For those of us with interest in and about the covered bridges of Oregon the Fourtner Bridge on the north skirts of Grand Rhond may be the only one many have not seen in person. All the other bridges… you can drive “up to” or through. The Fourtner Bridge, built by “Doc” Fourtner and spouse, is on private property and out of view from the passing road.
My family and I were extremely fortunate a few years back, July of 2005 to be exact, when this bridge was the only of Oregon’s 51 registered sites I had not photographed and we stopped in at the property that used to be owned (and inhabited) by the Fourtner family.
The daughter of Doc Fourtner was at the farm that day and…. not occupied with urgency — she took us for a personal tour to the location and the bridge. I am indebted to her. Mrs Margie Ellis.
Follow this series of photographs and I hope you get a certain sense of the bridge as it is now. It’s a seldom seen gem in my opinion.
Mrs Ellis was most gracious with stories of her father and the bridge and you’ll see her in one of the photos on the long south ramp going to the cattle pasture in the rear fields. A few years later I mailed to Mrs Ellis a framed copy of this photograph and she in return sent me a personal card of thanks and bridge history.
