MON - Tippecanoe River Bridge
Photos
Photo courtesy of the Indiana State Department of Natural Resource, Division of Historic Preservation and Archaeology.
View more info about Indiana historic bridges from the SHAARD database
BH Photo #156312
Description
A very unique span that was removed after the railroad line was abandoned. It is interesting to note that this bridge was constructed long before the Oakdale Dam made Lake Freeman possible. Back then it was simply the Tippecanoe River it crossed and the limestone piers entire length could be viewed. Of course after the river had the dam put in, the water level increased, hiding much of the "tallness" of the piers. I recommend following the link to the "bygone Monon" page that can be found below, to view the bridge in it's early days.Facts
- Overview
- Lost Deck truss bridge over Tippecanoe River and access roads on former Monon Railroad in Monticello
- Location
- Monticello, White County, Indiana, and Carroll County, Indiana
- Status
- Lost
- History
- Built ca. 1895, demolished ca. 1990's
- Railroads
- - Chicago, Indianapolis, & Louisville Railway (CIL)
- Monon Railroad (MON)
- Design
- (4)6-panel, pinned Pratt deck trusses with polygonal lower chords
- Also called
- LN - Tippecanoe River Bridge
- Approximate latitude, longitude
- +40.73054, -86.75558 (decimal degrees)
40°43'50" N, 86°45'20" W (degrees°minutes'seconds") - Approximate UTM coordinates
- 16/520639/4508873 (zone/easting/northing)
- Quadrangle map:
- Monticello South
- Inventory number
- BH 42288 (Bridgehunter.com ID)
Update Log
- October 23, 2020: New photo from Tony Dillon
- July 30, 2016: New photos from Tony Dillon
- August 10, 2012: Updated by J.P.: Added category "Railroad"
- January 27, 2011: New photo from Jacob P. Bernard
- January 24, 2011: New photo from Jacob P. Bernard
- March 20, 2010: New photo from Ed Hollowell
- March 16, 2010: Updated by James Norwood: corrected builder info
- February 26, 2010: Updated by Anthony Dillon: Added new information
- April 10, 2009: Essay added by James Norwood
Sources
- James Norwood
- Bygone place of the Monon Monticello page - Scroll down page to see this bridge with many trains as well as the Tioga Bridge. Recent pics of remains of bridge abutments are on Monticello page 2
- Tony Dillon - spansaver [at] hotmail [dot] com
- Ed Hollowell - erhollowell [at] aol [dot] com
- Jacob P. Bernard
Comments
The link for Bygone Monon, http://www.monon.monon.org/bygone/monticello.html, is broke. The link is now https://monon.org/bygone_site/bygone/monticello.html. The link for the pre-dam photo is https://monon.org/bygone_site/mononmines/pixs19/10-19Montice...
The Monon Bridge had polygonal lower chords while the other deck truss had conventional parallel lower chords.
Looks like the same bridge to me.
Well the current photo #4 is the Monon bridge and in the background you can see the Tioga Rd. bridge which is still there.
Thanks for the heads-up James! I figured you would be in the know.
You are correct Anthony, that is not the Monon bridge. It is however the former Pennsylvania Railroad bridge over the same river that formerly sat near downtown Monticello. It was located beside where today the current Toledo Peoria and Western Railroad bridge resides. I can't remember which side it was, but I remember seeing some pics of the old structure(from pic 4)being removed with the new aka current bridge clearly seen in the same photo. The newer bridge was of course damaged in the 1974 tornado outbreak that heavily damaged White County, but was quickly repaired by then owner Penn Central. Good eye. James
Picture #4 is not the same bridge, as it doesn't have the polygonal lower chord. Not sure if there were any other deck truss RR spans nearby (apparently if the post card is correct there was!). This is a question for Mr. Norwood to answer.
This page's URL is http://bridgehunter.com/in/white/bh42288/
I’m certain this bridge wasn’t demolished until sometime in the early-mid 1990’s, not 1986 as noted in the description.