Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Covered Bridges
    Covered Bridges
    Covered Bridges
    Ebook86 pages41 minutes

    Covered Bridges

    By Joseph D Conwill

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Covered Bridges are historic pieces of American and Canadian rural history, gracing the countryside from Oregon to Tennessee and from California to New Brunswick and across Canada. In this lavishly illustrated volume Joseph D. Conwill recounts the rich, romantic history of covered bridges as they developed from early timber bridges, born out of the traditions of Medieval times, into modernized structures designed for the motorized traffic of the early twentieth century. Reflecting on the efforts to keep covered bridges in service as the face of the rural landscape is transformed, and the challenge of preserving their historic character while making them safe for modern traffic, Conwill guides the reader across the diverse range of covered bridges to be found throughout the North America.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBloomsbury Publishing
    Release dateSep 10, 2014
    ISBN9781784420109
    Covered Bridges
    Author

    Joseph D Conwill

    Photographer and historian Joseph D. Conwill has been interested in covered bridges since 1966. He has seen every covered bridge in North America, including nearly two hundred that no longer exist. He is editor of Covered Bridge Topics, the quarterly magazine of the National Society for the Preservation of Covered Bridges. His photographic work is included in various collections, including the National Archives of Canada.

    Read more from Joseph D Conwill

    Related to Covered Bridges

    Titles in the series (27)

    View More
    View More

    Related ebooks

    Architecture For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Microstorie

      May 24, 2021

      Microstorie
      9 min read

    • Article

      Built To Last

      Jul 1, 2022

      These man-made objects have grown into important sources of national pride to Americans. They also are iconic U.S. symbols to international visitors. The futuristic Space Needle was built for the 1962 World’s Fair hosted by Seattle, Washington. That

      4 min read

    • Article

      The Clifton Suspension Bridge opens

      Oct 29, 2020

      On 8 December 1864, the city of Bristol celebrated the opening of its new iron suspension bridge with a whole day of festivities – yet the finishing touches were still being made just a day earlier. The completion of this epic feat of engineering had

      6 min read

    • Article

      Pontcysyllte Aqueduct

      Jan 4, 2023

      Pontcysyllte Aqueduct
      3 min read

    • Article

      San Francisco’s Golden Gate

      Jan 1, 2019

      San Francisco’s Golden Gate
      5 min read

    • Article

      Bridge Basics

      Jan 1, 2019

      Tension Compression Here’s a look at six basic bridge types. For help with bridge terms, check out pages 8–9. A beam bridge was one of the earliest bridges. It is also one of the simplest and least expensive to build. Its main elements are

      3 min read

    • Article

      Towering Achievement

      Dec 8, 2023

      Towering Achievement
      5 min read

    • Article

      Comment

      Sep 17, 2021

      Comment
      4 min read

    • Article

      Suspended Steel Links The World

      Aug 18, 2021

      Suspended Steel Links The World
      6 min read

    • Article

      Third Time Lucky

      Feb 13, 2019

      Third Time Lucky
      3 min read

    • Article

      Watery Waymaking

      Sep 24, 2019

      Watery Waymaking
      13 min read

    • Article

      Chicaco On The Move

      Jan 1, 2019

      Chicaco On The Move
      4 min read

    • Article

      A Bridge Worth Crossing

      May 6, 2020

      A Bridge Worth Crossing
      3 min read

    • Article

      Bridging The Gap

      Jul 6, 2018

      Bridging The Gap
      5 min read

    • Article

      Grand Designs

      Apr 13, 2023

      Grand Designs
      4 min read

    • Article

      The Railway Viaduct

      Aug 12, 2021

      The Railway Viaduct
      9 min read

    • Article

      Getting Started

      Jan 1, 2019

      Getting Started
      2 min read

    • Article

      Bridge Champion

      Jan 10, 2024

      The Royal Border viaduct bridge, whose 28 arches soar high above the River Tweed at Berwick-upon-Tweed, takes all the plaudits. But meander upstream for a mile or so and you’ll come face to face with an even greater masterpiece and one that warms the

      3 min read

    • Article

      Modelling Bridges: Part I

      Feb 23, 2023

      Modelling Bridges: Part I
      9 min read

    • Article

      A Grand Tour of Britain

      Dec 28, 2022

      A Grand Tour of Britain
      33 min read

    • Article

      Roman Around

      May 16, 2022

      Roman Around
      5 min read

    • Article

      Two Branch Lines To Windsor

      Feb 16, 2024

      Two Branch Lines To Windsor
      8 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Covered Bridges

    4/5

    1 rating0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Covered Bridges - Joseph D Conwill

      READING

      This lovely covered bridge in the Gatineau Valley of Québec is just a few miles north of Canada’s capital city of Ottawa, Ontario.

      INTRODUCTION

      THE OLD COVERED bridge is a powerful symbol of American rural life. The timber tunnel, fragrant and mysterious, carries the traveler safely over a gurgling stream, along the road from bright green fields to cool shady woods. This dreamworld image does not always match reality, but it comes close often enough to make covered bridges among the most popular symbols of Americana. They are also very accessible symbols, being found in most parts of the United States except for the High Plains and the Rockies, and in much of eastern Canada as well.

      The redevelopment of the rural economy as a suburban one, based on travel to jobs elsewhere, has made covered bridge preservation more difficult. Most covered bridges as originally built could have carried heavy loads such as school buses, fire engines, or oil trucks on an occasional basis, but the bridges suffered from decades of neglect which weakened many of them early in the twentieth century. Until the 1960s the common expectation was that the covered bridges would eventually all be replaced with concrete, and many did not receive even routine maintenance. Since then, their popularity has inspired various efforts to keep them in service, although the vastly increased traffic volume on rural roads brings special challenges in dealing with one-lane bridges. Bypassing them is a possibility, but all structures need repairs now and then, and it is often hard to find funding for repairs unless the bridge is still carrying traffic.

      The historical period of covered bridge construction lasted from about 1805 to 1955. In the northeastern United States no new covered bridges were built after World War I. Construction in the Midwest lasted into the 1920s, and in parts of the South into the 1930s. In the Pacific Northwest, and also in parts of eastern Canada, where large supplies of high quality timber were still locally available, covered bridge construction lasted into the 1950s. The later covered bridges were built for automobile traffic from the very start. The United States still has 674 covered bridges from this historical time period, although over a third of them have been significantly modernized. Canada has 144, and more of them are original because on average they are more recent.

      The former Columbia–Portland Bridge over the Delaware River between New Jersey and Pennsylvania shows the mystery of the long, timbered tunnel. It was an excellent example of the Burr truss type of construction.

      The popularity of the covered bridge concept inspired several thousand imitations from the mid-1950s onwards. Most of these were mere decorative shells erected over concrete bridges, or structures built of small dimension lumber in backyards. They obviously had no relation to the historical prototypes other than as testaments to their popularity, but guidebooks and press accounts often cited them as if they were real. This explains the wild misstatements still frequently encountered that there are over eight hundred, or fifteen hundred, or even three thousand covered bridges in the United States, for by now the modern imitations greatly outnumber the originals, just as recent suburban houses of colonial style outnumber real colonial-era dwellings.

      From the late 1960s onwards, a greater awareness of historical building techniques led to the construction of a few new covered bridges that closely resembled the old ones. At first they were all-new road crossings, or else replacements for old covered bridges that had been accidentally lost to

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1