Dingleton Hill - 1882
The Dingleton Hill Covered Bridge, also known as the Cornish Mills Bridge, is a historic wooden covered bridge, carrying Root Hill Road over Mill Brook in Cornish Mills, New Hampshire.
This multiple kingpost truss bridge was built in 1882 by James Tasker, who is known to have built at least eleven bridges in the area. The bridge is a single span running 79 feet, resting on an original stone abutment and a 1954 concrete abutment. Its original wood-shingle roof has been replaced by corrugated metal. Only the lower half of the trusses are sheathed with vertical planking; the upper half is exposed.
The bridge was assembled in a schoolyard and then transported to the site. The farmers who used it would occasionally repair it. Milton Graton restored it in the summer of 1983 at which time he repaired the stone abutments and leveled the bridge. He also installed new bearing shoes, new plank flooring, and sheathing, and some new components, and repaired the roof. The cost of rehabilitating the bridge, in combination with the Blacksmith Shop covered bridge, was $30,000. The cost of restoration was made possible by a federal Historic Preservation Fund matching grant from the National Park Service of the U.S. Department of the Interior through the New Hampshire Division of Historical Resources, the Putnam Foundation, the Cecil Howard Charitable Trust, the Eva Gebhard-Gourgaud Foundation, and the Town of Cornish. The bridge was rededicated on October 23, 1983, with Hyland Tasker, a great-grandnephew of James Tasker in attendance.
Of the 400 covered bridges that once stood in the state of New Hampshire, as of 2019 only 54 remain.
The Dingleton Hill Bridge is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Located at: N43 27.861 W72 22.160 - WGCB #29-10-02
Photographed in July of 2019.