The Union Bridge Company was a bridge fabricator and contractor with works in Buffalo, New York

Buffalo, New York

Buffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...

, (believed closed in 1890 per HAER references) and Athens, Pennsylvania

Athens, Pennsylvania

Athens is a borough in Bradford County, Pennsylvania, two miles south of the N. Y. State line on the Susquehanna and Chemung rivers. Population in 1900, 3,749; and in 1910, 3,796. The population was 3,415 at the 2000 census...

. The Union Bridge company was formed in 1884 as a merger of several other bridge-building firms. Partners included George S. Field of Buffalo, Edumund Hayes of Buffalo, Charles MacDonald of New York City, Thomas C. Clarke of Seabright, NY and Charles Stweart Maurice of Athens, PA. (from Maurice Papers, Southern Historical Collection, Library of the University of NC, Chapel Hill, NC.)

History

Kellogg, Clarke & Co was formed in 1869 by Thomas C. Clarke and Charles Kellogg, with the backing of Samuel Reeves of the Phoenix Iron works of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania. In 1871 Kellogg left to form his own company and Clarke and Reeves formed Clarke, Reeves & Co. In 1884 Clarke, Reeves & Co. became the Phoenix Bridge Company. In the same year Clarke and Charles Macdonald formed the Union Bridge Company by merger of the Central Bridge Company of Buffalo, New York and Kellogg and Maurice of Athens, Pennsylvania.

The Union Bridge Company was purchased by the American Bridge Company

American Bridge Company

The American Bridge Company is a privately held civil engineering firm specializing in the construction and renovation of bridges and other large civil engineering projects, founded in 1900, and headquartered in Coraopolis, Pennsylvania, a suburb of Pittsburgh.-Products and industry positioning:The...

 in a 1900 consolidation of 24 US bridge building companies.

A company with the same name, chartered in 1873, was involved in a US Supreme Court case in 1907 involving compliance with a law giving the Secretary of War

United States Secretary of War

The Secretary of War was a member of the United States President's Cabinet, beginning with George Washington's administration. A similar position, called either "Secretary at War" or "Secretary of War," was appointed to serve the Congress of the Confederation under the Articles of Confederation...

 the authority to order removal of obstructions to navigation on rivers and waterways. It is not yet clear if this is the same company or not.

Notable projects

• Hawkesbury River Railway Bridge
  Hawkesbury River Railway Bridge
  The Hawkesbury River Railway Bridge spans the Hawkesbury River just north of the town of Brooklyn on the northern outskirts of Sydney, Australia...
  
  , NSW Central Coast near Sydney, Australia (1889)
• Niagara Cantilever Bridge
  Niagara Cantilever Bridge
  The Niagara Cantilever Bridge or Michigan Central Railway Cantilever Bridge was a cantilever bridge across the Niagara Gorge. An international railway-only bridge between Canada and the United States, it connected Niagara Falls, New York, and Niagara Falls, Ontario, located just south of the...
  
   (1883)
• Poughkeepsie Bridge
  Poughkeepsie Bridge
  The Poughkeepsie Bridge is a steel cantilever bridge spanning the Hudson River between Poughkeepsie, New York on the east bank and Highland, New York on the west bank...
  
   (1889)
• Coraopolis Bridge
  Coraopolis Bridge
  The Coraopolis Bridge is a girder bridge over the back channel of the Ohio River connecting Grand Avenue on Neville Island to Ferree Street in Coraopolis, Pennsylvania. It opened in 1995 to replace a structure of historic significance...
  
   (1927)
• Hawkesbury River Railway Bridge
  Hawkesbury River Railway Bridge
  The Hawkesbury River Railway Bridge spans the Hawkesbury River just north of the town of Brooklyn on the northern outskirts of Sydney, Australia...
  
   (Hawkesbury River
  Hawkesbury River
  The Hawkesbury River, also known as Deerubbun, is one of the major rivers of the coastal region of New South Wales, Australia. The Hawkesbury River and its tributaries virtually encircle the metropolitan region of Sydney.-Geography:-Course:...
  
  , New South Wales, Australia)
• Pasco-Kennewick Bridge
  Pasco-Kennewick Bridge (1922)
  The Pasco-Kennewick Bridge or Benton-Franklin Inter-County Bridge, known locally as the Green Bridge, was a steel cantilever truss bridge crossing the Columbia River in central Washington, connecting the cities of Pasco and Kennewick...
  
   (1922)
• Provo River Railroad Bridge (1884) (small through truss bridge, notable for having been disassembled, reused as a shorter bridge, then disassembled and reused as a still shorter bridge)
• Winona Railroad Bridge (1891)
• Saugatuck River Bridge
  Saugatuck River Bridge
  The Saugatuck River Bridge is a bridge in Connecticut carrying Route 136 over the Saugatuck River in Westport. The bridge, built in 1884, is the oldest surviving movable bridge in Connecticut and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The total length of the bridge is with a deck...
  
   (1884) Connecticut swing bridge. Hand cranked. Claimed oldest extant movable bridge in Connecticut.
• Cairo Bridge over the Ohio
• Memphis Bridge over the Mississippi

External links

• entry at Structurae
  Structurae
  Structurae is an online database containing works of structural and civil engineering of all kinds such as bridges, high-rise buildings, towers, dams, etc. Additionally, the database contains information on companies and persons involved in the design or construction of the structures...
  
  .de (empty of company info but source for some of the notable projects on the list)
• article at nycroads.com about proposed Hudson River
  Hudson River
  The Hudson is a river that flows from north to south through eastern New York. The highest official source is at Lake Tear of the Clouds, on the slopes of Mount Marcy in the Adirondack Mountains. The river itself officially begins in Henderson Lake in Newcomb, New York...
  
   crossings, including one from the Union Bridge Company
• archive from RPI
  Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
  Stephen Van Rensselaer established the Rensselaer School on November 5, 1824 with a letter to the Rev. Dr. Samuel Blatchford, in which van Rensselaer asked Blatchford to serve as the first president. Within the letter he set down several orders of business. He appointed Amos Eaton as the school's...
  
   illustration of Poughkeepsie Bridge
  Poughkeepsie Bridge
  The Poughkeepsie Bridge is a steel cantilever bridge spanning the Hudson River between Poughkeepsie, New York on the east bank and Highland, New York on the west bank...
  
   with notation "Poughkeepsie Bridge - Built by the Union Bridge Company - Charles Macdonald '57 President - Robert Escobar '57 Engineer"
• archive from RPI
  Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
  Stephen Van Rensselaer established the Rensselaer School on November 5, 1824 with a letter to the Rev. Dr. Samuel Blatchford, in which van Rensselaer asked Blatchford to serve as the first president. Within the letter he set down several orders of business. He appointed Amos Eaton as the school's...
  
   illustration of Hawkesbury River Bridge (Australia) with notation "Hawkesbury River Bridge - Designed and constructed by the Union Bridge Company - Charles Macdonald '57 of the Union Bridge Company - Robert Escobar '57, Engineer, of the Union Bridge Company"
• NRHP application archive giving ref to Poughkeepsie Bridge and Niagara Cantilever Bridge both being built by UBC
• Hawkesbury River history giving reference to bridge and company
• Supreme Court case of 1907, Union Bridge Company vs. United States from findlaw.com (may or may not be the same company)
• Saugatuck swing bridge, reference claims that UBC was absorbed by ABC in 1900.