A Bridge of Firsts: The building of the Wiscasset bridge

Thu, 10/12/2017 - 8:00am

Revisit the building of Davey Bridge linking Wiscasset to Davis Island, Edgecomb in photographs taken by journalist Phil Di Vece of Wiscasset. Costing over $8.5 million to build from 1981 to 1983, it was the first bridge of its kind constructed in northern New England. It's made up of 318 steel-reinforced concrete segments each weighing 40 tons held together by steel cables running within it post-tensioned to 846,000 pounds. Following its completion, it was dedicated by Gov. Joseph Brennan on Sept. 28. 1986 to Lincoln County Sheriff’s Detective Sergeant Donald E. Davey, who gave his life in the line of duty on June 30, 1984.

Local author and reporter Phil Di Vece will present the information and photographs he had gathered as a reporter during construction. His talk and pictures will show the progress of the project as well as insights to the impact to the community. This Friends’ of the Wiscasset Public Library program will be on Wednesday, Oct. 25 at 5 p.m. in the Fiction Room of the library.

Di Vece earned a Bachelor of Arts in journalism studies at Colorado State University and a Master of Arts in journalism at the University of South Florida. From 1980 to 1995, he owned and published a weekly newspaper, The Wiscasset Times, based in Wiscasset, where he continues to live and write. He is a former Wiscasset selectman, and is a trustee of the Wiscasset Water District.

Di Vece has a knack for colorful storytelling. His books “Wiscasset and Its Times” and “More Wiscasset and Its Times" take the reader on journeys through the storied past of Lincoln County’s Shire Town.