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Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey Brainstuffloren Boglebaum.

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Speaker 1: Here crossing the River Thames between the city of London

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Speaker 1: and southern The London Bridge in some form has welcomed

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Speaker 1: travelers for two millennia. Yet despite its longevity and fame,

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Speaker 1: it even has its own nursery rhyme. Oh. What people

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Speaker 1: think of as the London Bridge is often not the

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Speaker 1: London Bridge at all. In fact, do a Google search

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Speaker 1: for images of London Bridge and what you'll probably see

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Speaker 1: instead are images of the Tower Bridge, the famous Victorian

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Speaker 1: Gothic structure with two towers, which, to be fair, is

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Speaker 1: also a bridge in London. The actual London Bridge offers

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Speaker 1: a much simpler profile, and while the current structure dates

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Speaker 1: for the late nineteen hundreds, the story of the bridges

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Speaker 1: that have stood on that site is considerably longer. Today,

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Speaker 1: the London Bridge, Tower Bridge and three others are all

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Speaker 1: managed by the City Bridge Foundation, which has been operating

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Speaker 1: in one form or another for some nine hundred years.

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Speaker 1: It's a charitable trust and money is not required by

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Speaker 1: the bridge maintenance budget go to helping out Londoners in

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Speaker 1: need via the funding arm a City Bridge Trust. The

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Speaker 1: City Bridge Trust donates thirty million pounds a year in

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Speaker 1: this way. Okay. The first stone bridge on this site

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Speaker 1: across the Thames was built between eleven seventy six and

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Speaker 1: twelve oh nine CE. It was replaced in the early

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Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds and then again when the existing bridge was

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Speaker 1: built in the nineteen sixties and seventies. However, even before

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Speaker 1: the twelfth century stone bridge, a series of wooden bridges

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Speaker 1: had been constructed at the site, and the story of

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Speaker 1: the London Bridge begins with a Roman invasion and the

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Speaker 1: founding of the settlement of London Eum. It got its

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Speaker 1: start as a military pontoon bridge built by the Romans

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Speaker 1: when they were settling the area. For the next two

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Speaker 1: thousand years, the position of the bridge remained in nexus

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Speaker 1: for economic development. Timber bridges on the site were damaged

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Speaker 1: by multiple fires and a storm. The final wooden bridge,

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Speaker 1: designed by Peter, the Bridgemaster Chaplain of Saint Mary Colechurch,

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Speaker 1: was completed in eleven sixty three. Henry the Second commissioned

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Speaker 1: the first stone structure, also designed by Peter, just a

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Speaker 1: decade later, slightly to the west of the timber bridge location.

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Speaker 1: It was a simple masonry arched bridge and included a drawbridge.

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Speaker 1: This version, now referred to as the Old London Bridge,

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Speaker 1: was used as both day river crossing and a development

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Speaker 1: site for half a millennia. The stone Bridge was home

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Speaker 1: to around two hundred buildings at any given time, including residences, shops,

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Speaker 1: and a chapel dedicated to Saint Thomas of Canterbury. It

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Speaker 1: was during this period that the bridge was also home

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Speaker 1: to a morbid display the heads of traders to the

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Speaker 1: Crown dipped in tar and set on pikes at the

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Speaker 1: bridge's southern gateway, including those of Scottish hero Sir William

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Speaker 1: Walla and King Henry the Eighths. Chief Minister Thomas Cromwell,

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Speaker 1: who we've talked about in our episode on Humpty Dumpty

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Speaker 1: of all Things, Charles the Second stopped the practice in

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Speaker 1: sixteen sixty. Over the years, with so much development, the

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Speaker 1: bridge became constricted, not to mention the bathroom facilities dropped

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Speaker 1: straight into the Thames. So the city started removing the

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Speaker 1: buildings in these seventeen hundreds. As the London Bridge continued

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Speaker 1: to be a major transportation route even without its buildings,

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Speaker 1: a structural problems appeared. The arches deteriorated and the bridge,

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Speaker 1: which had experienced a variety of damage, was slowly sinking.

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Speaker 1: By the eighteen twenties, it was deemed structurally problematic. For

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Speaker 1: the article this episode is based on How Stuff Works.

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Speaker 1: Spoke via email with Roger Hobbs, Emeritith, professor in the

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Speaker 1: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Imperial College, London.

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Speaker 1: He explained a bridge peers are libel to damage from

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Speaker 1: shipping and from the force of the river rushing through.

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Speaker 1: This finished the life of the medieval bridge and probably

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Speaker 1: earlier bridges. They also need maintenance before problems become serious

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Speaker 1: or dangerous, so a so called New London Bridge was

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Speaker 1: proposed and it was completed in eighteen thirty one. A

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Speaker 1: Scottish civil engineer, John Rennie designed the masonry stone structure,

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Speaker 1: which was sturdier and highly engineered, but he died before

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Speaker 1: the design was approved. His sons constructed it upstream from

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Speaker 1: the twelfth century bridge, which was quickly demolished less than

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Speaker 1: one hundred years later. In the nineteen twenties, the city

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Speaker 1: knew that renovation or reconstruction would be necessary, although weight

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Speaker 1: of newfangled automobile traffic was causing it to sink slowly

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Speaker 1: into the river, but this new bridge remained until the

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Speaker 1: late nineteen sixties when it was finally replaced, but it

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Speaker 1: wasn't demolished. Instead, the new London Bridge, built in the

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Speaker 1: eighteen hundreds, was sold to one Robert P. McCullock, senior

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Speaker 1: chainsaw and motorboat magnate, who founded Lake Havasu City, Arizona,

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Speaker 1: in the nineteen sixties as a company town to test

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Speaker 1: his motors. In nineteen sixty eight, he purchased the bridge

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Speaker 1: for two point four million dollars of plus shipping costs

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Speaker 1: of an extra two hundred and forty thousand to bring

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Speaker 1: it to his new home, where he had it reconstructed

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Speaker 1: above a man made channel. Today, the city claims it's

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Speaker 1: the most visited built attraction in the state, an important

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Speaker 1: distinction for a place that also contains the Grand Canyon.

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Speaker 1: The London Bridge of today was designed by city engineer

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Speaker 1: Harold Knox King, with architects Mott hay And Anderson and

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Speaker 1: William Holford and partners. It was opened by Queen Elizabeth

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Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy three. The bridge features three spans founded

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Speaker 1: on concrete piers and is constructed of concrete and polished granite,

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Speaker 1: which isn't particularly striking, but is still a crucial roadway

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Speaker 1: and a curious public space. The structure is similar to

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Speaker 1: most overpasses in US high construction and isn't generally somewhere

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Speaker 1: tourists visit for its beauty, especially considering the historical architecture

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Speaker 1: throughout the rest of the city. However, the London Bridge

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Speaker 1: does offer an excellent location from which to take photos

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Speaker 1: of the nearby Tower Bridge. Until Westminster Bridge opened in

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Speaker 1: seventeen fifty, the London Bridge offered the city's only option

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Speaker 1: for crossing the Thames. Today, it connects two vibrant neighborhoods.

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Speaker 1: On the north side is the City of London, which

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Speaker 1: is the financial sector like Wall Street. To the south

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Speaker 1: is Southerark, with the Borough Market, the Shard and the

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Speaker 1: London Dungeon. Even with its current important status in modern London,

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Speaker 1: the bridge remains a site of tradition, such as the

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Speaker 1: twelfth century right to use it to drive sheep into

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Speaker 1: the City of London for sale. In twenty thirteen, twenty

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Speaker 1: sheep crossed the bridge in a reenactment of the historical

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Speaker 1: charter as part of a fundraising effort. This modern version

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Speaker 1: is expected to last over a century. But technically, yes,

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Speaker 1: the London Bridge has fallen down to some degree many

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Speaker 1: times during its two thousand year history. But where did

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Speaker 1: the nursery rhyme London Bridge is falling Down originate? It

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Speaker 1: was first published in the mid eighteen hundreds, but it

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Speaker 1: had probably been known long before that. There are a

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Speaker 1: few prevailing theories about what event the song refers to,

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Speaker 1: including an eleventh century Viking attack, the sixteen sixty six

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Speaker 1: Great London Fire, the rumored live entument of a person

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Speaker 1: in the structure's foundation, or even the ongoing issue of

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Speaker 1: the bridge needing repair. No consensus has been reached regarding

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Speaker 1: the identity of the fair lady mentioned in the rhyme either.

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Speaker 1: A one possibility is Eleanor of Provence, who was Harry

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Speaker 1: the Third's consort and controlled London Bridge revenue during the

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Speaker 1: late thirteenth century. Another guest is Matilda of Scotland, a

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Speaker 1: consort of Henry the First, who commissioned bridge projects more

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Speaker 1: than a century earlier. It has also been suggested that

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Speaker 1: it could be a member of the Lee family, who

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Speaker 1: claim it was one of their relatives who was walled

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Speaker 1: up in the bridge. Rumors of immurement have never been substantiated. Really,

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Speaker 1: it's Anybody's guests. Today's episode is based on the article

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Speaker 1: London Bridge has never fallen down, but it keeps getting

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Speaker 1: rebuilt on how stuffworks dot Com, written by Kerry Whitney.

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Speaker 1: Greenstuff is production of by Heart Radio in partnership with

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Speaker 1: how stuffworks dot Com, and it is produced by Tyler Klang.

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Speaker 1: Four more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows