Bridge buyer hopes to dance on landmark bridge - Orville Middleton plans remake of Borden Bridge into dance hall
BORDEN -SK- For most people, bridges are for crossing.
For Orville Middleton, they're for dancing.
The 85-year-old entrepreneur, who recently bought the Borden Bridge over the North Saskatchewan River 30 kilometres west of Saskatoon, says he wants to turn it into an open-air dance hall.
"I like to dance," says the longtime Saskatoon resident. "People come from Borden, Prince Albert and all over the place to dance in Saskatoon, so why wouldn't people in Saskatoon come out here to go dancing?"
When asked why he bought a bridge instead of a hall, Middleton simply shrugs and says, "Because it was here."
He plans to build walls, a roof and a hardwood floor for dancing, and hopes to start pre-fabrication by the winter.
It's a different concept, Middleton admits, but one that's earned him a lot of compliments from Borden residents, who worried their beloved bow-string arch bridge -- the longest of its kind in North America when it was constructed in 1937 -- might meet its end with a little help from some government dynamite.
"What else could you have done except blow it up?" asks Helen Sutherland, a Borden resident since 1948. "It's our landmark. It's part of our heritage, so I think most people here are grateful that it's still going to be around."
Borden Mayor John Rawlyck said the bridge is a source of pride for the town because of its unique architecture.
"It's got sentimental value because it provided a lot of work for people in the area when it was under construction," he said.
Construction on the bridge began in late 1935 during the height of the Depression as part of a government make-work project for unemployed farm and city workers. In fact, the Liberal government at the time decided to use the bow-string arch design, in part because the more difficult construction techniques would mean the workers would be employed longer. Where only a ferry existed to take traffic across the river a few years earlier, the new bridge quickly became an essential part in the development of towns and industries northwest of Saskatoon.
Unfortunately, it wasn't the safest bridge. Drivers often complained the
250-metre-long structure was too narrow to accommodate smooth two-way traffic, and the bridge was often blamed as the cause of traffic accidents and at least 20 fatalities. By 1982, 3,000 cars a day were using the bridge. The Borden Bridge officially closed in 1985 and a new one opened right beside it.
"The bridge was essentially a structure we no longer required," said Doug Wakabayashi, director of communications for Saskatchewan Highways and Transportation. "So if someone else can make use of it, that's fine with us."
Wakabayashi says an inspection of the bridge to ensure it is still structurally sound is a condition of the sale, but that has yet to be done.
"We don't typically inspect structures we don't use," he said.
The government put the bridge up for sale on June 23 and received two offers. Middleton's $33,000 bid was the highest and, on July 16, Middleton became the proud owner of one of Saskatchewan's oldest concrete bridges.
"I think I was lucky to get it," he says.
Middleton is surprisingly optimistic for someone who just bought a bridge. But then he's used to taking risks.
After serving in the Air Force for both the Canadian and American military during the Second World War, Middleton took his first business risk and opened a roller skating rink in his hometown of Kelowna. It was there that he met is wife, Jean, "sitting in the middle of the rink."
"She had just fallen down so I went over, picked her up, and skated her around."
In 1962, Middleton bought some trucks and came east to Saskatoon to work on the Gardiner Dam project. He ended up hauling most of the concrete used in the project. Soon after, he opened Saskatoon's first coin-operated car wash. Then he built a self-serve garage, where people could perform their own oil changes.
After seeing the huge amounts of oil collecting at the garage, Middleton began to think about a way to recycle it. So, in 1977, he built a refinery near Martensville called Magnum Oil Company to recycle used engine oil. He sold the company in 1997 and has been looking for new business ventures ever since. When Jean died three years ago, Middleton says he contemplated retirement, but soon realized it was something he couldn't do.
Middleton says he's received some suggestions for the bridge, including using it as a billboard for drivers passing by on Highway 16, a motel and a trailer park. Someone even suggested installing a bungee-jumping platform. But it's a dance hall Middleton has his heart set on. He still dances every week in Saskatoon and says his favourite dance is the jive.
He says he pictures people holding family reunions and wedding receptions on the bridge.
"How neat would it be for couples to say, 'We got married on the Borden Bridge?' "
Bridge in Brief
- Built between 1935 and 1937 by R. J. Arrand Company of Saskatoon
- Designed by Bev Evans for his master's thesis while a graduate student at the University of Saskatchewan
- At 250 metres long, the bridge was the longest bow-string arch bridge in North America at construction
- Labourers were paid 35 cents an hour during construction, and 50 cents if they brought a horse
- $33,000: The price Orville Middleton paid for the bridge.
*Kenyon Wallace, with files from Darlene Polachic,
The StarPhoenix
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