STYX RIVER, Ala. — If you have a chance, take a ride out on County Road 68 Extension to the Styx River. Take a look at the one-lane bridge that crosses the now placid stream. It’s called the “Steel Bridge.” The bridge has allowed youngsters to get to school on Dunbar Road, allowed people to get to church, and it was a good way for logging trucks to move the wood that that part of the county is famous for.

The 68 Extension connects Brady Road and Dunbar Road to the rest of the county. There’s a truck trail to the north, but a note on the map says that that road may have “sand drifts” after a rain, making it impossible for a light vehicle like a car to pass.

Yes, a one-lane bridge. It’s a layer of macadam and steel over wooden supports. If you walk around the bridge, you can see clearly that parts of the bridge must be original, perhaps going back to the turn of the century.

Take a good look. Take photos, bring the kids. You are right. Much of the bridge is original, from the early 1900s, and some of it dates back to 1957. More on that later.

The bridge is slated for demolition soon. County officials envision a modern, higher, (the current bridge is often covered when the Styx floods) safer structure.

That’s fine with Charles Gayle Lacoste and Hubert Dunbar. Both men live near the Styx and both are volunteer firefighters with the Rosinton Volunteer Fire Department. Lacoste, 87, is a “firefighter emeritus” with department, and received “Firefighter of the Year” honors in 1997-1998. Both have taken rescue vehicles at good speed over the bridge to get to a fire, to someone in trouble.

Both recall a very different structure that crossed the river until the late 1950s.

“We would hear stories from the old-timers like Pappy Hinote about there being an old stage station around there,” said Lacoste. “This is one of the few old bridges left standing. Wagons and things used to pass through there. There was a ford at that point.”

“My grandfather poured those pilings around 1903,” said Dunbar.

Both men say that the original bridge collapsed around December of 1957.

“I was just a kid,” Dunbar said. “A pulpwood truck took down the bridge.”

According to Lacoste, the truck was traveling at too high a speed for the bridge, which could not take the jarring of a fully-loaded truck. The bridge, which had a steel superstructure, collapsed, plunging the truck and its three occupants into the Styx. The driver and passengers survived, scared, but with no major injuries.

“I was told the truck bounced a few times,” chuckled Lacoste.

The bridge was another matter. Photos of the wreck show the steel supports lying sideways over the deck of the bridge. The Styx River community had lost a main connector.

“When the bridge collapsed, they put wooden runners up and did away with the steel,” said Dunbar.

That is the same bridge in use today.

While the bridge looks different, both men want to preserve the “Steel Bridge” name.

So, when there was a movement at the County Commission to name the planned new bridge for Judge Harry Toulmin, Dunbar got into action. Toulmin was he first United States judge to serve in what is now Alabama, according to an Alabama State Bar Association Web page.

“It (the bridge) was always called the Steel Bridge here,” said Dunbar. “as far as I know Judge Toulmin never came here. I suggested that it would be better to put his name at the courthouse.”

That was done, and a plaque honoring Toulmin has been installed at the Baldwin County Courthouse. Dunbar says county officials have told him that the new bridge will be called the “Steel Bridge.”

“The old bridge has to go, but I am glad the name will be the same,” said Lacoste.