details

Documenting North America's past & present covered bridges

Home

Grady's or State, Somerset County

If you find errors in the data please contact Bill Caswell.

If you would like to provide information on covered bridges that no longer exist from your state, or adopt a state to work on, we would certainly welcome your assistance. Please contact Trish Kane for more information.

Inventory Number: PA/38-56-07x
County: Somerset County
Township: Stony Creek
Town/Village: Shanksville
Bridge Name: Grady's or State
Crosses: Stonycreek River
Truss type: Burr
Spans: 1
Length: 85'
Roadway Width:
Built: 1880
Builder:
When Lost: 29 Aug 1966
Cause: Collapsed
Latitude: N40 01.21
Longitude: W078 55.12
See a map of the area
Topographic map of the area
Directions: In Stony Creek Township on T563, ½ mile west of Shanksville.

Grady's or State Bridge, Stony Creek, Somerset County, PA. Built 1880 Collapsed 29 Aug 1966
Todd Clark Collection

Grady's or State Bridge, Stony Creek, Somerset County, PA. Built 1880 Collapsed 29 Aug 1966
Traugott Keller Photograph, February 9, 1957, NSPCB Archives

Comments:
8-panel truss. In Penn Pilot aerial photography dated to May 4, 1939, the covered bridge is shown oriented east-southeast to west-northwest on Old State Bridge Road (T563) in Stony Creek Township. Near the end of its life, it had a sign over its portal "Trucks do not use, Cars at own risk". During the afternoon of August 29th it could be heard snapping and groaning at Shanksville, a half mile away. Another source stated: "The State Bridge was a covered bridge and they tried for years to get the funds to repair it. When they finally got the funds, but before they could get started, it collapsed into the creek." (from Our Town, Shanksville 1798-1975). On August 29, 1966 it collapsed of its own weight into the creek. Since that time, the site has been abandoned. The coordinates are at the gap in the creek.

Sources:
Clough, Philip & Betsy. World Guide to Covered Bridges, 1959, page 69
Barkman, Sheldon H.. Covered Bridges of Somerset County, PA, 1979, Page 11
National Society For the Preservation of Covered Bridges. Covered Bridge Topics, Volume XLVIII, No. 2, Spring 1990, page 11
National Society For the Preservation of Covered Bridges. Covered Bridge Topics, Volume XXXIX, No. 3, Summer 1981, page 14
Moll, Fred J.. Pennsylvania's Covered Bridges - Our Heritage, 2004, pages 126-127
Kipphorn, Thomas. Information received by email, May 2012

The images in this collection may be protected under copyright law and may only be used for educational, teaching, and research purposes.
If the intended use is beyond these purposes, it is the responsibility of the user to obtain the appropriate permissions from the owner stated in the image's credits.