REMEMBERING
THE BRIDGES
The history of crossing the Kalamazoo River is a three part story. The
story begins in the 1830s with an every man for himself ferry service utilizing canoes and
boats. Twenty years later there is evidence of
an early swing or draw bridge that was located where the ferry crosses today. In 1857 the
bridge collapsed and was replaced by a village franchised ferry service that still exists
in foot traffic form.
As Douglas and the surrounding fruit farms grew to the south, a better way to
cross the river was needed. But the area
topography and the volume of boat traffic below the villages presented a considerable
challenge. The solution was a low bridge-causeway-drawbridge which was constructed for
$5000 in the fall of 1870. It is visible in
the 1874 panorama and in the left photo. In 1901 this crossing was
rebuilt with a higher steel truss bridge on the Saugatuck side and a swing bridge on the Douglas shore.
This arrangement remained in use until 1936 when U. S. 31 was re-routed to become the
present-day Blue Star Highway. The highway required the building of a new bridge and the
construction of a huge earthen approach across the Clipson Bayou. Much of the material for
that work was secured from a very large and low island that lay just offshore at the end
of Griffith St. A large
sand-sucking dredge was used to pump the material from Kalamazoo Lake
to the causeway area. The right photo is
interesting in that it shows the causeway under construction, the dredge, the old steel
truss portion of the 1901 bridge and the back side of the Twin Gables B & B. By
Jack Sheridan
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