The Golden Gate Bridge, a modern feat of engineering during the Great Depression, opened to the public on this day, May 27, 1937.
“The greatest task that has ever challenged the genius, courage and will of man has been accomplished,” wrote J. Lawrence Toole in the official souvenir program for the bridge's dedication.
“After almost a century of dreams, decades of conversations and five years of heroic work, here is the bridge, the noblest steel structure on this planet,” he said.
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“The Golden Gate Bridge Party,” a week-long series of events to celebrate the bridge, began at 6 a.m. on May 27, according to the souvenir program.
“With bated breath, San Franciscans and citizens of the Redwood Empire have looked forward to this day when the mighty Golden Gate Bridge opens to the world's traffic,” read a welcome message from San Francisco Mayor Angelo Joseph Rossi, printed in the program.
Pedestrians are shown walking across the Golden Gate Bridge on its opening day, May 27, 1937. (Getty Images)
“May the bridge be a link that always unites us in ties of brotherhood,” he also said, thanking those who joined the city in “financing this incomparable structure.”
While the bridge would primarily be used to transport motor vehicles across the Golden Gate from San Francisco to Marin County, the first day of the bridge's official opening was reserved for pedestrians.
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An estimated 18,000 people were waiting to cross the bridge before it opened to pedestrian traffic, the Golden Gate Bridge Highway and Transportation District website notes.
That number did not decrease as the day progressed. An estimated 15,000 people crossed the Golden Gate Bridge every hour on its opening day, about 200,000 in total.
The Golden Gate Bridge in 2023. The iconic span opened to the public on this day in 1937. (Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)
On opening day, each pedestrian was charged a 25-cent toll to cross the bridge (equivalent to about $5.30 in 2023), and “dozens of hot dog stands lined the road” to feed hungry pedestrians, the same site said.
In 2023, crossing the Golden Gate Bridge will be free.
Still, cars pay a toll of $9.40 to travel to San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge website says.
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The Golden Gate Bridge is 1.7 miles from abutment to abutment, that website also notes, and the span between the two towers reaches 4,200 feet.
At the time of its opening, the Golden Gate Bridge had the longest span in the world, something Toole called the “final achievement of an engineering achievement without equal or comparison,” in the souvenir program.
The Golden Gate Bridge opened on this day, May 25, 1937. (DeAgostini/Getty Images)
“To every stranger who sees it for the first time, the wonder of its size, its beauty and its grace will be a lasting memory,” Toole wrote.
“You will be told its story and you will be amazed. Generation after generation, the history and charm of the Golden Gate Bridge will be passed down to all who fall under its spell.”
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In addition to the first pedestrians crossing the bridge on foot, May 27 saw several other “firsts” in the bridge's history.
The span of the Golden Gate Bridge between its two towers was the longest in the world when it opened on May 27, 1937. Today, the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge in Japan holds that title. (Getty Images)
A man named Florentine Calegeri crossed the bridge and returned on stilts.
And two sisters were also the first to skate on the Golden Gate Bridge, according to the Golden Gate Bridge website.
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Additionally, 11-year-old Anna Marie Anderson was the first girl lost and later found on the Golden Gate Bridge, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
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