BONO – A lost landmark that was significant to residents because of both practicality and heritage may soon be replaced.
In 2011, Rachel Simpson was an undergraduate student at Arkansas State University when she penned an essay on the old wooden bridge in her hometown. That bridge was more than timber and nails to her, it was a bridge both literally and figuratively for generations. The Jonesboro Sun reports that she recalled with fondness making countless trips over the bridge back and forth to school, but it was her twilight visits with friends that may have been most notable.
Simpson said the “folklore” surrounding the bridge – from standing on the top as a train would speed underneath to “seeing some floating lights sometimes at night … kind of a creepy factor” – was what really made the bridge a Bono landmark. She recalls how people would wait on the bridge to scream at a passing train. Or to watch the night sky for some still unexplained lights in the distance.
(See photos of the bridge before it was destroyed here.)
Steve Cline, who serves as the justice of the peace for District 10, is a lifelong Bono resident with bittersweet memories of the bridge. He grew up by the bridge and used it twice a day on his commute back and forth to work.
BNSF Railway was the owner of the old bridge in Bono. According to records, the rail line desired by the railroad company was going to cross a county road. Therefore in 1882, the wooden bridge was first built by the railroad to provide a means to keep the roadway intact. However, the circumstances surrounding the destruction of the bridge caught most people, residents and elected officials alike, by surprise.
“Judge (Ed) Hill had just become county judge and they (BNSF) came and didn’t notify the county or anybody,” said Cline. “They just came in a tore it down … and that was it.”
Cline remembers there was a car crash on the bridge just shortly before the bridge was torn down. He believes the accident was just the reasons BNSF needed to eliminate the old landmark.
“They’d been wanting to tear it down for years,” Cline said.
He said that after the fact, the railroad told him they didn’t want to own bridges and expected the county to pay for replacing it. Legal action against BNSF was discussed but never taken, and Cline thinks it may have been a moot point.
“The railroad has a lot of power, and they do want they want to,” he said.
Cline said a replacement bridge should be coming later this year. The new bridge will not be built on the site of the old wooden bridge, but rather at a “better location just up the road.” Of course, instead of being built with wood and nails, the new bridge will be a product of more modern engineering. Cline said the new bridge should be similar to the one over the rail line at Bridge Street in Jonesboro.
“It’s been a long time waiting,” said Cline, who noted that Hill has been working hard on the issue.
While the new bridge can’t possibly match the history and heritage of its predecessor, it might give some Bono natives a bit of closure.
“It’ll probably rekindle some memories,” said Simpson, who might just have to visit the new bridge to shout at a speeding train one last time or watch for those “floating lights” in the distance.
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