Perkiomen Bridge
Lower Providence Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
Built in 1799, it is one of the oldest bridges still in use in the State. A lottery was authorized by a 1797 law to raise $20,000 for its construction.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
Completed in 1799, this stone-arch span across the Perkiomen Creek ranks among the oldest bridges still carrying traffic in Pennsylvania. Its construction was financed in a distinctly early-American way: a state-authorized lottery, sanctioned by an act of 1797, that raised $20,000 for the work. In an age before public infrastructure budgets, lotteries and subscriptions were how a young republic paid to knit its roads together.
Why it matters
The bridge is a working monument to how the early republic built its transportation network, funding permanent public works through ingenuity rather than taxation.
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