proposal was ignored; few were willing to heed a young, inexperienced and impetuous engineer. To gain experience, Ellet started to work on railroads and canals, and later became the chief engineer on the James River and Kanawha Canal project. He further improved his reputation by contributing articles about suspension bridges to respected engineering journals, such as American Railroad Journal; eventually, Ellet built his first suspension bridge over the Schuylkill River, Pennsylvania, in 1842. Ellet had the looks of an actor, which were complemented by his entertaining oratorical skills. He took advantage of these characteristics, and used showmanship and dramatics to market his proposals. These skills helped to win him attention and raise his profile both in the public and within the industry. However, his imperiousness also ruffled the feathers of people, which caused conflicts. Nonetheless, his capability to promote himself had won him the contracts for the Suspension Bridge and the later Wheeling Suspension Bridge; the Wheeling contract was won in July 1847, while Ellet's plan for the Niagara Suspension Bridge was still in its initial stages of construction. Ellet's initial design for the bridge at Niagara placed all forms of transportation on a single deck. The railway track was in the middle of the deck, sandwiched between carriageways and footpaths on the outer sides. Moreover, trains would not go over the bridge; their cars would be disconnected from the heavy locomotives and pulled across the bridge by horses, cables, or lighter engines. Before the work could begin, Ellet faced the problem of all suspension bridge construction: getting a line across the gap. Ellet's brainstorming sessions with his men raised several ideas that could enable a line to be suspended across the gorge; these included firing cannonballs with the line attached, towing it across the river with a steamer, and tying it to a rocket that would then be launched across the gorge. Ultimately the bridge engineer chose an idea inspired by Benjamin Franklin's experiment with a kite. It was similar to 15th century inventor Leonardo da Vinci's plan to span a gap. Ellet also took the opportunity to generate publicity for his project. Organizing a kite-flying contest, he offered $5 to any boy who flew a kite across the gorge and secured the kite string to the other side. Youths from nearby towns flocked in to participate in contest that was held in January 1848. Unlike the other boys