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McBride Covered Bridge
Description
Another one of Madison County's unique flat roofed covered bridges. It was built in 1871 by Benton Jones and stood until being destroyed by arson in 1983. The man who burned it did so because he was distraught over a woman who left him...they had carved their initials in the bridge. He would later turn himself in and as part of his sentence he performed many hours of community service, much of which went to working on the other bridges. My understanding is that he enjoyed it so much that he served many hours past what he was sentenced helping to preserve the other spans.Bridge had been bypassed and the new bridge crossed the re-channelized river just to the North. The pin marks the spot where the columns and some wood remain.
Facts
- Overview
- Lost Lattice through truss bridge over North River on McBride Bridge Road (now McBride Road)
- Location
- Madison County, Iowa
- Status
- Destroyed by fire
- History
- Built in 1871 by Benton Jones; destroyed by arson in 1983 and replaced.
- Builders
- - Benton Jones of Winterset, Iowa
- J.P. Clark
- Design
- Lattice through truss with flat roof
- Dimensions
-
Length of largest span: 72.0 ft.
Total length: 85.0 ft.
- Also called
- Wiggins Covered Bridge
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +41.42412, -93.94052 (decimal degrees)
41°25'27" N, 93°56'26" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 15/421409/4586267 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Saint Charles NW
- Inventory numbers
- WGCB 15-61-01x (World Guide to Covered Bridges number)
BH 50652 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Update Log
- January 27, 2015: Updated by Luke: Added builder from HAER
- December 20, 2011: Added by Tony Dillon
Sources
- Tony Dillon - spansaver [at] hotmail [dot] com
- Luke
Comments
McBride Covered Bridge
The remains of the McBride ridge is located 2 miles north of Cummings Rd. on McBride Rd. -South of the River on the West side; down in a lower area. The red round metal supports are still there as are some burned wood. We just seen it last week as we did 22 years go also. I could sent some photos later if you email me. Thank you for posting the old photo, etc. of the bridge! D & C Hansen
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This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/ia/madison/bh50652/
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/ia/madison/bh50652/
McBride Bridge (1882 -1983)
Once located in Section 34, Jefferson Township, about seven miles northeast of Winterset and over the North River branch, the McBride Bridge was built in the spring of 1882 under the direction of bridge crew foremen Harvey P. Jones and George K. Foster, using the Town lattice truss and a nearly flat roof. (It was not built by Benton Jones, as previously reported.) It was approved by supervisors in January 1882 as a bridge at Folwell Ford. Folwell Ford served as a public highway that ran northeast through the farm of Samuel Folwell, then turned north at a property line shared with Augustus and George Burger. McBride was also referred to as Burger Bridge for a time, and can be found in the county engineer’s Bridge Book No. 2 as “Burger Bridge”. However, it ended up later being named after Scottish immigrants, Malcolm and Eleanor McBride.
The total length of the bridge was 85 feet, with the length of the longest span at 72 feet. McBride was bypassed in 1966 when a modern bridge was built nearby. The McBride Bridge fell victim to arson on October 8, 1983. According to news reports, a local man had just broken up with a girlfriend when she decided to go back to her husband, and he burned the bridge down attempting to remove his initials from the bridge.