by Steve

In our travels, we will occasionally encounter things that just should not exist. Things that shouldn't be there. The city of Las Vegas is an example--it really has no reason for existing out in the middle of the desert with virtually no resources. This post is about another one of those things: the London Bridge in Lake Havasu City. But first a little history.

The Parker Dam was constructed on the Colorado River about 155 miles downstream from the Hoover Dam.  Construction began in 1934 and was completed in 1938. The Hoover Dam was completed in 1936, so these dams were being built at the same time, on the same river. Which also meant that the lakes they created were being filled at around the same time. 

Parker Dam created Lake Havasu, and it took four years to fill, completing the lake in 1942. The resulting lake, however, was not an immediate magnet for people. This is, after all, the middle of the desert with no major cities anywhere near it. Here's where the chainsaw comes in.

In 1943, Robert McColloch started a small engine company in Wisconsin.  After a few years, he moved the company to California and began manufacturing chainsaws. At first the saws required two men to operate them, but in 1949, McColloch revolutionized the industry by making a one-man chainsaw. Sales took off, and he would go on to change the industry again by making a lightweight chainsaw.  (You can read more about the history of McColloch here.) 

By 1963, the company had expanded into aircraft engines and outboard motors. While flying over the desert looking at Lake Havasu as a place to test outboards, McColloch thought that it might be a good spot for a city. He had money from his successful chainsaw company and had decided to try real estate development, so he acquired an abandoned military base on Lake Havasu. It cost him nothing, but he was committed to developing the land as part of the deal. The problem was that this was in the middle of the desert with no good way to get there. There was only one unimproved road leading to Lake Havasu in 1964.

Nevertheless, McColloch and his realty partner start advertising, flying people in and selling them lots. But it wasn't enough; he needed something else to lure people, something beyond dry desert, sunshine, and cold river water. His realtor came up with the crazy idea of buying the London Bridge and reconstructing it at Lake Havasu. 

The London Bridge, which was the latest one of several constructed on that particular site on the Thames river, had been completed in 1831. The lampposts on the bridge had been made from melted-down cannons captured from Napoleon at the battle of Waterloo.

But by 1924, the bridge had begun sinking due to the weight of automobile traffic, and one end was three to four inches lower than the other. Since it also blocked boat traffic on the river, the city of London decided to see if anyone would be willing to buy it, and they advertised it for sale in 1967. 

McColloch and his partner bid $2.4 million for the bridge and ended up getting it. Then they had to get the thing dismantled and moved to Arizona. The London Bridge was an entirely stone structure, way too heavy to move, even after dismantling it. So they kept only the façade and even had all the stones shaved down, losing four to eight inches of depth on each one. The stones were all numbered and shipped off to Arizona, along with the lampposts that lined the bridge. The stones became the facing on a newly constructed steel frame for a bridge that spanned nothing but sand.

So that's how Napoleon's cannons ended up in the Arizona desert, on a bridge that spans a man-made channel that didn't need to be there, except as an excuse for a bridge, in a city that probably shouldn't exist. But it all works.