Detail of the portal bracing, highlighting the ornate designs that compose it.
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Key Facts |
Bridge Name | Type | Road | Location | City | Crossing |
Wells Street Bridge |
Truss |
Old Wells Street |
Allen County, IN |
Fort Wayne |
St. Marys River |
This bridge might be called the king of Indiana truss bridges! I bet you could count on one hand the number of bridges remaining today that are as ornate as this spectacular marvel of engineering and artistry. While truss bridges in and of themselves are a seen by many as work of art today, this was not always the case back in the late 1800s. Some people thought truss bridges were ugly, and did not blend in the with city. As a result, some of the urban bridges display a lot of decorations as builders sought to make them more pleasing to the eyes of the people at the time. This sometimes resulted in bridges like the Wells Street Bridge, or the long demolished (1970) Manchester Bridge of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, which was likely the most ornate and heavily decorated bridge ever built. See this photo from HABS HAER. The demolition of the Manchester Bridge, even as long ago as 1970, is in my opinion the greatest bridge atrocity ever committed. Fort Wayne in contrast, moved to preserve the crown jewel of its city, and chose to preserve this bridge for pedestrian use. The need for a larger crossing for vehicles was produced in the form of a modern bridge built on a new alignment west of the truss bridge.
The portal bracing is what makes this Wells Street Bridge so stunning. The smaller photo shown above describes the beauty better than any verbal relation could do. Further note that the sway bracing also has some decorations added to the corners also, furthering the cause. The bridge actually was even more decorated originally. Missing are finials, which were originally present on the endposts for the bridge. End-post date plaques may have been attached to these finials also. I have a postcard image available here that shows the bridge. The bridge itself is a Whipple truss, also known as the double intersection Pratt truss bridge. Allen County has a large number of Whipple truss bridges, but this truss style is otherwise a rare and significant configuration. As a modification of the classic Pratt style, the Whipple truss was capable of spanning a longer distance. Whipple truss spans, including the Wells Street Bridge are fairly long. While a couple isolated areas of the bridge have had steel repaired, the overall historic integrity of this bridge is excellent, including original guardrails. Only the loss of the finials is detrimental to the structure. Builder plaques remaining on the bridge credit the prolific Wrought Iron Bridge Company of Canton, Ohio with building the bridge. This bridge stands today as a spectacular, everlasting monument to a company that stood at the forefront of the metal truss bridge world.
The Wells Street Bridge, according to the postcard, also had a trolley sort of rail-line on it also, probably accounting for the wide width of this bridge. This bridge was built at a time where the common thing was a one lane bridge. In an urban area, however a two-lane bridge might be built. This bridge is indeed wide for its time periods, and as a result, is a very massive bridge considering its ancient 1884 construction date. The top chord of this bridge is very large, which is apparent both from the portal view and when looked at from a side view location.
People may call this the Old Wells Street Bridge, but to me this is just plain Wells Street Bridge, and the current vehicular crossing is the New Wells Street Bridge!
