Kirkland resident Eduardo Calderon has always had a special thing for bridges — he’s just never had the chance to really delve into what makes crossings so attractive until now.
Calderon, who has lived in Kirkland for 40 years, will present his photographs from a two-year project on historic bridges in King County on Sept. 13 at the Kirkland Library. He moved to the Seattle area from Arequipa, Peru, in the late 1960s to study anthropology at the University of Washington.
The project encompasses 17 bridges, and was funded by grants from 4Culture, King County’s cultural arm. Five of the images are on display at the Kirkland Library until Nov. 27.
Calderon said he worked with historians and people from the Washington DOT in selecting the bridges, four of which were photographed in 2015 and an additional 13 photographed in 2016.
The list includes the York Bridge on the Sammamish River, between Kirkland and Redmond.
“It’s hard to pick a favorite,” Calderon said, “but one of my favorite ones was the Leschi Park Trolley Bridge in Seattle. It’s one of the oldest.”
The bridge was built for an old trolley system that ran from downtown Seattle to Lake Washington, where trolley riders could take a ferry to the Eastside.
“What’s left of the trolley line is in the upper part of the park, and is overgrown,” Calderon said. “It’s not being used as a bridge in the sense that people can only go underneath. I’d probably driven under it many times without paying attention.”
In most cases, Calderon had never seen the bridges on the list until he showed up with a set of cameras.
He walks around with a small digital camera, deciding on the best viewpoint for each bridge. Once he’s seen several different angles, he brings out the heavy, 4×5 large-format camera.
Think of the cartoon cameras from Tweety and Sylvester.
Calderon captured each image on black-and-white film. The Oct. 13 presentation will include the digital images that led to each bridge photo, and the history of each bridge from Margaret Holwenger, an engineer from the King County Department of Transportation.
Calderon hopes to eventually display the entire collection as one exhibit, and possibly add more bridges to the list next spring.
The presentation is scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m.
