Read time: 9 min.

The road less traveled is almost always worth venturing down, and here are some examples if you don’t believe me: although most everyone who’s driven through Yorktown over the past eighteen years is familiar with the steel truss bridge at Morrow’s Meadow, two more metal crossings -both older and more impressive- sit less than a mile off Highway 32 in Mt. Pleasant Township.

I’m pretty new to tracking down old truss bridges, all told. Not counting railroad bridges, Delaware County was home to eight when I got interested in them in 2009, and five could still be driven across! Unfortunately, the 1925 Black’s Mill Road Bridge was closed to vehicular traffic in 2003¹ and removed around 2011.

The Strong Road Bridge in Albany, built in 1905, was dismantled and moved to a new Cardinal Greenway trailhead in 2019². Most recently, the 1902 Smithfield Bridge was removed in 2021. The losses were tragic for Albany and Smithfield- Delaware County’s historic bridges are disappearing from their communities right in front of our eyes!

The High Banks Bridge

Thankfully, that’s not the case in Mt. Pleasant Township yet. Traffic on County Road 300-South -the boundary between Salem and Mt. Pleasant Townships- crosses the White River over the High Banks Bridge. That means that the north half of the bridge is in Mt. Pleasant Township and therefore, Yorktown!

The High Banks Bridge is officially known as Delaware County Bridge 130. A pin-connected, eleven-panel camelback through truss, the crossing was built in 1902 by Indiana Bridge Company for $7,000. It’s the second-oldest of three remaining camelback bridges erected by the firm³, which is still in business making structural steel trusses and rack systems a hundred and thirty-seven years after it was founded⁴. Believe it or not, the company was responsible for some of the steel trusswork at the massive Nestle plant just down I-69 in Anderson.

When it comes to old iron bridges, the phrase “through-truss” means that travelers pass through the structure’s trusses, or load-bearing elements. The bottom chord carries the bridge deck, but the trusses along the side of the bridge are supported by cross-bracing above the roadway. They’re sort of open-air tunnels. 

Old steel and iron bridges were engineered with many kinds of trusses. Three relevant to the bridges in Mt. Pleasant Township are the Pratt, Parker, and Camelback varieties. Working backward, the Camelback is a variation of the Parker truss, itself a variation of the Pratt. Invented in the 1840s by Thomas and Caleb Pratt, Pratt trusses are simple, time-tested designs.

C.H. Parker invented the Parker truss -a Pratt with a polygonal top chord- in the mid-1850s. My understanding is that Parker truss bridges are hardier than their predecessors and offer engineers the opportunity to save money on material costs⁵. Camelback trusses came even later: they’re Parker trusses with exactly five slopes along their top that offer the same material savings as Parkers, but can usually be built to span longer distances⁶.

The High Banks Bridge is 204 feet long, while its main span (the part that goes between its cut stone abutments) stretches precisely 200 feet. In 1973, the bridge’s understructure was damaged by an overweight vehicle that exceeded its five-ton limit⁷.

The bridge was repaired but was lightly traveled over the ensuing decades. In 2005, County officials sought public comment on the fate of the 103-year-old bridge as they considered repairing it, replacing it, or closing the crossing permanently⁸.

Thankfully, the bridge was completely rehabilitated in 2009 during a project that also rebuilt County Road 300-South to address flooding that often made the roadway impassable⁹. More recently, the wooden roadway of the restored bridge was replaced with a steel deck in 2023.

Today, the High Banks Bridge remains a popular canoe launch, a landmark for paddlers headed downstream from Yorktown to Daleville, and the best way to get to a series of artesian wells just up Highbanks Road. 

The Priest Ford Bridge

Officially Delaware County Bridge 131, the Priest Ford Bridge is the older brother of the bridge at High Banks. Constructed in 1897¹⁰ for around $7,000¹¹, it’s the oldest and longest of Indiana Bridge’s remaining camelback trusses¹²! A through truss like its sibling, the bridge was designed with a two-hundred-foot-long span but actually stretches 259 feet thanks to its approaches.

The Priest Ford Bridge was threatened by the White River’s floodwaters for most of its history. During the Great Depression, the Civilian Conservation Corps built a nearby levee along the river’s west bank which began to fail in the early 1950s¹³. In response, a central support pier was added to the bridge’s deck during a 1974 rehabilitation to try and strengthen it.

In 2000, county officials announced plans to bypass the old bridge but leave it standing and visible from a new, $1.2 million crossing situated about 170 feet to the northeast¹⁴. I’m glad they did! The new bridge was completed in 2001 and eliminated a sharp turn where Priest Ford Road angled west to meet the river¹⁵.

Although it’s no longer accessible by car, the Priest Ford Bridge remains a landmark for kayakers floating the river and motorists taking the backroads between Yorktown and Daleville. Unfortunately, its future may be in jeopardy: the span has garnered the nickname “Brokeback Bridge” in recent years based on reports of injuries idiots received from jumping off its deck into dangerously shallow water below¹⁶.

The Mahalasville Bridge

The Mahalasville Bridge may be the newest truss bridge in Mt. Pleasant Township, but it’s still nearly a century old. Built by the Vincennes Bridge Company for $9,848, the 160-foot long, two-span Pratt truss bridge was first installed at Indian Creek near Martinsville in 1926 after an earlier crossing was washed away in a storm¹⁷.

Unlike the through truss bridges at High Banks and Priest Ford, the Mahalasville Bridge is a pony truss. That means its structural members – its trusses- aren’t connected at the top. As a result, pony truss bridges aren’t often as strong, stable, or suitable for long single spans as their through-truss cousins.

Although Indiana officials considered the Mahalasville bridge historic, engineers in Morgan County believed the crossing was too narrow to be suitable for modern vehicles. Officials ordered the bridge removed in 2003, bypassing red tape from historic groups by using local funds for its replacement (Old, 2003).

Fortunately, the story of the Mahalasville Bridge had a happy ending for local bridge fans: Yorktown officials were searching for a crossing to connect Morrow’s Meadow with the town proper when they came into contact with John Camden, a metalworker who specialized in truss bridges. Although the bridge’s shorter 70-foot span had been damaged and was no longer suitable for repair, Camden restored the 90-foot segment, which was installed at Morrow’s Meadow in 2005²⁰.

Historic truss bridges like those at High Banks, Priest Ford, and Morrow’s Meadow convey a sense of artistry and craftsmanship absent from the ubiquitous concrete spans that have replaced so many of their brethren. People in the Yorktown area should be proud of their old bridges! As their ranks inevitably dwindle further, I hope future engineers and officials continue to view them as a source of pride.

Sources Cited
1 Slabaugh, S. (2010, June 14). Does Anyone Need A Historic Bridge? The Muncie Star Press. Pp. 1-2.
2 Slabaugh, S. (2019, June 18). Cranes will set historic bridge over White River. The Muncie Star Press. p. A1.
3 High Banks Bridge (2017). Historic Bridges. Web. Retrieved July 30, 2023.
4 Indiana Bridge Company Records (n.d.) Bal State University Archives and Special Collections. Ball State University Libraries [Muncie]. Retrieved July 30, 2023.
5 Truss Bridges (n.d.) North Carolina Department of Transportation [Raleigh]. Web. Retrieved July 30, 2023.
6 (See footnote 5).
7 Bridge Closed After Damage (1973, October 20). The Muncie Star. p. 13.
8 Slabaugh, S. (2006, April 28). Bridge built in 1902 could be closed permanently to traffic. The Muncie Star Press. p. 3.
9 Bad road, bridge to be rebuilt (2009, January 8). The Muncie Star Press. p. 42.
10 White River Levee Repair Is Requested (1968, September 5). The Muncie Evening Press. p. 31.
11 New Bridge (1895, March 13). The Muncie Morning News. p. 5.
12 Priest Ford Bridge (2017). Historic Bridges. Web. Retrieved July 30, 2023.
13 Iliff, D. (1968, September 5). Corps of Engineers Asked to Reconstruct White River Levee. The Muncie Star. p. 2.
14 Roysdon, K. (2001, April 1). Lacking support. The Muncie Star Press. Pp. 1-4.
15 Roysdon, K. (2000, January 18). Two bridge, two outcomes. The Muncie Star Press. p. 7.
16 Roysdon, K. (2016, June 20). Brokeback Bridge: County issues warning. The Muncie Star Press. Web. Retrieved July 30, 2023.
17 Hillenburg, A. (2005, November 27). Historic Bridge finds new home in Yorktown. The Martinsville Reporter-Times. Pp. 1-14.
18 Old bridge to be replaced (2003, March 3). The Martinsville Reporter-Times. p. 1.
19 (See footnote 17).
20 Roysdon, K. (2005, October 23). Bridge will add to trail system. The Muncie Star Press. p. 3.