Larkin Covered Bridge, North Tunbridge Vermont
- Categories:
- Vermont
- Covered Bridges
- Multiple Kingpost Truss
The Larkin Covered Bridge is one of five covered wood bridges remaining in the town of Tunbridge. The five bridges, together with another in the adjoining: town of Chelsea, cross the First Branch of the White River within a distance of about seven miles, comprising one of the most concentrated groups of covered bridges in Vermont. These bridges have not been altered seriously, and their historic environment of an extraordinarily scenic agricultural valley remains essentially undisturbed.
The Larkin Bridge is the youngest of the group, having been built in 1902. It is also the next to the last covered bridge built on a public highway in Vermont during the historic period of covered bridge construction, which began about 1820. Only the Larkin bridge and the Kingsbury bridge in Randolph (1904) are known to have been built after the beginning of the twentieth century (excluding a modern revival of the type built in Woodstock in 1969). The lower cost of wood construction compared with that of iron or steel probably accounted for its extraordinarily late use in the Larkin bridge, which carries only a lightly traveled rural road.
The covered bridges of Vermont are among its most cherished and symbolic historic resources. About one hundred of the bridges still stand in the state, the highest concentration by area of covered bridges in the country.
Bridge Description
The Larkin Covered Bridge consists of a single span supported by two flanking timber multiple kingpost trusses. The trusses form a rectangle in plan; the portal ends, however, are skewed, giving the bridge its overall shape of a parallelogram. The structure rests on abutments built originally of irregular stone blocks laid dry; the west abutment has been either faced or rebuilt with concrete.
The Larkin bridge is 68 feet long at floor level. The ends of the side walls flare outward slightly to meet the gable ends which overhang the floor one foot at each portal. The bridge is 16 feet wide and has a 13-foot roadway. The wood floor, which consists of planks laid flat and parallel to the trusses, is 67 feet long.
On the exterior, the timbers bolted together to form the trusses (and side walls) of the bridge are sheathed with unpainted flush boards hung vertically. Similar siding protects the ends of the trusses immediately inside the portals. There are no windows or openings in the side walls.
The gable ends are also sheathed with unpainted flush boards hung vertically. The portal openings are rectangular except for rounded upper corners. The medium-pitch gable roof is covered with standing seam corrugated metal sheeting.
West portal (1973)
