Old Iron Bridge over Little Wabash River

My grandmother and her sisters were raised on a farm close to the Little Wabash River in southeastern Illinois. Leech Township of Wayne County, to be exact.

Her father, known in the family as "Grandpa Fisher", owned land on both sides of the river. How convenient is must to have been to have the only bridge over the river in that part of the state near his properties. In fact the road in front of the homestead seems to be the main road between Albion in Edwards County and Fairfield, the county seat of Wayne County back in the day. A better highway was eventually built north of the railroad that ran through the area.

The bridge was washed out (probably not the first time) years ago, but was there when Wilma, Jerry, Jim and Don Dixon visited Grandpa Fisher and stayed on the farm. You can still see the iron support beams today, but that's all that is left.

I sent Uncle Don an email including an old picture of the bridge in better times. He reminded me about some features of the bridge and the wonders of eating pecans that grew on his Grandpa Fisher's land across the river.

Here's the text that was included with the picture:

Old Iron Bridge or Scotts bridge was built on sec 21 T2S R9E finished in 1865 at a cost of $4,000

Noticeable among the many substantial improvements made in Leech Township is that of the building of the iron bridge across the Little Wabash, on Section 21, Township 2 south, Range 9 east. Previous to the erection of this structure, great difficulty was ofttimes experienced in crossing the river, the course of which divides the township into two divisions, and the settlements on either side were quite distinct from each other. The bridge was built by contract for the county in 1865, at a total expense of about $4,000 and 12,000 acres of swamp land.

Can you believe that they built a bridge while the Civil War was just wrapping up? I guess what they say about the economic power of the north compared to the south must have been true. I know that steel was a very important commodity during the war, as a lot of armaments and railroad repair had to be done.

HI Lee, Enjoyed the picture. When we were kids and visited Grandpa, we would go to the river and cross this bridge. The bridge looked about the same in the early 40's and the boards had holes in them so you had to careful where you walked and or drove across it. Grandpa had about 60 pecan trees near the bridge and the nuts were great. Thanks, Uncle Don