Built with wood pegs
by Randall Branham
Title
Built with wood pegs
Artist
Randall Branham
Medium
Photograph - Photography /photo Art
Description
Most old covered bridges were built using a lattice or x truss system and trunnels or better known as wooden pegs to hold all the timbers together. They were a very strong and long lasting connection that was used to distribute weight evenly over a longer span.
I remember as a kid ,we built a new home over in Highland county, but first we had to tear down the existing 110 year old home. The house was built using mortise and tenon and pegged with what was called " tree nails", trunnels or wooden pegs. They were so strong we couldn't pull it down with the farm tractor they had to be cut up with saws, The wood was so hard it dulled the saw almost immediately. The timbers on this old home were covered from top to bottom with pure black walnut siding keeping the timbers solid and shielded from the weather. We had folks come all the way from Washington DC to take photos ,this was back in the middle fifty's. This was before we had freeways for folks to travel more rapidly on. Oh BTW I helped build bridges here in Ohio. Yes I'm that old I helped build most of the bridges around I-275 here in Cincinnati .
Uploaded
January 6th, 2014
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