PART TWO
As was the case with many other bridges along the Delaware River, a ferry service predated the construction of the first bridge at what is now Washington Crossing.
The first ferryman was named Henry Baker in the late 1600s. The most famous ferryman, however, was Samuel McKonkey who steered General George Washington across the river for the infamous surprise attack upon Hessian mercenaries at Trenton on Christmas 1776. McKonkey later sold his ferry to Benjamin Taylor and the area on the Pennsylvania side of the river soon became known as Taylor’s Ferry and, later, Taylorsville.
The New Jersey side was known as Titusville, owing to sawmills and a fishery established by Joseph Titus in the 1700s.
Men from both sides of the river endeavored in the early 1830s to secure charters from the two states to form a company that then sold shares of stock to raise capital for constructing a bridge. Resulting legislation to establish the Taylorsville Delaware Bridge Company was enacted by New Jersey on February 14, 1931 and by Pennsylvania on April 1, 1931. The legislative measures named Mahlon K. Taylor, Aaron Feaster and Enos Morris of Pennsylvania and Daniel Cooke Esq., James B. Green and Joseph Titus of New Jersey to sell the fledgling bridge company’s stock shares.
In the summer of 1833, the bridge company posted a series of legal advertisements seeking contractors to build the envisioned bridge. The resulting bridge was “thrown open for crossing” on January 1, 1835. A newspaper item from that time stated: “We don’t know the rates of Toll, but have understood that from favorable terms upon which the bridge has been built, the Directors will be able to place the charges for toll at a very moderate rate.” It was the first bridge to open between the New Hope Delaware Bridge Company span to the north and the Trenton Delaware Bridge Company span to the south.
The first Taylorsville Bridge lasted six years. It was among six Delaware River covered bridges decimated or completely destroyed by the “Bridges Freshet” of January 1841. The bridge company replaced its obliterated structure, but nobody knows when the replacement bridge was completed and opened. However, the structure – a typical barn-like wooden covered bridge of that era – lasted until the “Pumpkin Flood” of October 1903.
It’s unclear why a new bridge stockholder entity – the Washington Crossing Delaware Bridge Company – was created after the 1903 flood. The new company apparently managed to raise the necessary funds to construct a new bridge on the remnant piers and abutments that had supported the two prior Taylorsville wooden bridges. One of the piers, however, was so damaged by the 1903 flood that it had to be completely reconstructed.
The New Jersey Bridge Company of Manasquan, N.J. was contracted to build the new bridge – a six-span, 878-feet-long steel double-Warren truss structure. It was constructed in portions of 1904 and 1905. The bridge opened to traffic on April 11, 1905 and tolls were collected by its private owners for its first 17 years of operation.
A 1905 toll schedule from the Trenton Public Library’s Trentoniana Room archives shows the toll rates for livestock, tractors, carts pulled by “beasts of burden,” bicycles, pedestrians (“foot passenger”) and a newfangled contraption called “automobile.” Tolls were collected in both directions — walking or riding. Records indicate that the bridge’s last toll collector in April 1922 was Theodore Scheetz.
While the new steel bridge was an upgrade over its wooden predecessors, it was narrow and largely served agricultural traffic. At the time of public acquisition in 1922, the bridge had a wood floor, scant incandescent lighting, and no sidewalk. Meanwhile, the toll collector’s house on the New Jersey side did not have indoor plumbing. Joint Commission meeting minutes indicate that former toll collectors obtained water from the home of one the bridge company’s directors. More alarmingly, the toilet facilities at the toll collector’s house were described as an open privy that was “a menace to health.”
After completing their purchase of the former private toll bridge in the spring 1922, the states annually paid the old Joint Commission equal tax-generated subsidies to operate and maintain the bridge. This arrangement continued to late December 1934, when the states disbanded the Joint Commission and established the Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission (“the Bridge Commission”) with an expanded mission of building new “super highway” toll bridges. The new Bridge Commission was assigned the old Joint Commission’s responsibility of caring for the bridge with equal annual tax subsidies from the two states.
To be continued.
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