With only 24 Covered Bridges remaining in New York State, it was at one time home to over 300 covered bridges. Many crossed major rivers like the Mohawk, Delaware, and the Hudson. Many more crossed streams, creeks, and brooks like the Battenkill, Beechers Creek, Shadow Brook, and countless others. Covered bridges once dotted the vast landscape of New York, and everywhere in between.

Most earlywood truss bridges were simple Kingpost or Queenpost trusses, which were easy to fabricate and erect and could be used for crossings up to around 50 feet in length. For wider crossings, these trusses were constructed in a series, supported by masonry piers or cribbing between the spans. Almost all of the authentic wooden truss-covered bridges still standing in New York State are over one hundred years old. The Empire State's oldest covered bridge is the Hyde Hall covered bridge in Glimmerglass State Park at the north end of Otsego Lake. The date of construction is ca. 1825.

In the early eighteen hundreds, Major Salmon Wheat was credited with building the first covered bridge in New York State. It was a rugged arched span that crossed the Neversink River at Bridgeville in Sullivan County. Completed in 1807, it was in continuous use for over one hundred years before it was eventually removed in 1917.

In 1804, a sawmill owner named Theodore Burr invented a truss that is known as a Burr Truss. Patented that same year, the truss consists of a simple parallel chord truss and a wooden arch. At Waterford, N.Y., Theodore Burr’s four-span eight-hundred-foot wooden arch bridge was the first to be erected across the Hudson River.

Today in New York State, almost all wooden truss designs are represented. Although a few additional replicas have been erected in recent years, only twenty-three Empire state covered bridges are considered Historic Authentic examples. Theodore Burr’s arch truss design is represented in the Hyde Hall, Salisbury Center, and Perrine's bridges. William Howe’s truss design is evident in the Jay, Buskirks, and Rexleigh bridges. Colonel Steven Long’s truss design is used in the construction of the Downsville and Hamden bridges. Itiel Town’s lattice truss design bridges are the most prevalent in New York today. This truss design is used in the Beaverkill, Bendo, Lower Shavertown, Eagleville, Fitches, Grants Mills, Halls Mill, Newfield, Shushan, Van Tran Flat, and Olive/Turnwood bridges. The Copeland Bridge uses a Queenpost truss design, and the Tappen and Forge bridges incorporate the Kingpost truss design. The shortest Historic covered bridge in the state is the Forge covered bridge at 27 feet long. Since the Blenheim Bridge was lost in 2011, the longest covered bridge in the state is now the Jay Bridge at 175 feet in length.

Wooden truss bridges at one time were numerous throughout the Empire State. Today, only 22 of these survivors of an era long since gone are still present. Fifteen of these covered wooden spans continue to serve in the capacity for which they were intended. The rest are either by-passed and preserved to some degree, or stand on private property. These testimonials of fine woodworking craftsmanship are a rare sight indeed. They should be preserved for future generations to appreciate.

 Photographed in August 2015 & May 2023