Bridge Party

Last year they met and shook hands beneath the bottom of the Hudson River. This year they met and shook hands above the Hudson's surface--two Irish-blooded politicians, neighbors, mutual admirers; Governors Alfred Emanuel Smith of New York and Arthur Harry Moore of New Jersey. Last year's ceremony was to celebrate the opening of the Holland Vehicular Tunnel between lower Manhattan and Jersey City (TIME, Aug. 30, 1926). On that occasion, gold teeth flashing and freckles getting lost in dimples, the Governors had jocularly pushed and pulled each other across the interstate line. Last week's ceremony on the S. S. De Witt Clinton, anchored at midstream, was to signalize the breaking of ground for the world's longest suspension bridge* --between Fort Washington Park, N. Y., and Fort Lee, N. J. There was no jocular pushing, no pulling; but Democratic Governor Smith pertly warned Republican Senator Walter Evans Edge of Governor Moore's party to take care lest the new bridge make way for a Democratic invasion of New Jersey.

*The three longest suspension bridges existing at present are: 1) the bridge at Philadelphia reaching across the Delaware, with a span of 1,750 ft.; 2) the Peekskill (Bear Mountain) bridge over the Hudson--1,632 ft.; 3) the Williamsburg bridge over the East River--1,600 ft. The new bridge is to be 3,192 ft.--twice the length of the Brooklyn Bridge.