2125, 2126 UNITED STATES (California) - The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco

2125 The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco (1)

The Golden Gate Bridge, one of the most internationally recognized symbols of  San Francisco, is a suspension bridge spanning the Golden Gate strait, the channel between San Francisco Bay and the Pacific Ocean. It has been declared one of the Wonders of the Modern World by the American Society of Civil Engineers. Built between 1933 and 1937, was, until 1964, the longest suspension bridge main span in the world, at 1,300m.

2126 The Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco (2)

 

Chief engineer in charge of overall design and construction of the bridge project was Joseph Strauss, but, because he had little experience with cable-suspension designs, responsibility for much of the engineering and architecture fell on other experts. The graceful design was conceived by New York’s Manhattan Bridge designer Leon Moisseiff, and Charles Alton Ellis was the principal engineer of the project. Irving Morrow designed the overall shape of the bridge towers, the lighting scheme, and Art Deco elements.

Total length of the Golden Gate Bridge from abutment to abutment is 2,737m. Its clearance above high water averages 67m while its towers, at 227m above the water, were the world's tallest on a suspension bridge until 1998. The weight of the roadway is hung from two cables that pass through the two main towers and are fixed in concrete at each end. Each cable is made of 27,572 strands of wire. There are 130,000km of wire in the main cables. The bridge has approximately 1,200,000 total rivets.

About the stamps
On the postcard 2125
The first stamp is the Christmas stamp 2012, about which I wrote here. The second stamp, depicting Spicebush Swallowtail, is part of a definitive series with butterflies, about which I wrote here.  

On the postcard 2126
The first stamp is the one issued in 2013 for celebrating Kwanzaa, about which I wrote here. The second stamp, depicting Spicebush Swallowtail, is part of a definitive series with butterflies, about which I wrote here.  

References
Golden Gate Bridge - Wikipedia

Sender 2125, 2126: Denise 
Sent from Greenvale (New York / United States), on 13.01.2014
Photo: Ken Glaser Jr.