Penny Bridges and more

Mitch Fincher makes penny sculptures. That is, he made them for a talk he gave while a Civil Engineer at Texas Tech University in 1980. I was led to this page by an article about Coin Towers I found on the venerable Milk and Cookies weblog.

Fincher gives us step-by-step instructions for building a penny bridge. Starting from building a simple penny tower, you learn how to build a single penny-span bridge, which leads, eventually, to as much as a seven-penny-span structure. It is a wonder of dexterity and knowledge, defying common sense logic almost as much as it seems to defy gravity. It is my suspicion that once you know how to build a penny bridge, your loose change will never be quite as loose again.

Then there are the penny domes (hollow, of course) and the penny bridge-dome, the penny spiral and the penny pyramid. Inspiration follows inspiration - each invitations to play and wonder.