Rutherford's Crossing Bridge

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's the story of Rutherford's Crossing Bridge: and it's one worth hearing. Before 1919, if you needed to cross Red Oak Creek out in Ellis County, you had exactly one option: you waded in and you hoped for the best. Fording the waters, they called it.

Sounds almost romantic until you picture it in a downpour, the creek running high and mean, and you've got somewhere to be on the other side. Bad weather and floods had a way of making that crossing flat-out impossible. You didn't cross.

You waited. Could be a long wait. So when the Texas Bridge Company came out and put up a proper span in 1919, folks in that vicinity had reason to breathe a little easier.

The whole thing cost five hundred and sixty-five dollars (not a fortune, but not nothing either) and what they got for it was a Warren Pony truss bridge. Now that was a common bridge type in its day, a workhorse of early twentieth century bridge building technology, the kind of structure that quietly stitched communities together across creeks and gullies all across this state. Most of them are gone now.

This one is still standing. And that's really the point, isn't it? It's a reminder (the marker says so plainly) of early transportation patterns in Ellis County.

The engineering is modest. The story behind it is not. Every time someone rolls across Rutherford's Crossing Bridge, they're traveling a path that once stopped a lot of good people cold at the water's edge.

What the marker says

Constructed in 1919 by the Texas Bridge Company at a cost of $565.00, this Warren Pony truss bridge provided transportation across Red Oak Creek for area residents. Prior to the bridge's construction, the only way for people to cross the creek in this vicinity was by fording the waters, a task which often proved impossible due to bad weather and floods. A once-common bridge type, this structure is representative of early 20th century bridge building technology. It stands as a reminder of early transportation patterns in Ellis County.