{"nrhp_refnum":"79003186","name":"Rupert Covered Bridge No. 56","other_names":[],"category":"structure","location":{"address":"ST 449","address_restricted":false,"city":"Rupert","county":"Columbia County","state":"PA","lat":40.98144027500007,"lon":-76.47264889999997,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1979-11-29","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Engineering","Transportation"],"significance_levels":["local"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"Rupert Covered Bridge No. 56 is a covered wooden bridge in Rupert, Columbia County, Pennsylvania, measuring 185.33 feet long with a roadway width of 17.75 feet and a clearance of 12 feet. It is a Burr Arch Truss structure.","why_significant":"The nomination argues the bridge is significant for its engineering and its role in transportation. It is built on the Theodore Burr arch-truss design, and the document notes that covered bridges have not been built in Columbia County in the last half century, which makes the county's design and engineering unique. Bridges like this served the rapid growth of towns and the farming, saw mill and grist mill activity that depended on travel between them.","narrative":"Rupert Covered Bridge carries traffic across a waterway in Rupert, Columbia County, Pennsylvania. It is 185.33 feet long, has a roadway 17.75 feet wide and 12 feet of clearance, and is built on the Burr Arch Truss system, with eight diagonal beams on each side of a central king post and an arch superimposed on the truss. The portals are curved archways of horizontal boards, the walls are plain vertical planks, and the roof is tarred metal laid over wooden shingles. The floor carries two runways over horizontal boards. One abutment is stone and mortar and the other has been replaced by concrete, and some reinforcements have been added to the structure. Jessee M. Beard is named as builder. The bridge is regarded as an example of covered bridge engineering, a type that served the growing towns and the farming and milling economy of the county, where bridges of this kind had not been built for half a century.","period_of_significance":null,"architect_builder":"Jessee M. Beard (builder)","architectural_style":"Burr Arch Truss","criteria":["A","C"],"status_note":null,"vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.1-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 17:11:32.74351-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_PA/79003186.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79003186/745a902a5e-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/79003186/745a902a5e-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY-SA 3.0","author":"Ruhrfisch","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rupert_Covered_Bridge_13.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Ruhrfisch</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY-SA 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rupert_Covered_Bridge_13.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/71992810","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rupert_Covered_Bridge_No._56","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7380269"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/pennsylvania/columbia-county/rupert-covered-bridge-no-56-79003186/"}