William C. Kingsley (1833–1885) was an American construction contractor who is best known for being one of the main figures involved in the creation of the

Brooklyn Bridge The Brooklyn Bridge is a hybrid cable-stayed/ suspension bridge in New York City, spanning the East River between the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn. Opened on May 24, 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge was the first fixed crossing of the East River ...

Career

Kingsley settled in

Brooklyn Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

in 1856 and worked as a contractor for the Brooklyn water works. He soon entered into partnership with Abner Chase Keeney (1826-1884), a civil engineer and contractor. In subsequent years, their construction firm, Kingsley & Keeney, was given large contracts to build Prospect Park, the stone wall around

Central Park Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West Side, Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the List of New York City parks, fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban par ...

, sewerages for Brooklyn and Manhattan, and the Hempstead Reservoir. But undoubtedly, Kingsley & Keeney's greatest project was the

.Jeffrey I. Richman, ''Brooklyn's Green-Wood Cemetery: New York's Buried Treasure''; Lunenburg, Vermont: The Stinehour Press, 1998 (1st edition); pp. 150-51. Print. Robert W. Storm, ''Ancestors and Descendants of Daphene Emily Keeney: A Preliminary Survey''; West Hartford, Connecticut: Whitney, Warren & Co., 2013; pp. 128-131, 135. By the mid-1860s, Kingsley was convinced that a bridge between

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

and Brooklyn was feasible and, perhaps most importantly, would benefit Kingsley & Keeney. Kingsley became the driving force behind that project, hiring Colonel Julius Walker Adams, a civil engineer who had worked with him on the Brooklyn sewers, to come up with a design and to prepare cost estimates. However, although Adams had previously dabbled in bridge designs and had many influential friends, he had never built a bridge of any consequence. His role was to come with a lowball estimate of the cost of the bridge, allowing Kingsley and its other promoters to gain the necessary approvals from public officials. Adams concluded that the Brooklyn Bridge could be built for $5,000,000; ultimately it would be built by John and

Washington Roebling Washington Augustus Roebling (May 26, 1837 – July 21, 1926) was an American civil engineer who supervised the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge, designed by his father John A. Roebling. He served in the Union Army during the American Civ ...

for three times that amount. When the New York and Brooklyn Bridge Company was organized in 1867, Kingsley became one of its major shareholders. Soon, he was named its superintendent, and a motion, proposed by none other than

Boss Tweed William Magear Tweed (April 3, 1823 – April 12, 1878), often erroneously referred to as William "Marcy" Tweed (see below), and widely known as "Boss" Tweed, was an American politician most notable for being the political boss of Tammany ...

and passed by the other trustees, authorized payment to Kingsley & Keeney of 15% of all construction costs. This was an unheard-of percentage for such a large contract; in 1870 alone, it amounted to $175,000. In 1873, after Tweed had fallen from power, Kingsley & Keeney's contract with the Bridge Company was renegotiated, and its payment was slashed to the much smaller flat fee of $10,000 (equal to about $300,000 in 2023) per year.https://www.in2013dollars.com/us/inflation/1873?amount=10, accessed Dec. 9, 2023. In 1875, Kingsley joined the board of trustees of the Brooklyn Bridge, and succeeded

Henry Cruse Murphy Henry Cruse Murphy (July 5, 1810 – December 1, 1882) was an American lawyer, politician and historian. During his political career, he served as Brooklyn#Mayors of the City of Brooklyn, Mayor of Brooklyn, a member of the United States House of ...

as president of the board in 1882, upon Murphy's death; he held that position on May 24, 1883, the day that the Brooklyn Bridge opened. After his death, Kingsley was succeeded as trustee by Seth Lee Keeney (1831-1913), a building contractor and the brother of Kingsley's late partner.

Memorial

William C. Kingsley is interred at

Green-Wood Cemetery Green-Wood Cemetery is a cemetery in the western portion of Brooklyn, New York City. The cemetery is located between South Slope/ Greenwood Heights, Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, Borough Park, Kensington, and Sunset Park, and lies several bl ...

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

. His monument was cut from granite stone that was once a part of the Brooklyn Bridge and was placed there by the bridge's Board of Trustees to honor his role in making the dream of a bridge between the great Cities of New York and Brooklyn a reality.

References

External links

Green-Wood Cemetery Burial Search
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kingsley, William C. 1833 births 1885 deaths