~~WIY!~IL~Vrrvrr~M Volume16 Fall 1987 Number3
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T SOCJ:E'I'Y W@IB1 J:N":O"UST:RJ:AL .A:RC:H:EOLOGY ~~WIY!~IL~vrrvrr~m Volume16 Fall 1987 Number3 THE TEXAS LENTICULARS: 1 DOWN, 8 SURVIVE MINERAL SPRINGS BRIDGE Caldwell County, Texas Right: The 40-ft. lenticular truss in 1985. Tex. St. Dept. of Hwys. & Trans. photograph. Below: The cl890s Berlin Iron Bridge Co. structure this year, after Charlie Johnson (L) and Wayne Plant (R) starting working on it. Luling (Tex.) Newsboy & Signal photograph. In Sept, a bulldozer finished off the diminutive Mineral Springs Bridge over Westfork Creek in Caldwell Co., Texas, near Austin. This 40-ft., cl 890s pony truss, reportedly the victim of heavy June rains, was one of a rare cluster of lenticular trusses that have managed to survive, like an isolated flock of whooping cranes, in the Austin-San Antonio area of cen tral Texas. Most are familiar with the lenticular as the spectacularly undulating, 720-ft Smithfield St Bridge [NHL, HAER] in Pittsburgh, Pa., design ed by Gustav Lindenthal and built 1879-83- In contrast, the Texas group consists of quite small, very angular, single-span structures, of which Mineral Springs was the shortest. Still standing are six pony trusses and two through trusses. Three are along the famous San Antonio River Walk. All were fabricated in the 1890s by the Berlin Iron Bridge Co. of East Berlin, Conn. Bridge historian Victor Darnell (author of the SIA's Directory ofAmerican Bridge-Building Cos.) believes that these are the only extant lenticular trusses west of the Mississippi. The Mineral Springs demolition involved no federal funds, so the State Dept. of Highways & Public Trans. remained unaware of the loss until it was spotted in a newspaper article. The county engineer replaced the truss with an 89-ft. railroad flatcar, with the county's road administrator declaring, "This is a prototype and if it works then we can use it in other places:' (He probably hadn't checked SIAN for Spring 1984, which carried a photo of a stream spanned by a defunct Great Northern cattle car.) fur further info., contact Tom Eisenhour [SIA], SDHPT, Austin TX 78701-2483 (512-463-8790). T.E. '/Um page for more bridges . .. Published by the Society for Industrial Archeology Editor: Robert M. Frame III Room 5020 National Museum of American History Smithsonian Institution Washington, D.C. 20560 SPECTACULAR LENTICULAR! SURVIVING LENTI CULAR TRUSSES IN SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS. All were built by the Berlin Iron Bridge Co. in the 1890s, and all cross the San Antonio River. The Augusta, Croc kett, and South Presa bridges are along the city's famous River Walk (Paseo de/ Rio). Tex. St. Dept. of Hwys. & Trans. photographs. Top center: Augusta Street Bridge (1890). This bridge has been rehabilitated. At left is the builder's plate. At right is a detail from the end post. The small "406" at the bot tom is believed to be the con tract number. Above left: Crockett Street Bridge (1891), with its top chord·mounted light standaid5. Above right: South Presa Street Bridge (1890), showing the lower chord connections with the floor beams. Left: Brackenridge Road Bridge (1890), with its extra ordinary cresting. This is one of the state's two lenticular through-trusses. 2 SIA Newsletter, Vol. 16, No. 3, Fall 1987 TEXAS LENTICULAR TRUSSES OUTSIDE SAN ANlDNIO. All were built in the 1890s by the Berlin Iron Bridge Co. Above left: Yancey Road Bridge over Hondo Creek, Frio County. This is one of the state's two lenticular through-trllS.5eS. Above right: County Road 133 Bridge at Dodds Creek, Coryell County, revealing the characteristic double-convex-lens profile created by the top·and bottom chords. Below left: County Road 173 Bridge over Plum Creek, Caldwell County. Below right: End panel of Coun ty Road 230 Bridge over Plum Creek, Caldwell County. Tex. St. Dept. ofHwys. & Trans. photographs. DOUBLEHEADER PRESERVATION AWARDS A unique two-part nationwide awards program to honor historic Preservation Act (128 pp.), a special commemorative edition of the preservation efforts, marking 20 years under the Natl. Historic Preser Advisory Council's Report to the President & the Congress 1986. Copies vation Act of 1966, seeks nominees. The program is jointly sponsored by avail. free while supply lasts from Pubs. Office, Advisory Council, address the White House, the Advisory Council on Hist. Pres., and the Dept. of above. the Interior, under the auspices of the "Take Pride in America" public awareness campaign. The first category, President's Historic Preservation Awards, will recognize private citizens whose achievements exemplify the contribu tions of free enterprise to historic preservation. The second category, GREAT FALLS HYDRO National Historic Preservation Awards, will honor projects and programs that have been federally assisted in some way. Awards will be GOES ON STREAM presented by the Sec. of the Interior and the Chair of the Advisory Council. A range of disciplines will be eligible for consideration, including Erected in 1912-14 to harness directly the water power of the Great architecture, landscape architecture, community planning or revitaliza Falls of the Passaic River at Paterson, N.J., the Society for Establishing tion, archeology, materials conservation, architectural history, rural Useful Manufactures Hydroelectric Plant [NHL, HAER] was preservation, maritime preservation, and preservation of historic rededicated in June as an operating facility. The ceremony was significant engineering_ Entries must have resulted in the preservation of specific, enough to attract US Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg and Rep. Robert A. Roe. identifiable historic properties listed in or eligible for the Natl. Register. The plant is within the Great Falls Historic District, which encompasses Projects must have been completed within the past ten years; programs the SUM's power canal system, designed originally by Pierre l'Enfant and must be currently in effect. dating to 1792-1846. This is the site of the first planned industrial develop Nominations for both categories will be open until Feb. 19, 1988, with ment in the US, and had been encouraged by Alexander Hamilton. presentation ceremonies planned for mid-summer. The Advisory Council Originally designed to produce 5,000 KW using four generators, it Chair has appointed a task force to oversee the program and to serve as operated until 1969, when the low cost of fossil fuels and the high cost a selection jury. Entry forms and further information are avail. from the of replacing aging equipment forced it to close. Its refurbishing was Office of Executive Dir., Advisory Council, HOO Pennsylvania Ave., financed by a $1.3 million grant from the Federal Dept. of Energy and NW, #809, Wash. DC 20004 (202-786-0503). about $13 million in loans and private investment. Today's capacity is In addition to the special awards program, the 20th anniversary of the 11,000 KW, which is being sold to the Public Service Electric & Gas Co. NHPA is being celebrated with 1Wenty l'ears of the National Historic for transmission throughout N.J. SIA Newsletter, Vol. 16, No. 3, Fall 1987 3 ROEBLING'S AQUEDUCT RESTORED, REOPENED After six years of patience and painstaking restoration work, John A. 1920s; Edward Huber, who owned the aqueduct toll-bridge for 30 years; Roebling's Delaware Aqueduct [NHL, HAER; see SIANSpring 86:1] the last living direct descendent of John Roehling; an assortment of was re-Opened to general automobile traffic (10-ton limit) on June 13. The political figures, and even a message from Pres. Reagan. Commenting at aqueduct was completed in 1849 and operated for the next half-century. the ceremony were SIA President Thorwald Torgersen and Director The National Park Service bought the structure from the last private Robert M. Vogel. Among the politicos was the infamous (to the NPS and owner in 1980. · most RR historians) U.S. Rep. Joseph M. McDade from Scranton, the The ribbon-cutting rite climaxing the $5 million project attracted a clever legislator who engineered a pork-barrel, spending-bill amendment variety of notables, including Howard Swope, who was a boatman in the that bought his city's Steamtown for the Park Service and set in motion an enormously expensive and controversial museum project [SIAN Spring 87:4]. The Roehling project was not without its own controversy, since travel between Lackawaxen, Pa., and Highland, NY., had been disrupted ever NOTES since the crossing was closed about 1980. "River politics;' as it is known locally, had generated an anti-NPS faction. Protestors showed up at the re-opening ceremony and a small plane circled overhead, trailing a ban EAIA'S "OTHER" WORTHY PROJECTS. Like many grants-in-aid ner reading "NPS get out:' programs, that of the Early American Industries Assn. receives many The reworked bridge has enough width for only one lane of traffic; traf more applications than it can fund. In an unusual-but commendable fic lights at each end signal drivers when it's okay to cross. The NY. light effort, the EAIA has published a list of projects that did not win awards, defaults to green, because there is no room there for a line of vehicles, urging its membership "to encourage these studies in other ways:' Many while on the Pa. side approaching autos trip a pressure-sensitive switch of these also will be of interest to SIA members: to get the green. 21nvestigation of the transition of earthenware to stoneware pottery pro duction in 19th-C North Carolina'!--focuses on a major technological change cl800-24, including changes in clay extraction and kiln structure. Linda Flowers Carnes, Rt. 5, Box 113, Pittsboro NC 27312. -!'Archaeological investigations at Nunagiatchiak, a late 19th-C shore . fi}:n- '~~ I ._. :' I whaling station in N.