Ian Jack (9 September) bemoans the paucity of indigenous civil engineering input to the new Forth/Queensferry crossing compared with earlier bridges such as the 1890 Forth railway bridge. The senior foreman on that bridge was Japanese. Kaichi Watanabe was a protege of the Scottish pioneer of technical education in 19th-century Japan, Henry Dyer. A graduate in civil engineering of Glasgow University in the 1880s, Watanabe was also a protege of the rail bridge’s main engineers, John Fowler and Benjamin Baker. Indeed, there is a famous 1887 photograph of both Fowler and Baker acting as supports to Watanabe, who sits suspended between them, to demonstrate the cantilever principles embodied in the bridge’s iconic design.
Brian Donald
Menstrie, Clackmannanshire
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