More than a century ago, painters executed elaborate tableaus illustrating sequences of historic events. Nowadays hardcover graphic histories, illustrated in comic-book style, similarly relate stories of the past in a sequence of panels but in a format anyone can own. One of the latest titles in this growing genre, The Bridge, illustrates the conception and construction of one of New York’s—and the world’s—familiar landmarks. The birth of the Brooklyn Bridge is depicted in pictures and captions and explores the project’s human side—the drama of its designer, John Augustus Roebling, who died before the structure was completed, and his son, Washington, who finished his father’s work.
