Covered bridge

While we were in Indiana recently, we had an opportunity to do some exploring. My wife's cousins, our hosts, took us to Bridgeton, a beautiful little town whose high point is a grist mill and a restored covered bridge. The original, built in 1868, was 245 long and crossed the Raccoon Creek. An arsonist torched the historic structure in April 2005, but no sooner were the flames extinguished and the remains hauled away than an army of volunteers got to work raising funds to replace it. A year later, the job, truly a community effort, was done, and the bridge was open to foot traffic. It's an exquisite piece of engineering, a graceful double-arched structure ribbed in poplar, all cut from local (and donated) trees. There will always be madmen in this world. Fortunately, there are also good men—and women—to pick up the pieces and put them back together.