By Ravena Gildharie
Engineer Joseph Walter Holder was called a ‘madman’ when he started building the Demerara Harbour Bridge (DHB) in 1976.

“I remember a man passing one day on a motorbike; he stopped and said to us working on the bridge at that time, ‘you are mad people to build a bridge on nothing. You are wasting taxpayers’ money.’ Because there was literally no foundation for the structure, it was built on floating pontoons, and never done here before,” recollects Holder.

He was 39-years-old then, and the Project Manager tasked with erecting the 1851 metre-long structure, now the fourth longest floating bridge in use in the world. It is also the world’s longest floating steel bridge. This year, the DHB observes its 40th year of existence and Holder will celebrate his 81st birthday, and 57 years as an engineer.
He currently sits on several technical advisory boards/committees, is a supervising consultant and lecturers to young engineering students, who calls him ‘The Bridge Man.’

Though the DHB catapulted him to fame, Holder has engaged in many other infrastructural projects that connects Guyana from Berbice to Rupununi. He is documenting these

experiences and compiling an e-book that includes pictures from his earliest years in civil engineering, papers on the technical aspects of some projects and his personal ‘Joetry.’ He posts these on his Facebook page but hopes to have it someday published in print.

“The main idea is to share with the young and upcoming engineers, the lessons learnt from infrastructural projects in the past; and also, to let them know why he chose to do certain things the way we did,” explains Holder, one of the founding members of the Guyana Association of Professional Engineers (GAPE). He and his wife, Ismay, resides in North Ruimveldt, Georgetown. The couple has been married for 50 years and have two sons, and two grandchildren, all of whom live overseas.

Early years
‘Joe,’ as he is popularly called, was born on November 28, 1936 in Bartica; the eldest of 11 children. His mother was a teacher and his father, a foreman in the Transport and Harbours Department Garage in Bartica. The senior Holder was also a bodybuilder and weightlifter, who owned ‘Joe’s Gym.’

Young Joe attended St. John the Baptist Anglican School and at age eight, wrote the Government County Scholarship examination. “I had to travel to the Dolphin School in Georgetown to take the examination, and found Georgetown to be a big city, confusing and exciting,” he recalls.

On his second attempt at the examination, he won a scholarship to attend Queen’s College (QC) in 1947. The relocation affected Joe’s performance during his first year at QC. “I found this disturbing. I discovered, like Dr. Cheddi Jagan, who transferred from a school in Port Mourant to QC, that I was a big fish in a little pond where I grew up, but at QC I was a little fish in a big pond. In my second year at QC I said to myself that famous tautology “Enough is enough!” and set out to change things. At the end of the second year, I placed first in my class following examinations, and every year after that, all the way up to the sixth form, I was among the prizewinners,” he explains.

He earned a scholarship to the University College of the West Indies (UCWI) to pursue a Bachelor’s Degree in Physics, Pure Mathematics and Applied Mathematics. He later attended the University of Birmingham, University of Toronto, University of Guyana and University of Pittsburgh; gathering several Diplomas, Degrees and Masters in civil engineering, public works and public administration.

Engineer in action
Upon his return from England to Guyana in 1960, Joe became Assistant Engineer in the Public Works Department. His first project was the Abary bridge that links Berbice to Demerara. The project was done during 1961 and Holder was assigned to get experience in construction management.

Shortly after, he went to Canada to pursue his Master’s Degree in Structural Engineering and underwent training in the design of prestressed concrete bridges in the Department of Highways, Ontario. When he got back to Guyana, he led construction of the Mahaica to Rosignol roadway in 1965. Two decades later during 2003-2007, Joe guided construction of new bridges across the Mahaica and Mahaicony Creeks, under a project that upgraded structures between Timerhi and Rosignol. He had previously rebuilt bridges along the Soesdyke-Linden in the 1990s; replacing wooden structures with reinforced concrete.
As Chief of Works in the 1970-1980 period, Joe supervised construction of the Soesdyke-Linden and Essequibo Coast thoroughfares.

‘Del Conte road’
Another project most dear to Joe is the Parika-Gonshen road, but it is yet to be realised. Holder hopes to see it completed before he departs.
Back in 1962, it was his second undertaking when he served as assistant resident engineer to supervise the Venezuelan contractor, Del Conte, to build a 36-mile roadway between Parika and Goshen, located opposite Bartica. That $8 million (British Guiana dollars) project was halted after one year due to disagreements between the contractor and the then government. The present administration revisited the initiative two years ago and is pursuing the road’s completion.

Meanwhile, Joe also worked on the Mazaruni hydro and road construction as well as the Tiperu Quarry during the late 1960s to early 1970s. During 1980s, he was promoted to Permanent Secretary in the Works Ministry, and was involved in the Linden/Lethem road and Takutu bridge projects.
In December 1974, Joe represented the Guyana government to Rio de Janeiro where he discussed with officials of Brazil’s Federal Highway Department, preliminary location and design of a bridge across the Takutu river, linking Guyana and Brazil. But, it wasn’t until 33 years later that construction materialised, and eventually the Takutu Bridge was commissioned in 2009.

Demerara Harbour Bridge
This project remains the pinnacle of Holder’s career. In 1980, he was awarded the Golden Arrow of Achievement for his contributions to civil engineering and construction management of the DHB.
“The construction of the DHB was not only a struggle with the forces of nature, but also a struggle among various social forces in Guyanese society, during which the utility and effectiveness of participatory democracy in the organisation of social activity was visibly demonstrated,” Joe recalls. The bridge was declared open to traffic on July 2, 1978 at a ceremony attended by Prime Minister Forbes Burnham and according to Joe, one of the largest crowds seen in Guyana attended the event.