When I was a kid, family travel involved a lot of road trips in The Old Man’s Buick. There were no superhighways in those days, except for the Indiana Toll Road but it didn’t go where we wanted to go.

On US 45 in Tigerton, there was a steel through truss bridge that I loved. There was something about that bridge that I really liked. Perhaps it was the superstructure that was above the road surface. Perhaps it was the idea of entering the portal, traveling through the steel tunnel and leaving the exit portal. Perhaps it was just the idea of being enveloped in a web of steel while crossing the Embarrass River.

It’s gone today, replaced by a boring, unromantic, unstylish and ugly flat slab of concrete that crosses the Embarrass River, and if there weren’t a green sign telling you the name of the river, you’d never know there was a bridge there.

A “through truss” bridge is one in which the structure that holds up the bridge is above the roadway. Such bridges used to be common in Wisconsin but not so much anymore. This one, in Grant County, Wisconsin, is typical of the through truss bridge.
Grant River Bridge

This sort of structure has always fascinated me.

Apparently, I’m not the only one. James Baughn is another man who has a fascination with bridges. He lives in Missouri and some time ago, he began to document historic bridges in Missouri to either help preserve them or, at least, record their existance before being replaced by, as James calls them, Ugly Concrete Eyesore Bridges.

Before long, his Herculean task expanded to include historic bridges across the country. He has access to a list of all the extant, historic bridges. The list is broken down by state and then by county.

Since one person cannot document them all, he has developed a team of “bridge hunters.” A bridge hunter is a nut, like me, that loves old bridges. We search them out and document the bridges (photograph them, mostly) and send the photos to James for inclusion in his website. Often, he has access to historic records and can document even more interesting facts about a bridge.

For example, in rural Dubuque County, Iowa, there is a bowstring truss bridge that crosses the narrow Lytle Creek. The 113 foot bowstring arch-truss was built by the Massillon Bridge Company of Ohio in 1873. In it’s day, it was on a major thoroughfare and a vital link in the county. Now on a dead end road, the bridge currently serves one homestead. At one time, bowstring truss bridges were common in Iowa, but maintenance issues doomed them to be replaced by less troublesome designs. The change of this road to a dead end likely helped preserve this bridge, a pristine example of a once common, but now very rare, bridge design. Using James’ list, I was able to locate the bridge and document it.

Bowstring Truss

James found a link to a historic database maintained by the Iowa DOT. The bridge has a most interesting history. You can see the bridge on his website and follow the link to the Iowa DOT historic bridge site.

http://bridgehunter.com/ia/dubuque/washington-mill/

The amount of travel that I do for my real job has allowed me to go hunting bridges in places I might not otherwise get to. I already knew of a couple of favorite bridges on the Lincoln Highway. This one, in Tama, Iowa, was built in 1915 and the name of the highway is cast into the railings.

Hunting bridges sometimes is an adventure in itself

not to mention, hanging over railings or stepping into muck is all part of the adventure. Sometimes walking, let alone driving, across some of these old bridges is an adventure in itself, like this old railroad bridge that crosses the Des Moines River.

If you’re fascinated by old architecture and old bridges, check out James Baughn’s Historic Bridge website. You might just turn into a Bridge Hunter, like us!

Historic Bridges of the United States.