Year constructed: 1876-1877
Alternate name: Wilson's Ferry Bridge, Des Moines River Bridge
Bridge type: Pin-Connected Whipple Through Truss
National Register of Historic Places status:
Listed
Length: 647 feet
Spans: 4
FHWA: 235880
Jurisdiction: Mahaska County
Location: Fulton Avenue over the Des Moines River, 6.8 miles southwest of Oskaloosa, Section 1, T74N-R17W (Jefferson Township)
Details
More commonly known as the Eveland Bridge, this large-scale structure had been contemplated by Mahaska County almost as long as people crossed the river at this point. The Eveland Ferry began operating here around 1854. After receiving citizens' petitions from time to time urging the county to replace the ferry with a permanent bridge, the county board of supervisors finally agreed in April 1875 to undertake the bridge's construction, provided that a sufficient local subscription of funds could be raised. In June 1876 the supervisors solicited competitive bids, based on a design by civil engineer C.W. Tracy; in September they awarded a contract to fabricate and build the multiple-span iron structure to McKay and Nelson, proprietors of the Fort Wayne [Indiana] Bridge Works. A Fort Wayne crew worked through on the massive stone piers through the winter and following spring, completing the bridge n the summer of 1877. The Eveland Bridge functioned as a regionally important crossing for some 90 years before its closure. It now stands abandoned, with the deck and stonework deteriorating but the superstructure intact.
The importance of the Eveland Bridge to regional commerce endured for decades, and for this the structure is historically significant. The Eveland Bridge is further distinguished as a well-preserved, large-scale example of the Whipple through truss. Basically a Pratt with diagonals that extend over two panels, the Whipple truss was seldom employed for wagon trusses in the state. Few were ever erected and fewer yet remain today. For its exceedingly rare use of wrought and cast iron components, its rare truss configuration, and its long-standing role in regional transportation, the Eveland Bridge is one of the most significant wagon crossings in Iowa [adapted from Fraser 1992].