Wheeling Suspension Bridge
The Wheeling Suspension Bridge is a suspension bridge spanning the main channel of the Ohio River at Wheeling, West Virginia. It was the largest suspension bridge in the world from 1849 until 1851. Charles Ellet Jr. designed it and supervised construction of what became the first bridge to span a major river west of the Appalachian Mountains. It linked the eastern and western section of the National Road, and became especially strategically important during the American Civil War. Litigation in the United States Supreme Court concerning its obstruction of the new high steamboat smokestacks eventually cleared the way for other bridges, especially needed by expanding railroads. Because this bridge was designed during the horse-and-buggy era, 2-ton weight limits and vehicle separation requirements applied in later years until it was closed to automobile traffic in September 2019.
The main span is from tower to tower. The east tower rests on the Wheeling shore, while the west tower is on Wheeling Island. The east tower is above the low-water level of the river, or from the base of the masonry. The west tower is above low water, with of masonry. Detailed analysis of the bridge was conducted by Dr. Emory Kemp.
The Wheeling Suspension Bridge was designated a National Historic Landmark on May 15, 1975. It is located in the Wheeling Island Historic District.
History
A charter was granted to the Wheeling and Belmont Bridge Company in 1816 to construct a bridge to extend the National Road across the Ohio River. Although the U.S. Congress authorized the National Road in 1806, and cities competing for that crossing included Wellsburg, West Virginia and Steubenville, Ohio, that bridge connecting Wheeling with Belmont, Ohio was nevertheless completed. The National Road formally reached Wheeling on August 1, 1818, but then ferries took passengers and freight to the other section of the National Road which began in Belmont and continued westward. In 1820 Congress authorized the National Road's extension to St. Louis, Missouri.Another attempt to charter and construct a bridge across the Ohio River was made more than a decade later. That began in state legislatures and ultimately succeeded in getting the bridge built using new technology. It also produced two rounds of important litigation in the United States Supreme Court, in 1849–1852 and again in 1854–56.
Technology and delays
Since 1820 Congress had spent much money to clear navigation obstacles from the Ohio River, which flows from Pittsburgh down through Wheeling to Cincinnati, Ohio and eventually reaches the Mississippi River at Cairo, Illinois slightly downstream of St. Louis, Missouri. Goods and produce could thus ship fairly cheaply and quickly down the Ohio River and reach the ocean port of New Orleans, Louisiana. Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky had become a great proponent of internal improvements, in part because the Ohio River drained into the northern part of his state and contributed to the growth of Louisville. Both road and navigation improvements helped bring manufactured goods and people to Kentucky, western Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, etc., and as well as allowed produce and natural resources to reach eastern, southern and even international markets. However, President Andrew Jackson had a much stingier view of internal improvements than Senator Clay, preferring to leave their construction to private or individual state interests, if at all.Meanwhile, ferrying the U.S. mail, as well as passengers and goods across the Ohio river at Wheeling to connect the two sections of the National Road proved cumbersome and expensive. Maintaining the National Road also cost money, especially after floods in 1832 left debris, as well as destroyed shore facilities. In 1835 Congress gave existing sections to the adjoining states, in order to pass on those maintenance costs. In the interim, new steamboat technology helped goods move upstream as well as downstream, and both railroad and bridge technology had also evolved. Nonetheless, navigation on the Ohio River between Wheeling and Pittsburgh remained hazardous at certain times of year.
Pittsburgh and Wheeling both competed to become commercial hubs connecting east and west across the central Appalachian Mountains. To the north, the Erie Canal and the Welland Canal proved a commercial boon even to cities some distance away. Soon, Pennsylvania competed by subsidizing first a short canal ending at Pittsburgh, then railroads connecting Pittsburgh to Philadelphia, which had rail and water connections to New York City and was a major international port in its own right. In 1835, a new incline railroad connected Pittsburgh to Ohio valley produce and goods. The combination of Pennsylvania railroads and canals became known as the "Main Line". In 1846 Pennsylvania's legislature chartered the Pennsylvania Railroad to connect its state capital Harrisburg with Pittsburgh. While transappalachian commerce initially boomed in part because canals enabled one man, one boy, a horse and a boat to transport what had previously involved ten men, ten wagons and sixty horses, toll revenues proved insufficient. Since 1844 Pennsylvania had been trying to sell its unprofitable investment.
A transappalachian route through Virginia could attract southern shippers. However, Virginia's legislature was dominated by plantation owners who already had access to cheap river transport for many months every year. Meanwhile, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad was chartered in 1827, reached Harpers Ferry in 1834 and soon out-competed the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal for commercial transport down the Potomac River Valley to Chesapeake Bay. The B&O proved a boon for Baltimore, Maryland. The B&O wanted to connect to Virginia, as well as the Ohio River valley through Parkersburg, but Virginia legislators repeatedly denied it permission to build a line along the Shenandoah and Kanawha valleys. Virginia instead subsidized first the James River Canal, then railroads through its higher Appalachian mountains. Virginia's legislators wanted to direct its commerce towards its capital and its seaport rather than toward Baltimore. However, Wheeling had become Virginia's second largest city by 1840, and its interests also lobbied to become a B&O terminus, linking the railroad to cheap river transportation. Especially after the B&O reached Cumberland, Maryland in 1842, railroad technology was out-competing the National Road. The Virginia General Assembly in the 1830s and through the 1840s required the B&O to take a relatively northern route across the Appalachians in the then-Commonwealth and connect at Wheeling. The B&O finally acquiesced after 1847, its threats to move its transappalachian passage to Pittsburgh having proven idle and Pennsylvania having chartered the Pennsylvania Railroad.
While the Wheeling and Belmont Bridge Company languished for nearly two decades, in 1836, it managed to raise sufficient private funds to build a wooden bridge between Zane's Island and the Ohio shore. Nonetheless, a navigation channel still remained between Wheeling and that island.
Pennsylvania legislators for decades blocked federal legislation to authorize the proposed Wheeling bridge. In 1836, Federal engineers proposed a suspension bridge with a removable section to enable steamboat smokestacks to clear, but Congress tabled it. In 1838, the U.S. postmaster reported 53 irregularities in mail service around Wheeling between January and April. An 1840 postmaster's report urging a bridge to avoid such mail interruptions got lost. Another proposal requiring hinges on high steamboat smokestacks also initially failed. In 1844, a steamboat packet line began connecting Pittsburgh and Cincinnati. As traffic on the National Road also languished, Virginia's congressmen finally abandoned their efforts to win federal funding for the Wheeling bridge in early 1847. That year civic boosters instead formed a new company to build the bridge, and the new officers requested proposals in May 1847. The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad track to Wheeling was finally completed in 1853, the same year a packet line connected Wheeling and Louisville.
Construction
After these and other delays, in 1847 the legislatures of Virginia and Ohio jointly issued a new Wheeling bridge charter. Charles Ellet and John A. Roebling were invited to submit designs and estimates for a bridge over the east channel of the river to Wheeling Island. Ellett was the chief engineer of the Virginia Central Railroad and in 1853 would build a railroad over the Blue Ridge Mountains at Rock Fish Gap. The new Wheeling bridge would be of a suspension design, since Ellet and Roebling were the foremost authorities. It would also be above low water. Their initial calculations relied on the highest smokestacks being about, but stack height kept increasing, so the planned bridge came to impede the largest steamboats with high stacks. Ellet received the contract award in 1847 with a bid of $120,000, and construction began the same year. The bridge was completed in 1849 for about $250,000.Supreme Court litigation (1849–1852)
Because the relative legal status of the new steamboat and railroad technologies was unclear, as was the jurisdiction of the United States federal courts over bridges and navigable waters, the litigation concerning the first bridge to cross a major river west of the Appalachian Mountains had great effect. During the previous years, the United States Supreme Court had divided concerning the scope of the federal power in the Commerce Clause, as well as extent of concurrent state powers. In 1847, in U.S. v. New Bedford Bridge Company Justice Levi Woodbury on circuit duty had determined that no federal law defined obstruction of navigable waterways and upheld a drawbridge near the port, and Justice Samuel Nelson had done similarly while a justice of the New York Supreme Court.The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh interests represented by Edwin M. Stanton and Robert J. Walker sought an injunction against the bridge from the U.S. Supreme Court justice supervising the geographical area, Robert C. Grier, who had been a Pennsylvania state judge in Pittsburgh and surrounding Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. Justice Grier was surprised at this use of equity, especially because it was first brought in the Supreme Court and not before a U.S. district judge. It was also begun on July 28, 1849 during the Supreme Court's summer 1849 recess. Pennsylvania's attorneys argued that the new bridge was a nuisance that obstructed the Ohio River. The Wheeling and Belmont Bridge Company's charter from Virginia required that it not obstruct navigation on the river, and Article IV of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 labeled the navigable waters leading into the Mississippi and St. Lawrence Rivers "common highways" and required they be "forever free". The Pittsburgh and Cincinnati steamboat line operated new vessels with very high smokestacks which would be damaged by collisions with the bridge, and stopping in Wheeling to transship passengers and freight would be expensive for the company. Pennsylvania also argued harm to its "Main Line" toll revenues. While Virginia never finished its proposed canal and railroad system, the Pennsylvania system never was profitable. It became less so after the Wheeling route became easier, and would become even less used were the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad to construct a track on the bridge or its own bridge nearby. During the litigation voters wanted to sell it, but no deal was finalized.
The Wheeling Bridge Company, represented by Charles W. Russell and U.S. Attorney general Reverdy Johnson argued the bridge helped the U.S. mails and also connected military posts. They also argued the public's right to cross the river, as well as Pennsylvania's failure to prove irremediable injury because it had not brought suit during the two years the bridge was under construction and technology also existed to lower steamboat smokestacks. Meanwhile, Virginia attorney Alexander H. H. Stuart also tried to convince Pennsylvania's governor William F. Johnston that his state's arguments in this case could jeopardize Pennsylvania's bridges across the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers. Other attorneys and engineers approached the U.S. Congress and Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Virginia state legislatures. Finally, the Hempfield Railroad was chartered to connect Wheeling and Pittsburgh.
Justice Grier held a hearing in Philadelphia on August 16, 1849, and on August 30 refused the requested injunction to remove the bridge. Instead, he referred the matter to the full court. That heard argument on February 25, 1850, as well as reviewed extensive depositions. Rather than an opinion, on May 29, 1850, Justice Nelson issued a one-page order appointing Reuben Hyde Walworth as commissioner.
Walworth received considerable scientific and commercial evidence, including a report from U.S. Army engineer William Jarvis McAlpine. However, both parties were dissatisfied with Walworth's 770-page report, issued in December 1851. Pittsburgh was disappointed that Walworth refused to order the bridge removed. Virginia and Ohio interests complained because he found the waterway obstructed and recommended raising the bridge an additional —which would cause enormous technical difficulties and additional cost. However, after reviewing both parties' exceptions, receiving another report from McAlpine and hearing more argument on February 23 and 24, the U.S. Supreme Court also refused to order the bridge removed, but instead amended the new required height to. The court accepted the bridge company's proposal to study a removable portion as an alternative. Thus, Edwin Stanton won a nearly pyrrhic victory on Pennsylvania's behalf but the bridge remained standing.