Y connecting with Frisco
North of the river crossing the rail splits, allowing trains from the Frisco line to switch onto the army track from either direction.
Photo taken by Clark Vance in July 2015
BH Photo #333277
John, you have outdone even yourself with this research. I need to run back down with my tape to see which of the possible spans we have.
I believe I have been able to piece together the complete history of this span using several sources:
Milliken Bros was contracted to build the following spans in 1902, including this 163' span:
https://archive.org/details/sim_enr_1902-06-26_47_supplement...
In addition, this article lists the Milliken Bros. spans as having been built between St. Louis and Monett:
https://books.google.com/books?id=5VBBAQAAMAAJ&vq=milliken&p...
This appears to be one of the unique Schaub trusses described in this article:
https://archive.org/details/sim_enr_1904-03-24_51_12/page/29...
The spur to Ft. Leonard Wood was built in 1941:
https://archive.org/details/sim_railway-age_1941-04-19_110_1...
In addition, the Frisco bridge records below shows a 164' span across the Meramec River at Moselle, which was built in 1939. Also note the two 154' spans at the other crossing of the Meramec River, which were the spans documented in the Schaub Truss article.
#3 is what it looks like when I take my contacts out ;)
Google earth measures it at about 163', and with the skew, I suspect Moselle is the original location. I also did not see any other contracts with Milliken for the Frisco.
The truss itself is odd, and the article mentions that Missouri Pacific and Iowa Central also used this design. I believe those bridges are documented on this site:
http://bridgehunter.com/ks/saline/bh50245/
http://bridgehunter.com/ia/marshall/iowa-river-railroad/
http://bridgehunter.com/ia/hardin/bh51824/
http://bridgehunter.com/ia/mahaska/up-south-skunk-river/
http://bridgehunter.com/ia/poweshiek/bh55076/
It appears that the Schaub variant was only used from 1901 to about 1903. The other examples above all use riveted connections, while this span also uses pinned connections.