GRANITE FALLS -- When Granite Falls was founded more than 125 years ago, a rope was strung across the Minnesota River and people relied on a hand-pulled ferry to cross the river where the footbridge now stands.
But ever since the 1880s, a pedestrian bridge of some sort has crossed the river at this point that links the east side and the community's downtown.
The first bridges were wooden structures and often had to be repaired or replaced after spring floods and ice hit them.
Once, more than 100 people took a sudden plunge into the Minnesota River when they overloaded the wooden footbridge and it collapsed without warning, according to old newspaper files of the Granite Falls Tribune.
The current steel suspension bridge was built in 1935 by the Minneapolis Bridge Company at a cost of $7,600.
