM Historian, Dick Bowser and the Arch's Unique Tram System, www.stlouisarch.com

Fig 8. Dick Bowser, the inventor of the Arch’s Transportation system

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Bowser recalled, "The first question

[Saarinen's partners] asked me was did an elevator

have to travel vertically? I said I didn't think so. My

father built and installed a dumbwaiter that

transferred from one hatchway to another about

halfway up its travel. If they were interested, the

dumbwaiter was in a church building in Birmingham,

MI. It turned out that the building was within a mile

of their offices."42

Bowser was an unlikely candidate for the

difficult design work. He had no formal training and

had never graduated from college. But Bowser

worked for two weeks, day and night, to design a

system that met the NPS requirements. 3,500 people

had to be able to make it to the top in an 8-hour day

or 11,000 people in a 14-hour day.43

Saarinen provided Bowser with little but an

outline sketch of the Arch containing a rectangle at

the base and the word elevator. Bowser considered several designs but eliminated them

independently. “A combination of the elevator principle and the Ferris wheel principle

was developed into a train of capsules, and I had my solution,” Bowser recalled.44 Eight

capsules run independently on tracks in each leg of the Arch. The capsules rotate about

42 Moore, p 1. 43 Moore, p 2. 44 Ibid.

Fig 9. The capsules and track that take visitors to the top of the Arch

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155 degrees to remain vertical during the 3-4 minute ride to the top. Five people can sit

comfortably in each capsule yielding a capacity of 200-225 per hour. The trains have been

in operation for over 25 years. In that time, the capsules have traveled approximately

200,000 miles and have brought over 18 million passengers to the top of the Arch.45

Engineering makes the Gateway Arch a great monument. But a monument is more

than an object of adoration. The stone and steel engage visitors in a silent dialogue.

Inevitably, the dialogue is introspective because monuments are silent. Nonetheless, the

Washington Monument, the faces at Mt. Rushmore, and the Gateway Arch give the visitor

the opportunity to ask questions. And the inquisitive visitor is rewarded with renewed

understanding and awareness.

In the Museum of Westward Expansion,

underneath the green grass below the Gateway Arch, a

visitor experiences life on the western frontier. The story

of the American westward experience is told through the

objects, clothing, tools, and words of the people who

lived there."46 Thomas Jefferson stands in the middle

looking outward, bronzed with one hand on his hip, as if

admiring the frontier himself.

45 Ibid. 46 Capps, McElroy, Moore and Richard, p 23.

Fig 10. Thomas Jefferson in the Museum of Westward Expansion

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Fig 11. Meriwether Lewis

As the visitor walks away from Thomas Jefferson,

decade increments pass in concentric circles. "Great

paintings, quotations, and actual objects, such as boots,

hats guns, knives, beads and tobacco,” reveal

themselves.47 Beaver pelts remind the visitor of the

animal’s rapid decline. Musket and powder recall the

primary means of procuring foodstuffs. The tools of men

who traveled up rivers trading with Indians can be found.

Jefferson’s directive to Meriwether Lewis had

been: “In all your intercourse with the natives, treat them

in the most friendly and conciliatory manner which their own conduct will admit… make

them acquainted with our wish to be neighborly, friendly and useful to them.”48 The

natives permitted Lewis and Clark to trade with them and allowed the expedition to pass

upon their land. And the manner in which they greeted the trespassers was generally

friendly:

“Neither the Native Americans nor the mountain men threatened the vital interests of the other. Rather, there was much exchange between the two. In many ways, especially with the French traders, it was the white man who adopted the Native American way, not the other way around.”49

However, the tone of the first encounter would not be echoed through the ages.

The men who expanded the country westward would come to destroy the Native

American way of life that had transpired for generations.

47 Ibid. 48 Skarmeas, Nancy, Thomas Jefferson, “The Object of Your Mission” from a letter to Meriwether Lewis, Ideals Publications Incorporated, Nashville, Tennessee, 1998, p 89. 49 Capps, McElroy, Moore, Richard, p 22.

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The bison hunter was the most devastating to

the Plains Indians—a people who would have lived

nearby the location of the Arch. In 1800, millions of

bison moved easily through the American plains.

“When the herds moved, thunder rose from their

hooves.”50 But the bison hunter killed them

indiscriminately and the population declined rapidly.

The Plains Indians had depended entirely upon the

bison, using every part of the animal, including the

hair, skin, sinews, hooves, meat, muscle and fat.51 The

Plains Indians ceased to exist as a culture because their lives could not be sustained

without the animal.

The Jefferson Expansion Museum assists the observer who wishes to develop a

potent and historically accurate understanding of western expansion. The visitor is brought

into contact with the artifacts of U.S. history, but is offered no explanation or opinions;

displays are unnamed and without descriptions. The artifacts serve only to augment the

participant’s understanding and not to define it. In this way, the Jefferson Expansion

Museum continues the silent dialogue incipient above ground.

Each year thousands of visitors come to the Arch to be inspired and few leave

disappointed. They bring their children—whose senses are betrayed by the Arch’s

alarming scale. The children frolic on the green lawn under the Curve’s noontime shadow

and adults muse openly about the marvels of its construction. All the while, the monument

speaks silently about a land blanketed in dense forest whose bison moved easily through 50 Ibid. 51 Capps, McElroy, Moore, Richard, p 24.

Fig 12. The Arch rises majestically from the green memorial grounds

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the open parries. The astute recognize that a land and its people are ephemeral. The Arch’s

perilous and daring reach heavenward seems to affirm that, “Nothing is unchangeable but

the inherent and unalienable rights of man.”52 And every time we gaze at its glistening

silver skin, we are reminded that these rights must be afforded hard work and struggle.

One can never be certain that the Gateway Arch will stand 1000 years from now.

Even a massive concrete and steel structure is fragile in a world of deep uncertainty. But

triumphantly it reminds us of the great privileges of citizenship. In the dawn of evening,

the Arch reaches high to invoke the nobility of a struggle for freedom. And at daybreak, it

returns beautifully to earth, to remind us of our responsibility as citizens.

52 Ibid.