1932: The Debut of the Arlington Memorial Bridge

January 16, 1932

The Arlington Memorial Bridge, crossing the Potomac River and linking Virginia with Washington, D.C., was opened. A caravan of 12 automobiles became the first vehicles to travel over this stone, steel, and neoclassical masonry arch bridge. The first of these automobiles transported President Herbert Hoover (1874-1964) and First Lady Lou Henry Hoover (1874-1944).

While the idea of such a bridge had been proposed as far back as 1886, it was not until the 1920s that those plans finally gained traction. A large part of the reason for the newfound momentum involved a high-profile embarrassment on November 11, 1921, when then-President Warren G. Harding (1865-1923) was being driven to Arlington National Cemetery for the dedication of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. 

Harding found himself stuck in a three-hour traffic jam because the structure officially known as Highway Bridge, which was opened at that section of the Potomac River in 1906 and remained in use until 1962, had become a major bottleneck in the area for that day’s high volume of vehicles. Harding subsequently pushed for funding so that a new and improved bridge could at long last be built in that vicinity. 

The Arlington Memorial Bridge is still very much in use today. Its northeastern approach is on the side of the nation’s capital, near the Lincoln Memorial and at the western edge of the National Mall; the southwestern end links up with Memorial Drive, which crosses the Boundary Channel Bridge in Virginia and goes to Arlington National Cemetery. While no longer in use, this bridge’s bascule span did have the distinction of being the longest, heaviest, and fastest-opening structure of its kind in the world. The Arlington Memorial Bridge was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1981.

Photo Credit: Public Domain

For more information on the Arlington Memorial Bridge, please check out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlington_Memorial_Bridge