Cameron Suspension Bridge

That old iron span just off the highway is the Cameron Suspension Bridge, built in nineteen eleven and, at the time of its completion, the longest suspension span west of the Mississippi River. The Office of Indian Affairs contracted the Midland Bridge Company of Kansas City to connect the Navajo and Hopi reservations to the Arizona road network across the Little Colorado River. For decades it was one of the few reliable crossings of the river in this country.

When a newer deck truss bridge replaced it for highway traffic in nineteen fifty-nine, the old span was retired but not demolished. It still stands today, listed on the National Register of Historic Places, a slender reminder of how recent and how hard-won the connection between this corner of the Colorado Plateau and the rest of the country really was.