Scaled-Down Birthday Bash Marks Golden Gate Bridge’s 50-Year Span

Brushing aside threatened lawsuits, predictions of gridlock and assorted kill-joys, this city will celebrate its pre-eminent symbol today in a party marking the Golden Gate Bridge’s first half-century.

Socialite Charlotte Mailliard, the city’s official party-giver, took over party planning in January, and Mayor Dianne Feinstein took over fund raising in April, when it looked as if the celebration, then being handled by Golden Gate Bridge District directors, might turn into a civic embarrassment.

Beginning at dawn and continuing into the night, there will be fireworks, food, music and parades by land, sea and air, in an event billed as a family-oriented celebration.

Across the Golden Gate in Sausalito, a series of somewhat irreverent weekend events are planned, including a 50-year birthday salute to Spam, complete with a sculpture of the Golden Gate’s north tower made of 3,500 Spam cans.

On the San Francisco side, the day will begin at 4:45 a.m., when the 4,200-foot-long span will be closed to cars. People will be able to walk its length between 6:15 a.m. and 8 a.m. Traffic will resume by 9:30 with a parade of vintage cars.

200,000 on Foot

The walk will commemorate the opening on May 27, 1937, when 200,000 people took a break from the Depression to walk or run across, many stopping for picnics. At noon the next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signaled by gold-key telegraph that the bridge was open for traffic, and 500 military planes flew overhead.

At the time, the Golden Gate was the world’s longest single-span suspension bridge, but it since has been eclipsed by the Verrazano Narrows Bridge in New York.

Other bridges may be more impressive engineering feats, but no bridge can match the majesty of the Golden Gate, which connects San Francisco with Marin County.

“No one can stand for long in the presence of a magnificent structure like the Golden Gate Bridge without being moved by its sweep and grandeur,” said Albert A. Grant, president-elect of the American Society of Civil Engineers.

During 4 1/2 years of construction, 11 workers died, including 10 who were killed when scaffolding snapped and plunged their staging platform through a safety net.

Net Saved Others

“The net was built to catch a man,” E. C. Lambert, 77, of Honolulu, one of two who survived the fall, said in a ceremony to remember the dead earlier in the week. “The staging weighed tons. The net tore like tissue paper.”

The safety net saved the lives of 19 men during four years of construction and was one of the innovations that resulted from the project. Others included mandatory safety lines and hard hats.

The commemorative event has gradually shrunk from a $22-million affair, grandiose in the view of some but still shy of the $35-million cost of the bridge. Sunday’s party will cost $600,000, most of which was raised in the last two months from the city and corporate donors.

Other donations, including gardens at the bridge and electrical work for the installation of lights, will bring the total value of the celebration to $4 million to $5 million, said Terry Sellards, chief executive officer of Friends of the Golden Gate Bridge, which is working with Mailliard to put together the bash.

The event was mired in controversy from the start when a private promoter threatened to sue the bridge district for stealing what he said was his idea--the 50th-year celebration. Donors were hesitant to give for fear of a legal battle, and no television network came forth with a bid for exclusive rights to air the party live.

Making matters worse, Marin County residents envisioned a catastrophe if the bridge was closed, as planned initially, for the entire day. When bridge directors bowed to the pressure and decided not to close it, rock promoter Bill Graham, fearing a major traffic jam and angry at what he saw as the bridge board’s shortsightedness, canceled a free concert that would have featured San Francisco performers ranging from the Grateful Dead to Huey Lewis and the News.

Instead, the Pottstown, Pa., High School band will perform, marking the fact that 21,500 tons of steel used on the span came from Pottstown.

There are no firm predictions about how many people will turn out for the party. Some officials contemplate 250,000 or more for the bridge walk, but Lt. Val Daniels of the California Highway Patrol noted, “It’s not like selling tickets at the L.A. Coliseum, where you know you have a sellout or not.”

Transit Trouble

Fearing gridlock, authorities hope that public transit will carry the throngs into town. The system has not always performed in stellar fashion, however. Last weekend, thousands of runners headed for the San Francisco Bay-to-Breakers run had to take buses and cars when the trans-bay subway from Oakland to San Francisco broke down for five hours.

The biggest jam may be not on the streets but in the bay. The Coast Guard expects 2,000 to 5,000 pleasure boats to crowd into the area nearest the San Francisco Marina District, site of the fireworks show. Just as the fireworks start, Lt. John Carroll of the Coast Guard noted, the tidal current at the Golden Gate will be its most treacherous.

“It couldn’t have been worse,” Carroll said, noting that 35 cutters and patrol boats from Crescent City south will be out. “It will be a very busy day.”

Between the morning walk and the evening fireworks, there will be marching bands, a carnival and food booths in San Francisco’s marina area. Tony Bennett will sing, and San Francisco’s Symphony will perform during the evening.

‘Small-Town’ Feeling

Antique planes will fly overhead in the morning and afternoon. Air Force jets will perform aerobatics. There will be a parade of military ships and old-time ships, plus yachts and any other boats that can join in.

“The whole feeling of the celebration will be almost small-town,” event spokeswoman Violet Welles said.

As the weekend grew closer, the “family style” event was getting more pricey. There were pay-as-you-go parties in hotels and restaurants with bridge views. Sunday evening bay cruises were going for up to $500, and $75 would get revelers into a buffet dinner at Ft. Mason, part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, plus a good view of the fireworks and entertainment by Maria Muldaur and others.