IN 1904, a group of Canadian workers began the hard slog of constructing the world's longest bridge, across the Saint Lawrence River just south of the city of Quebec. It was a wildly ambitious project. And it wasn't just for the Quebecois: Railroads were revolutionizing commerce and communications, and the bridge would connect people and allow trains to run from New Brunswick in the east to Winnipeg in the west. The river was 190 feet deep at the center, and ice piled high above the water's surface in the winter. Nothing about the bridge's construction would be easy. The engineers chose a complex cantilever design, a cutting-edge approach but a cost-efficient one too. Ambition creates risks, and warning signs started to appear. The steel trusses weighed more than expected. Some of the lower chords of the bridge seemed misaligned or bent. Workers raised concerns. But the project's leaders pressed ahead.
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