{"id":20492,"date":"2021-09-30T11:14:18","date_gmt":"2021-09-30T15:14:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/?p=20492"},"modified":"2021-09-30T11:14:18","modified_gmt":"2021-09-30T15:14:18","slug":"on-a-clear-day-you-can-see-forever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/on-a-clear-day-you-can-see-forever\/","title":{"rendered":"On a Clear Day You Can See Forever"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"position: relative; padding-top: max(60%,326px); height: 0; width: 100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"position: absolute; border: none; width: 100%; height: 100%; left: 0; right: 0; top: 0; bottom: 0;\" src=\"https:\/\/e.issuu.com\/embed.html?backgroundColor=%23e6e6e6&amp;d=portland_monthly_magazine_october_2021&amp;hideIssuuLogo=true&amp;pageNumber=30&amp;u=portlandmagazine\" width=\"300\" height=\"150\" sandbox=\"allow-top-navigation allow-top-navigation-by-user-activation allow-downloads allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-modals allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<h3 class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">What\u2019s more than forty stories tall,<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s1\">shaped like an obelisk,<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s1\">and built of Maine granite?<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/h3>\n<h3 class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">a) the Washington Monument<br \/>\n<\/span><span class=\"s1\">b) the Penobscot Narrows Bridge support towers<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s1\">c) both<\/span><\/h3>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">By Alec Palmer<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">The <strong>Penobscot Narrows Bridge<\/strong> is one of just four bridge observatories standing in the world today. At 420 feet (forty-two stories), it\u2019s the tallest occupied structure in Maine, and the highest bridge observatory on the planet, according to <a href=\"http:\/\/maine.gov\/\"><span class=\"s2\">Maine.gov<\/span><\/a>. The observatory provides a 360-degree panoramic view of the surrounding countryside, including historic Fort Knox. <b>Eileen Bartlett<\/b> has been a part-time usher for the observatory for the past three years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p5\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">What drew you to this unusual job? Do you have any personal connection to the bridge?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">My grandpa grew up a half mile from here. His father drowned in the river on Thanksgiving Day, 1894, two months before my grandpa was born. That was back when a ferry ran between <strong>Fort Knox <\/strong>and <strong>Bucksport<\/strong>. The old <strong>Waldo-Hancock Bridge<\/strong> was built in 1931.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p5\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">I used to be terrified of the Waldo-Hancock Bridge. Did it scare you too?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">No, not really. When I was a kid, a friend and I would get in the middle of the bridge and wait for a truck to pass by and make the suspension bridge shake up and down!<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p5\"><strong><span class=\"s1\">What happens when someone gets vertigo<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/span><span class=\"s1\">in the observatory?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<p class=\"p3\"><span class=\"s1\">I\u2019ve never seen anyone panic. They\u2019ll say, \u201cOh god, we\u2019re high!\u201d and they\u2019ll have to come right down, but it doesn\u2019t happen every day. People are warned that it\u2019s floor-to-ceiling glass, so you can look straight out at the horizon. Some people end up hugging the wall the whole time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\"><em><span class=\"s1\">Read the full story in the digital magazine above.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p class=\"p7\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-large wp-image-20493\" src=\"http:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day-1024x538.jpg\" alt=\"OCT21 Clear Day\" width=\"1024\" height=\"538\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day-1024x538.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day-300x158.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day-768x403.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day-200x105.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day-620x326.jpg 620w, https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/OCT21-Clear-Day.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What\u2019s more than forty stories tall, shaped like an obelisk, and built of Maine granite? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20494,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20492","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20492","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20492"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20492\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20550,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20492\/revisions\/20550"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20494"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20492"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20492"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.portlandmonthly.com\/portmag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20492"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}