Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 39, Number 66, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 23 April 1907 — Another Dredge Day At The River. [ARTICLE]

Another Dredge Day At The River.

Sunday was another Dredge Day lnoction for Rensselaer people and several, hundreds of them, more o: less, went out to the Robinson bridge, on the Pleasant Ridge road, to witness the work of moving the bridge and as they hoped, to see the dredge get in action to go thru where the bridge is. In this they were disappointed for the whole day was spent in preparing to move t’ne bridge but no actual start made. It is the largest and heaviest steel bridge in the county, unless it be the Washington street bridge iu Rensselaer, and its removal is]no small nor easy job. It is a single span bridge and the plan is to pull it to one side, without taking it apart at all, and then to re place it in the same condition. A I sort of trestle work has been built I under the bridge supported by a I large number of green tree posts I and on these is a double track I on each side of heavy steel I beams I which held the plank flooring of I the bridge, and ou these tracks a I set of large wooden rollers at each I corner' of the bridge, and which is I to be pulled ofl on the roadway, to I the west, by an iron capstan, workI iug a (heavy steel wire cable. It Iwas a matter of a good deal of ■ speculation Sunday, among the I many % self-constituted engineers ■ among the spectators, whether the I trestle! work would support the I heavy bridge when half of its ■weight came over a singles pair of Ithe posts, and tne general coucluIsion was that it t< e quick sand in ithe river bed gave wiy under the Ipo-'ts and one side settled mere I than the other and the bridge got ■to going “slonch-wise” and turned Iturtle in the river, then Contractor ■Rutherford would be up against it ■good and hard, while as for the ■dredge men, they would, in that ■case, just as well dig their bait and land go fishing. I However, the prophecies of mis ■fortune weie not realized, and at lone P. M. Monday the bridge was Ibalf off, End it was expected it Iwould be clear off by four or five lo’clock.