Bigelow Bridge
Facts
- Overview
- Abandoned swing through truss bridge over Fourche La Fave River on former Spur AR 113 just southwest of Bigelow
- Location
- Perry County, Arkansas
- Status
- Abandoned, with deck and two panels missing
- History
- Built 1909 by the Southwestern Bridge & Iron Co. of Fort Worth, TX
- Design
- Swing Pratt through truss
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +34.99766, -92.64394 (decimal degrees)
34°59'52" N, 92°38'38" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 15/532492/3872841 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Martindale
- Inventory number
- BH 10480 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Comments
According to the Google Maps, this bridge is still open to traffic.
As it shows the road to still exist.
checked out the bridge today and talked to a near by land owner (nice guy) aparently the bridge was brought down from michigan on a barge. there was aparently a mill there as well. you can see the foundations on the guys property. he said it was the old fourche river mill co. (finding info on that now)
Here's a distance shot of this bridge, only two weeks after Fred's pics.
Visited this bridge on 4 Feb '07. Had a hard time locating it and never really got close to it. I turned right at the water plant utility building and then the next left into a semi-dump site. The road to the left of the utility building was rutted real bad and sloppy so I could make it in my car. The photos I took were from about 100 yds. away.
Webmaster's note: The photos that were here have been incorporated into the main site.
This bridge is difficult to see, especially in summer. Both old road grades are overgrown with brush starting a good distance from the bridge itself. The easiest way to see it is to drive to it from the Bigelow side and turn right where the approach road ends by a utility building, and then take a left at the next turn. It takes you to a bluff/junkyard overlooking the river just north of the bridge. If the water is low, you can get to the bridge along the river bank, but there is a small creek near the bridge you will have you jump. The west end of the bridge is the damaged section.
a coworker of mine named Robert is a lifelong resident of Bigelow and he offered this bit of information:
in the mid 1970's, possibly 1976 - the bigelow bridge in a freak occurence ( a vehicle crossing it somehow ignited the flame ) caught fire and burned. it was then abandoned.
I'm not to far from Bigelow. I'd like to see it for myself. Email me with some more imfo!!
I was curious how long ago this bridge suffered its terminal damage....
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/ar/perry/bigelow/
visited the bridge today with a friend from bigelow. spoke with a property owner and was told that in the early 70's the mill owner was burning some milk cartons from the school and caught the deck on fire. there was not enough money to repair it. shortly after that someone actually stole the now missing section and sold it for scrap.