My life in appalachia - The old bridge
Would you drive over the old bridge? I was sitting on another bridge, a bridge in much better shape than the one above, when I snapped the photo. Two bridges crossing the same small creek almost close enough to entice a person to jump from one to the other, but not quite. Two bridges owned by two different families.

One bridge leads to fields that now lie fallow with no one left to farm them. The other bridge leads to home-home to four generations of the same family spread out across the land they own.

One bridge leads to fields full of memories left by generations of a family who used to farm them but are now scattered like chaff in the wind. The other bridge leads to a family still going strong.

Two sides of a coin lined up between two bridges.

Tipper

Appalachia Through My Eyes – A series of photographs from my life in Southern Appalachia.

 

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30 Comments

  1. TIPPER
    I CROSSED ONE SWINGING BRIDGE
    ON FOOT WHEN I WAS YOUNGER IT IS
    LOCATED IN THE OZARKS OF ARK, IF
    I WERE THERE I BELIEVE I WOULD
    CROSS IT ON FOOT, FOR I KNOW THAT
    GOD WOULD PROTECT ME EVEN IF I
    FELL IN THE WATER.
    JOHNIE IN ARK,

  2. Oh, not drive over it, but I would walk very carefully across it! The story of the families is incredible… makes you wonder… and I like wondering while I explore! 🙂

  3. Why, Tipper, you are just downright poetical today! And no ma’am, couldn’t, wouldn’t, & shouldn’t cross that bridge-

  4. growing up in the arcadia valley i had a school friend who lived right next to the st.francis river and to go anywhere they had to cross a swinging bridge…i onl visited their home one time…that was enough for me. i literally crossed that bridge on my hands and knees.

  5. Tipper, This is a beautiful photo. The story triggered deep emotion in me. One family took what they had and made something wonderful of it. The other left and are now scattered.
    I feel a poem rising.
    Meanwhile, Dear One, I’m sending best wishes to you and your family for 2012.

  6. My Dear Friend Tipper,
    All you would have to do to get me to cross that old rickity bridge would be to stretch a hand rail of wire acrost it on both sides leading to the opposite side….
    I will cross any Swinging Bridge or Suspension Bridge in NC or TN…I love them that much and the more they move the better I like’em..NO FEAR from my childhood I imagine…I always wanted a cabin so far back in the mountains that you had to park your car and cross the revenes on a swinging bridge totin’ your groceries to the house..!!…
    The picture of the moldy wood in the bridge reminds me of a long time back swinging bridge (without the wire), that I crossed one time when I was a kid……LOL
    Love this post good one as usual,
    Thanks B. Ruth…and to think I am afraid of Spiders..!

  7. Nice bridge picture, Tipper. The ols bridge has a lot of character and is interesting to look at, but I will pass on the invitation to cross it.

  8. Don’t think I could stand to sell “family” land. Families are never the same once the homeplace is sold. When the old people die, no one sees each other any more.
    I choose your bridge.
    Pam

  9. I wouldn’t want to drive across this bridge, but your photograph would make a beautiful jigsaw puzzle and the little story of the two bridges would make it a great piece of history to tell along with a puzzle. Hmmm! Just a thought. Great page you share each day, I thoroughly enjoy viewing it and look forward to the Appalachian Blog each time. Thank you and HAPPY NEW YEAR to you ALL from New Brunswick, Canada.

  10. Tipper,
    I’d bet that old bridge has about
    three hemlock logs holding it up.
    Those things last a hundred years
    usually. I believe I can see a skiff of snow too. I love that stuff! Happy New Years to all…Ken

  11. A bridge similar to this one once crossed Town Creek going from my house to my Grandfather’s house. When I was a child, we walked across it, but if we were in our farm wagon, going to Grandpa’s mill to get corn ground into meal, my father would drive the mules and wagon through the “ford” just north of the bridge (and, strangely enough, the water of Town Creek ran north there!). Strange how many wonderful memories your picture of the old bridge brought back to me. We had bridges and footlogs over so many streams in Choestoe, Union County, GA–mountains of N. GA–in bygone days. Sometimes, the remains of an old bridge can still be found, moss-covered and abandoned, over one of the mountain creeks.

  12. I wouldn’t drive across this bridge. It looks kind of sad sitting there. It’s function was once very important to the people who built it and used it to wind up in a state of neglect. I am sure it could tell some great stories of the people that it served through the years. It is comforting to know that while some things diminish with age other things will grow stronger with the passing of time.

  13. Humm! I might try walking across them, but taking a car or truck – I think it a bit risky. Of course, it depends what lies in the water below the bridges. Anyway, I would just see myself looking and not walking.

  14. Tipper, this is a little off your subject but reminds me of the old spider bridges I used to see in the “country” where my Grandma and Uncle used to be. (that country being the Missouri Ozarks)

  15. A sad but true vision of what is going on in the world right now. Do we try to make the one safer or do we just proceed as we always have done.
    As for me. I have had nightmares since I was a child of one of those little bridges falling apart while I was on it. Thank you but no to both bridges.

  16. I don’t think I’d even want to walk across that old bridge much less drive. Looks like the next good gully washer might take it out. Is there not a footlog handy? That is the best way to cross a creek that size.
    I didn’t know if it was footlog or foot log so I googled it and didn’t find either. Is footlog not a nationally known term.

  17. This reminds me of a situation I got into when we bought the place we currently live, when we had the survey ran one side of the land line was different than my neighbor next to me, it was showing I was (according to a survey done years before by his surveyor) that I was losing about 10ft of land for about 400ft, when we talked about it I told him there was more in life to worry about than 10ft of dirt, besides in 50 years someone else will probably own my place anyway. The old bridge just shows us we really don’t own the land, we just borrow it for a while, then it’s someone else time to use it. Nice reality Check..

  18. No, don’t think i’d want to drive across that old bridge. It doesn’t even look safe enough to walk across it. Does make you wonder tho about the folks that used it all those years ago and what it was like for them back then.

  19. Nice post Tipper. I love old bridges, they allow us to pick up where earth didn’t.
    We have lots of bridges here in MI and one we’ve had to cross many times. It’s a covered bridge for one car at a time. It makes us stop & take in it’s beauty & the beauty that sorrounds it while we take turns going through.

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