Please do not put the tube's
lid back on to tight!!!!!!!!!!!!
Located where new meets old.
At the cache's location you will be able to see what is left of
Bixby's first bridge across the Arkansas River and a paved jogging
trail. As you look for the cache ponder what else could have been
left there by past and present visitors.
Bixby as most Oklahoma towns back in the late 1800s and early 1900s
had it's share of outlaws. Fred Barker of the MA Barker Gang robbed
a Bixby Bank. "Pretty Boy" Floyd visited often since his father
lived near Bixby. How many times they must have crossed this
bridge.
First Bridge Opens
Bixby's wagon bridge over the Arkansas River was opened in
September of 1911. It was labeled "the longest bridge in Oklahoma."
The structure was just a little over one-half mile in length and
stood thirty feet above the riverbed.
It was important because it provided the most direct route between
Oklahoma's second and third largest cities, Tulsa and Muskogee. The
flow of traffic passed right by Bixby's front door.
1938 Bridge Collapse
Around 7:45 p.m. on December 9, 1938, two 110 spans of the Bixby
Arkansas River Bridge on Highway 64 collapsed. At the time of the
collapse, a trailer truck and one car were on the bridge and fell
approximately thirty feet into the river.
Three Bixby men rowed out through a swift current to the three
victims, two men in the sedan and a truck driver. All were rescued
(including the men's hunting dog) and taken to Tulsa hospitals
where they were treated for cuts, bruises and several broken
bones.
After the collapse of the bridge, local traffic traveling north of
the river from Bixby was rerouted through Jenks while a new bridge
was being built. The new bridge was located about 1/2 mile west of
the old bridge and Highway 64 was moved from Riverview to the new
Memorial Drive. But thats another cache I mean story.