Prentiss Bridge
Description and history
The Prentiss Bridge is located in a rural setting in southern Langdon, spanning Great Brook east of Chester Turnpike, about 0.2 miles (0.32 km) south of its junction with Lower Cemetery Road. It is a Town lattice truss, 36 feet long and 15 feet (4.6 m) wide, set on stone abutments. Its exterior is finished in vertical board siding, with a ventilation gap between the siding and the gabled roof.
Bridges are known to have stood on the site since at least 1791, when the town requested a report on a bridge standing here. In 1794, the town appropriated funds to build a bridge near the mill of Jabez Rockwell and John Prentiss. In 1874, the town appropriated $1,000 to replace that structure; the present bridge was presumably built soon afterward.
Langdon's Prentiss Bridge was constructed by Albert S. Granger in 1874. The town of Langdon paid $1,062.09 for the project. Granger himself was paid $197.50 for labor, $34.97 for lumber, bolts, and spike, and $23 for the use of a derrick; nineteen other men were paid for labor and supplies.
The Prentiss Bridge was bypassed in 1955. A new, two-lane steel and concrete bridge was constructed next to the Prentiss Bridge to allow traffic to cross Great Brook without the bottleneck caused by the one-lane bridge.
Measuring thirty-five feet long, the Prentiss Bridge is the shortest historic covered bridge in New Hampshire.
See also
- National Register of Historic Places listings in Sullivan County, New Hampshire
- List of New Hampshire covered bridges
- List of bridges on the National Register of Historic Places in New Hampshire
References
- ^ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
- ^ "NRHP nominatiaon for Prentiss Bridge". National Park Service. Retrieved 2014-07-15.
- ^ Chandler, Kim Varney (2023). Covered bridges of New Hampshire. Portsmouth: Peter E. Randall Publisher. ISBN 978-1-942155-52-2.