What’s Behind the Name?
The inspiration behind Eads is both the majestic bridge that spans the Mississippi and James B. Eads, the man for whom the bridge is named. My love for the Eads bridge was born out of many early morning bike rides on the Saint Louis riverfront, finding inspiration from the bridge’s strength and beauty. As the first to span the Mississippi River in Saint Louis, and an engineering marvel of the time, the bridge represented both innovation and opportunity when it opened in 1874.
My appreciation for the man behind the bridge stems from the locally renowned blog, Distilled History. In the four-part series, “The Summer of Eads”, author Cameron Collins chronicles the compelling life of James Buchanan Eads. From his families unfortunate beginnings in Saint Louis to his rise among the city’s business elite, James Eads exhibited a fierce determination, a great sense of duty, and unrivaled ingenuity. His inventions and business acumen brought him great fortune but he never wavered in his commitment to work for which he was engaged. But it was not the ship salvage company from which he built his reputation, nor the fleet of ironclads he developed to dominate river warfare during the Civil War, but the bridge that bears his name which he believed was his greatest achievement.
Certainly there are many characteristics of both James Eads and the grand Eads Bridge which we aspire to with this firm. For further reading on the life of James Eads see The Summer of Eads: Part I, Part II, Part III, & Part VI.
-pb