Jumbo and the Brooklyn Bridge

Jumbo was an African Bush elephant born in Sudan in 1860. Being a baby, he was sold to the Italian dealer Lorenzo Casanova, who carried him to Europe and sold it to Gottlieb Kreutzberg, who, after a short period of time sold him to the Jardin des Plantes in Paris. Still small, he was overshadowed by a couple of elephants bigger and nicer than him. Another top zoo in Europe, London Garden, was looking desperately for an African Elephant. Finally, they acquired the Elephant (still nameless) in exchange for a rhinoceros, two dingoes, a jackal, a possum, a kangaroo and a pair of eagles; ill and in poor condition, he is shipped to England on June 26, 1865. 

Matthew Scott, Scotty, becomes his new nurse, trainer and the friend who will be at his side till the very end. He was the one who names the elephant Jumbo. Time passes and Jumbo grows more and more. And more: 12 feet in height, 14 feet in length and seven tones. And he becomes more and more famous. Thanks to his friendly character, he begins giving rides to children; among those children were a young Winston Churchill and the Prince of Wales. He was the most important attraction of the zoo, reason why a new house was build for him and an elephant girl, Alice, was chosen to live with him in their new elephant house with bath pool. From that moment he won´t need to walk to the Themes to have regular baths. 

In 1881, the probably most important circus magnate P.T. Barnum, wanted the by far largest known elephant in the world: Jumbo. The zoo, aware of the fact that Jumbo was approaching his ‘musth’ period, sold him for 20.000 £. The whole process was held under a quite dark negotiation, and the zoo tried to revoke the sale after furious pressures by the population trying not to lose their beloved animal (The Elephant War, 1960, by Gillian Avery is a historical novel featuring the protest movement based in Oxford). 

But Barnum wasn´t a magnate for having a big hearth so on March 24, 1883, Jumbo and Scotty depart towards America, where they arrive on April 9 and debut in Madison Square Garden, New York the next day. After 31 weeks of circus tour, Barnum won $1.75 million thanks to the new attraction, Jumbo.

Brooklyn bridge was completed in 1883, but many people was skeptical about it stability. In May 1884, Jumbo was one of the 21 elephants of P.T. Barnum that crossed the Brooklyn Bridge in order to prove that the bridge was safe.
His theory was that if the bridge could easily hold Jumbo and his pals, the bridge could easily hold as many pedestrians as New York could throw at it. Barnum originally offered Jumbo to open the bridge the previous year and was turned down.

In September 15, 1883 Jumbo dies stuck by a train when he was entering his train. Many metallic objects were found in the elephant's stomach, including pennies, keys, rivets, and a police whistle. His skeleton was shipped to the American Museum of Natural History in New York. The elephant's heart was sold to Cornell University; his hide went to Tufts University in Massachusetts, where a fire in 1975 will destroy it. The elephant's ashes are kept in a 14-ounce Peter Pan Crunchy Peanut Butter jar in the office of the Tufts athletic director, while his taxidermied tail, removed during earlier renovations, resides in the holdings of the Tufts Digital Collections and Archives.

Dumbo is a 1941 American animated film produced by Walt Disney inspirited in Jumbo.

The Pentagon has double toilet facilities that is needed for a builidng its size

The Pentagon, located in Arlington (Virginia), is the headquarter of the United States Department of Defense.

When World War II broke out in Europe, the headquarters of the United States Department of War was spread out in different temporary buildings such as the Greggory Building, the National Mall. The situation was unacceptable for secretary of War Henry L. Stimson, and that is what he told President Franklin D. Roosevelt. It was decided to build a new building from scratch; it had to be no more than four stories tall with a minimal amount of steel, which implied the building would be sprawling over a large area. Steel was in short supply during WWII. The originally chosen site had a roughly pentagonal shape, and that is how it was designed.  But president Roosevelt suddenly got concerned that the new building could obstruct the view of Washington D.C. from Arlington Cemetery. Finally, the obsolete Hoover Airport location was selected. But, after changing the site, the design was maintained because a major change would have been very expensive. Nevertheless, it was modified to a perfect shaped pentagon. Part of the attached neighborhood, Hell’s Bottom, was bought for completing the space needed, including some pawnshops, some factories and 150 houses making 280 acres (1.1 km2).

Works begun on September 11, 1941. The reinforced concrete structure was covered with Indiana limestone facades.  680,000 tons sand from the Potomac River were used for the construction. The necessity of having the headquarters finished rush the process to an unbelievable speed, rushed even more, after Pearl Harbor attack (December 7 1941)

The Pentagon has double the standard toilet facilities due to the state of Virginia’s racial laws at the time of it construction. On each floor there were double toilet facilities separated by gender and race. However, president Roosvelt ordered to remove the “Whites Only” signs before the building was used and during a long period of time, it was the only building in Virginia were segregation was not allowed. 

The building was completed by January 15, 1943. It was the largest building in the country, housing more than 17 miles of corridors. Normally, it would have taken years, but it was designed and executed in just 16 months. 

Aerial view of the two first sides

MEGHLAYA BRIDGES

Meghalaya is a state in the north east of India. It is a heavily forested region very rainy. It is said to be the wettest place in the world, with an average annual rainfall as high as 1200cc in some areas; the town of Cherrapunji holds the world record for most rain in a calendar month. This means that during the raining season, those streams that are spread out through all the area, become indomitable torrents that destroy everything in their way, including bridges. That is why the inhabitants developed, centuries ago, an amazing way to create bridges that would withstand the flows: Natural living bridges made with directional roots.

If you want to see with your own eyes how they work, I strongly recommend the following video, extracted from a chapter, dedicated to the rivers, of Human Planet, an awesome BBC documentary. Absolutely all the chapters of Human Planet are amazing; I really encourage you to see them.  

 

DARUMA-OTOSHI, a New Demolition Method recognized as an "Innovation Award Finalist" in the 2012 CTBUH Awards Program.

DARUMA-OTOSHI, a New Demolition Method recognized as an "Innovation Award Finalist" in the 2012 CTBUH Awards Program.

Demolishing tall buildings in the middle of a city is becoming an everyday occurrence in big cities such as Tokyo, where the lack of space forces city planners to reinvent the urban core. It is becoming an issue impact on the environment and re-use of materials.  Kajima Corporation has developed a method that addresses and improves over traditional demolition methods. Deconstruction versus demolition. The “Cut and Take Down Method” consists on: “temporary columns are used around the structural column grid, the existing columns are replaced, and then hydraulic jacks are placed where the existing columns were and the building can be lowered to the next floor plate where the process is repeated”

"Daryna-Otoshi" is an old Japanese game that consists in taking the bottom pieces of a toy without dissasembling it. 

“There are so many quiet revolutions going on in tall buildings. Top-down construction is one such revolution, and here is another—bottom-up demolition.”
- Antony Wood, 2012 Awards Juror, CTBUH

These two videos clearly show how this amazing method works: