derricks, swelling at the veins, continued to hoist large
chunks of steel through the sky.
CHAPTER FIVE
KEEPING
THE WHEEL
FROM BENNY
After the towers had been finished in the winter of 1962, the cable spinning would begin—and with it the mistakes, the cursing,
the sweat, the death that Murphy had anticipated.
The spinning began in March of 1963. Six hundred men were up on the job, but Benny Olson, who had been the best cable-man
in America for thirty years, was not among them. He had been grounded. And though he had fumed, fretted, and cursed for three
days after he'd gotten the news, it did not help. He was sixty-six years old—too old to be climbing catwalks six hundred feet
in the sky, and too slow to be dodging those spinning wheels and snapping wires.
So he was sent four miles up the river to the bridge company's steelyard near Bayonne, New Jersey, where he was made supervisor
of a big tool shed and was given some punks to order around. But each day Olson would gaze down the river and see the towers
in the distance, and he could sense the sounds, the sights, the familiar sensation that pervades a bridge just before the
men begin to string steel thread across the sea. And Benny Olson knew, as did most others, that he had taught the cable experts
most of what they knew and had inspired new techniques in the task, and everybody knew, too, that Benny Olson, at sixty-six,
was now a legend securely spun into the lore and links of dozens of big bridges between Staten Island and San Francisco.
He was a skinny little man. He weighed about 135 pounds, stood five feet six inches; he was nearly bald on the top of his
head, though some strands grew long and loose down the back of his neck, and he had tiny blue eyes, rimmed with steel glasses,
and a long nose. Everybody referred to him as "Benny the Mouse." In his long career he had been a pusher, a walkin' boss,
and a superintendent. He compensated for his tiny stature by cutting big men down to size, insulting them endlessly and ruthlessly
as he demanded perfection and speed on each cable-spinning job. At the slightest provocation he would fire anyone. He would
fire his own brother. In fact, he had. On a bridge in Poughkeepsie in 1928, his brother, Ted, did not jump fast enough to
one of Benny Olson's commands, and that was all for Ted.
"Now look, you idiots," Olson then told the other men on the bridge, "things around here will be done my way, hear? Or else
Til kick the rest of you the hell off, too, hear?"
Very few men would ever talk back to Benny Olson in those days because, first, they respected him as a bridgeman, as a quick-handed
artist who was faster than anybody at pulling wires from a moving wheel and at inspiring a spinning gang to emulate him, and
also because Olson, when enraged, was wholly unpredictable and possibly dangerous.
In Philadelphia one day, shortly after he had purchased a new car and was sitting in it at an intersection waiting for the
red light to change, a jalopy filled with Negro teenagers came screeching up from behind and banged into the rear bumper of
Olson's new car. Quickly, but without saying a word, Olson got out of his car and reached in the back seat for the axe he
knew was there. Then he walked back to the boys' car and, still without saying a word, he lifted the axe into the air with
both hands and then sent it crashing down upon the fender of the jalopy, chopping off a headlight. Two more fast swings and
he had sliced off the other headlight and put a big incision in the middle of the hood. Finally he chopped off a chunk of
the aerial with a wide sweep of his axe, and then he turned and walked back to his car and drove slowly away. The boys just
sat in their jalopy. They were paralyzed with fear, stunned with disbelief.
Olson was in Philadelphia then because the Walt Whitman Bridge was going up, and the punks hired to work on that bridge were
incessantly tormented by Olson,
chunks of steel through the sky.
CHAPTER FIVE
KEEPING
THE WHEEL
FROM BENNY
After the towers had been finished in the winter of 1962, the cable spinning would begin—and with it the mistakes, the cursing,
the sweat, the death that Murphy had anticipated.
The spinning began in March of 1963. Six hundred men were up on the job, but Benny Olson, who had been the best cable-man
in America for thirty years, was not among them. He had been grounded. And though he had fumed, fretted, and cursed for three
days after he'd gotten the news, it did not help. He was sixty-six years old—too old to be climbing catwalks six hundred feet
in the sky, and too slow to be dodging those spinning wheels and snapping wires.
So he was sent four miles up the river to the bridge company's steelyard near Bayonne, New Jersey, where he was made supervisor
of a big tool shed and was given some punks to order around. But each day Olson would gaze down the river and see the towers
in the distance, and he could sense the sounds, the sights, the familiar sensation that pervades a bridge just before the
men begin to string steel thread across the sea. And Benny Olson knew, as did most others, that he had taught the cable experts
most of what they knew and had inspired new techniques in the task, and everybody knew, too, that Benny Olson, at sixty-six,
was now a legend securely spun into the lore and links of dozens of big bridges between Staten Island and San Francisco.
He was a skinny little man. He weighed about 135 pounds, stood five feet six inches; he was nearly bald on the top of his
head, though some strands grew long and loose down the back of his neck, and he had tiny blue eyes, rimmed with steel glasses,
and a long nose. Everybody referred to him as "Benny the Mouse." In his long career he had been a pusher, a walkin' boss,
and a superintendent. He compensated for his tiny stature by cutting big men down to size, insulting them endlessly and ruthlessly
as he demanded perfection and speed on each cable-spinning job. At the slightest provocation he would fire anyone. He would
fire his own brother. In fact, he had. On a bridge in Poughkeepsie in 1928, his brother, Ted, did not jump fast enough to
one of Benny Olson's commands, and that was all for Ted.
"Now look, you idiots," Olson then told the other men on the bridge, "things around here will be done my way, hear? Or else
Til kick the rest of you the hell off, too, hear?"
Very few men would ever talk back to Benny Olson in those days because, first, they respected him as a bridgeman, as a quick-handed
artist who was faster than anybody at pulling wires from a moving wheel and at inspiring a spinning gang to emulate him, and
also because Olson, when enraged, was wholly unpredictable and possibly dangerous.
In Philadelphia one day, shortly after he had purchased a new car and was sitting in it at an intersection waiting for the
red light to change, a jalopy filled with Negro teenagers came screeching up from behind and banged into the rear bumper of
Olson's new car. Quickly, but without saying a word, Olson got out of his car and reached in the back seat for the axe he
knew was there. Then he walked back to the boys' car and, still without saying a word, he lifted the axe into the air with
both hands and then sent it crashing down upon the fender of the jalopy, chopping off a headlight. Two more fast swings and
he had sliced off the other headlight and put a big incision in the middle of the hood. Finally he chopped off a chunk of
the aerial with a wide sweep of his axe, and then he turned and walked back to his car and drove slowly away. The boys just
sat in their jalopy. They were paralyzed with fear, stunned with disbelief.
Olson was in Philadelphia then because the Walt Whitman Bridge was going up, and the punks hired to work on that bridge were
incessantly tormented by Olson,
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