Once The ‘Long Bridge’ Had Its Day by Mike Brown

Milam County Historical Commission
Milam County, Texas

Once The ‘Long Bridge’ Had Its Day

Mike Brown - Rockdale Reporter

June 26, 2014

Sunday’s nice re-dedication ceremony at the historic Worley Bridge northwest of Rockdale

brings to mind one of those days in our area’s “bridge history” that will never be

repeated.

It’s been gone 12 years now — can that really be possible! — but the fabled “Long Bridge”

over the Little River just outside Cameron is still a vivid memory to many.

Its replacement was a pair of wider, not nearly as long and much more modern, bridges

that whisk US 77/190-Texas 36 traffic so easily and safely across the river that I’m sure

lots of folks don’t even realize they’ve crossed a bridge.

Not so with the Long Bridge. It was really long —at 4,151 feet just 49 feet short of the

Golden Gate’s main (center) span, although portal to portal the California icon is twice

as long.

And the Long Bridge was really narrow. Each one of the current bridges, with traffic only

going one way, is much wider than the entire width of the two-way traffic old structure,

where it often seemed you could reach out and touch the car you were meeting.

Why was it so overbuilt? (At the time of its dedication, May 17, 1947, it was the fourth

longest bridge in Texas.)

History, and memory. When construction was first planned in 1937, the memory of several

recent floods was still fresh, especially the granddaddy of them all in 1921.

When Milam’s rivers were out to that magnitude, the county, and by default Central Texas,

were literally split in half.

Water at the 1921 Little River Bridge crested 17 feet over the roadway in September of

that year.

Planners were determined to have a bridge that would provide passage over the flood

waters no matter what.

And they built one. World War II interrupted the project, as it interrupted most things,

and the Long Bridge took 10 years to complete.

But when it was finished in the spring of 1947 - incidentally just a couple of weeks

after the Texas City disaster - Milam County threw an opening ceremony worthy of the big

bridge. Five thousand people - more than lived in either Cameron or Rockdale - stood on

the bridge for over two hours and listened to speeches by Gov. Beauford Jester and every

conceivable elected official.

Representing Rockdale were Mayor J. B. Newton and W. P. “Red” Hogan and Clyde Franklin of

the Young Men’s Business League, forerunner of the Chamber of Commerce.

During construction it was planned for longtime County Judge Jeff Kemp to cut the ribbon

formally opening the bridge. Judge Kemp died in late 1946 and his widow, Lina, did the

honors, tears in her eyes.

Twelve hundred cars then crossed the bridge in the first half hour it was open. And they

kept crossing it for 55 years.

The river flooded under the bridge many times but water never got on the roadway.

mike@rockdalereporter.com

Texas Gov. Beauford Jester was the speaker May 17, 1947, when the landmark ‘long bridge’ was dedicated.

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All Credit for this article
goes to Mike Brown
and the
Rockdale Reporter