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James Hill was one of the first railroad tycoons. He emigrated from Canada in 1855 to St. Paul, Minnesota, and quickly rose through management positions in steamboat and coal companies. He and his partners entered the railroad business purchasing the bankrupt St. Paul & Pacific Railroad in 1862. This was the successor to the Minnesota & Pacific Railroad that was chartered in 1857. This was followed by the formation of the St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba Railroad in 1879. This line ran northerly from Minneapolis to Grand Forks, North Dakota, where it turned west towards the Pacific. Hill then had a line from St. Paul to St. Anthony across the river from Minneapolis and from Minneapolis to North Dakota. What he needed was a connecting bridge across the Mississippi. He and associates from Minneapolis also wanted a new, and major, station in downtown Minneapolis. At the time the station was in St. Anthony, which merged with Minneapolis in 1872, and passengers had to cross the river on the Fr. Hennepin Bridge (STRUCTURE September 2022) just upstream.
Hill and his associates met to consider a bridge in late November 1881 and on December 1, 1881, formed the Minneapolis Union Railway Company to build a bridge and new train station in downtown Minneapolis. Hill owned most of the stock in the Company. He hired Col. Charles C. Smith as his Chief Engineer. Smith had been his Chief Engineer on the St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba Railroad. Originally Hill planned to build an iron bridge across Nicollet Island north of the Hennepin Bridge as that was where the river was narrowest and a good rock foundation was present—both of which cut down the cost of the proposed bridge. Smith, however, convinced Hill that the masonry piers would block the river causing ice jams in the winter and log jams in the summer. In addition, Smith thought it possible that breaking up the sandstone river bottom could accelerate the movement of the falls upstream. Smith’s plan was to place his bridge below the falls about 500 feet south of the Fr. Hennepin Bridge and cross the river at a large skew with a portion of a masonry bridge on a curve, thus building a bridge on an S curve to accommodate the tracks of the St. Paul line that ran northerly along the east bank of the river and the St. Paul, Minneapolis and Manitoba that ran northerly along the west bank of the river. This alignment permitted the new station to be placed between Nicollet and Hennepin Avenue.
After purchasing the land needed for the project he retained Darragh & Haviland as his contractors. What Smith had proposed was a series of stone arches varying in span from 40 feet to 100 feet. The Thomas Viaduct had been built by the B & O Railroad as early as 1835 and was also on a curve. The famous Starrucca Viaduct by Julius Adams on the New York & Erie Railroad was built in 1848. Both of these bridges still carry railroad traffic today. While having a higher first cost than iron, their maintenance was low and the useful life much longer. The method of building the arches had not changed much from the time of the Romans.
Ground was broken in January 1882 in the middle of a cold Minnesota winter. Cofferdams were built around each foundation down to rock and pumped out to permit the setting of the foundation masonry that was set in mortar. The piers extended above the high-water mark. Working throughout the winter, the bridgemakers placed all of the 23 foundations by the spring of 1882. The foundations were connected by a tramway on wooden supports. Wooden formwork was placed, and the cut arch stones placed and anchored into place with a keystone. Stone spandrel walls were built up to retain the fill, which supported the twin track ties and rails.
The best description of the bridge was given by F. B. Maltby in an article entitled "The Mississippi River; Historical and Description of the Bridges over the Mississippi River in 1902." He wrote,
The first bridge below the falls is a magnificent stone arch viaduct, built and owned by the Minneapolis Union Railway. It is located immediately below the falls, the west end in fact passing above them. The river at this point is about 1,000 feet wide, with steep banks, rocky bottom and is not navigable at any stage. The bridge crosses the river diagonally and has a total length of 2,490 feet; the eastern 1,033 feet is on a straight line and the remainder is on a 6-degree curve to the right. Commencing at the east abutment the structure consists of first nine stone arches with a span of 80 feet each…then four arches with a span of 100 feet each… then six arches with the same dimensions as the first mentioned, then one arch with 71.36 feet span…then a 40-foot arch…then an arch with a span of 43.86 feet.. to the stone dam at the falls. Thence across this dam to the structure across the water power canal above the dam, forming a continuation of the viaduct. The latter structure consists of two skew iron girder spans aggregating 85 feet in length, two through pin connected iron spans each 130 feet in length, resting on tubular piers made of boiler iron filled with concrete, then a 40-foot iron girder reaching to the west abutment…
The piers are Minnesota granite up to the spring line, and all above that is magnesian limestone. The foundations below the dam are on soft sandstone which underlies the limestone at the falls. The deepest foundation is at Pier No. 13 and is 17 feet below low water. The bridge is a double track structure and is 28 feet wide over the parapet walls; the grade line is 65 feet above low water… It was built by Darragh & Haviland, and contains 30,554 yards of masonry, and about 10,000 yards of stone filling. It cost approximately $650,000.
This magnificent structure is the only stone bridge on the river below the falls.
During construction many started to call the bridge “Hill’s Folly.” When completed, however, they were writing it was, “firmer than the earth” and “more solid than the ground itself.” On August 30, 1884, newspapers were reporting the bridge and new depot, later called the Great Northern Depot, “will be brought into use for the movement of passenger business between St. Paul and Minneapolis and points beyond” on Monday September 1, 1884. The Depot was finished in April 1885.
The bridge was a huge success and Hill’s investment paid off for many years. Hill later merged all of his lines into the Great Northern Railroad that reached Puget Sound in 1892. The last train over the bridge was in 1978; the tracks were removed shortly after. In 1994 it was reopened as a pedestrian and bicycling bridge. It has been named a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark and is on the National Register of Historic Places. ■
About the Author
Dr. Frank Griggs, Dist.M. ASCE, specializes in the restoration of historic bridges, having restored many 19th Century cast and wrought iron bridges. He is now an Independent Consulting Engineer (fgriggsjr@verizon.net).
