One of the last remaining privately owned bridges of its kind in America, the Dingmans Bridge (above) spans the Delaware River providing a route between Pike County Pennsylvania and Sussex County New Jersey. The present structure traces its roots to the original crossing at Dingman's Choice. Starting in 1735, Andrew Dingman ran a flat boat ferry across the river between Pennsylvania and New Jers
ey. That structure survived only eleven years before flood waters washed an upstream bridge down into it, carrying both away. The Dingman family restarted the ferry. Somewhere around 1850, a second bridge was built. It only lasted four or five years before a terrific windstorm lifted it from its piers and dropped it into the river. Again, to the rescue, came the old Dingman’s Ferry boat. A year later, yet a third bridge was hastily erected. Its demise required neither flood nor wind. Shoddily constructed, it simply fell apart, plunging into the river. By then, it was Andrew Dingman the Third who restarted the reliable ferry service. Finally, at the turn of the twentieth century, came the three Perkins brothers from Horseheads, New York. They were structural iron men, bridge builders, and they had in their possession three magnificent trusses of pin-hung wrought iron which they transported to the Delaware and erected upon stone piers in the river. With no great ceremony, the Dingmans Bridge was opened for traffic in November, 1900. This bridge is still open today. How does it survive where its predecessors did not? The company is committed to a rigorous program of inspection and repair. A professional engineering firm inspects everything every year, above and below water, every rivet, nut and bolt, and on the basis of their report the company does yearly maintenance work. The bridge is probably in even better shape today than when it was built.
