The July 22, 1923 fire began when a lightning bolt hit the wooden span during an evening thunderstorm
By John Tredrea, Special Writer
STOCKTON — Monday (July 22) will mark the 90th anniversary of a legendary fire that destroyed the Centre Bridge-Stockton Bridge over the Delaware River, according to Joe Donnelly, Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission spokesman.
The July 22, 1923 fire began when a lightning bolt hit the wooden span during an evening thunderstorm.
The only photographs of the fire depict the bridge’s smoldering remains on the following day.
However, the blaze was a conflagration of such significant proportions that it became the subject of an iconic painting that continues to attract visitors to a Bucks County museum to this day, Mr. Donnelly said.
This painting, “The Burning of Center Bridge,” by Edward W. Redfield, depicts the fire as it lit the summer sky. Mr. Redfield was an American impressionist landscape artist and co-founder of a heralded artist colony at nearby New Hope. The canvas is featured prominently at the James A. Michener Art Museum, in Doylestown.
According to a museum posting, Mr. Redfield painted the piece from memory after making notes on an envelope while firemen attempted to extinguish the blaze on the night the bridge was struck by lightning.
ELMER ROBERSON — a Stockton resident at the time — wrote about the event in a pamphlet on the bridge’s history he issued five years later. In it, he said:
”Sunday evening, July 22nd, 1923, during a heavy thunderstorm accompanied by high wind and dashing rain, the bridge was struck by lightning and fire broke out on the up-river side, near the first pier from the Pennsylvania shore. The fire, fed by the old shingle roof and dry timbers and fanned by the high wind, spread rapidly. New Hope firemen prevented the fire from spreading to nearby property at the Pennsylvania end. Stockton firemen ran a line of hose out on the bridge and fought the flames from the inside, but their efforts were unsuccessful and they were driven back span by span. They had retreated to the first span on the New Jersey end, which the fire had not reached, when the span, weakened by falling spans farther out, broke off and fell, carrying eight firemen and eight volunteer helpers down to the river bed 30 feet below. Volunteers rushed down the river bank to their aid. When a final checking up was made it was found that although several of the fire fighters were painfully injured, no lives had been lost.”
More than a dozen firefighters had to be rescued from the river, said Mr. Donnelly, who noted that Centre Bridge was the third wooden span to cross the Delaware between New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
”The 90th anniversary of this fire is now just days away and it just seems to be a potential injustice to allow the approaching anniversary date to advance without giving it some measure of attention, recognition, and remembrance.”
A Trenton newspaper report said that one fireman suffered a broken collarbone and lacerations of the head, shoulder and arm, while another had a nail go through his foot. The article went to say that the rescue of the firemen took place in dim light, since the fire cut off Stockton’s electricity — which was carried by wires crossing the bridge from the Pennsylvania side. The entire bridge was destroyed, four spans being consumed by flames, while the fifth span collapsed and dropped into the Delaware.
”After the structure went down, it struck on rocks and sand bars and one end was crushed like an egg shell.
”When the fifth span fell the firemen saw that it would be of no use to continue fighting the flames, and the bridge was left to the mercy of the blaze. It burned for several hours. The river for a considerable distance down was lit up with burning timber floating down.”
The injured firemen were taken to their homes where they were treated by physicians.
AT THE TIME OF THE FIRE, Centre Bridge was the oldest remaining 19th-century timber-covered bridge along the Delaware River between Pennsylvania and New Jersey. It originally began operations during the spring of 1814 at a location purported to be near the halfway point between the Trenton Bridge — the first bridge to cross the Delaware in January 1806 — and the Palmer Bridge at Easton and Phillipsburg, which opened later in 1806, according to Mr. Donnelly.
Reportedly, this centralized location accounted for the structure’s name — the Centre Bridge. Like its predecessor timber counterparts and the other subsequent wooden-covered bridges that would be constructed along the river, the Centre Bridge was built and operated as a shareholder-owned toll crossing with specific rates for everything from livestock to pedestrians to horse-drawn carriages. Departments of transportation and public agencies, such as a Bridge Commission, simply did not exist. However, the private companies that were created to build these early bi-state bridges always needed to first acquire approval from their respective state Legislatures to incorporate.
Once constructed and put into operation, the Centre Bridge served as the initial river crossing for the York Road, which linked Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Many portions of this route are still in existence in the two states as York Road, Old York Road, Lower York Road, etc.
The original bridge, however, had several serious design flaws and deficiencies, so much so that it underwent extensive renovation and repair in 1829. The bridge also underwent significant repairs after the flood of 1841 washed away two piers, three spans, and the tollhouse on the New Jersey side of the river. Once repaired, the resulting bridge continued in service until the 1923 fire, earning the distinction in that period as the only bridge between Trenton and Easton to fully withstand the flood of 1903.
All totaled this timber bridge with six barn-like spans supported by stone-masonry piers and abutments served the region for roughly 109 years, the longest of any of 16 covered bridges that once crossed the Delaware.
After the fire, the stockholders for the old Centre Bridge Company learned that the insurance would not be sufficient to cover the costs of replacing the bridge. Four years passed before a new bridge was built to link the village of Centre Bridge in Solebury and Stockton Borough once again.
In his book, “ Bridges over the Delaware River,” author Frank T. Dale explains how the two states jointly purchased the Centre Bridge’s remnant masonry piers and abutments for $10,000, encased them in concrete and then erected a bridge of “fire-proof steel girders.”
The new bridge was opened for business — without a toll — by the predecessor agency to the current DRJTBC on July 16, 1927. The states assigned ownership of the bridge outright to the DRJTBC on July 1, 1987.
According to Mr. Donnelly, the 200th anniversary of the actual crossing will not occur until spring 2014 — just like the crossing at New Hope-Lambertville, which will turn 200 years old in September 2014.
Explanation — “You can’t say the bridge will turn 200 years old, since there has been more than one bridge at each location.
”The current Centre Bridge-Stockton Bridge was opened in 1927. But its predecessor bridge at the location opened in 1814. So, the crossing turns 200 years old — not the specific bridge. Steel — the material used in the truss for the current bridge — didn’t even exist in 1814.”
For more information about the Commission and its various initiatives to deliver safer and more convenient bridge travel for its customers, see: www.drjtbc.org.

