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Video: Here's A Man Jumping Off The Brooklyn Bridge In 1930, For Sport
By
Jen Carlson
Published Aug 11, 2015
Modified Apr 11, 2018
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By
Jen Carlson
Published Aug 11, 2015
Modified Apr 11, 2018
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On May 24th, 1930, Jack Latkowski sat shotgun in a car which drove him to the middle of the Brooklyn Bridge. There, he got out in his swimming briefs and tank top (which read: Daredevil Jack), and casually climbed over the bridge barrier. He briefly assessed the best way to jump, made the Sign of the Cross, and as a handful of others looked on, took a spectacularly messy jackknife-esque leap into the East River. Hardly any form at all! But he survived, which was the point. And he went on to do it again and again.
Video of the 1930 jump has now surfaced—it is not embeddable, but you can WATCH IT HERE.
Latkowski lept off the bridge for sport, which was something of a badge of honor amongst a certain set of thrill-seekers at the time.
In 1882, Walter Donaldson was supposed to be the first to jump from the bridge, but once all of New York was watching and the winds began to blow, he decided against it. It wasn't for three more years that someone tried—in 1885, Robert E. Odlum became the first. He did not survive the jump, but that didn't stop others from stepping off the side, including one man who did so while donning "immense canvas wings." Another successfully leapt to the waters below in an effort to impress his girlfriend. And the most famous jump was made by Steve Brodie in 1886, who walked away with 200 bucks, a story in the Times, and some time in the Tombs.
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1930
1930s
brooklyn bridge
daredevil
flashback
history
Jack Latkowski
jump
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Jen Carlson
Jen Carlson is a former WNYC and Gothamist editor.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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