Talk:Whipple Cast and Wrought Iron Bowstring Truss Bridge

what was it doing for for 32 years?

"constructed about 1867 and erected in its present location in 1899."

The timeline has a unexplained gap of 32yrs. Was it moved from a 'previous' location, was it sitting in a warehouse in a box somewhere, or did it actually take 32 years to 'erect' it? Exit2DOS ^{• Ctrl • Alt • Del} 17:02, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

The first of those three. It was described ca. 1900 as having been moved from "Schoharie", which could mean three places in the same general area west of Albany. Daniel Case (talk) 17:01, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Discrepancy on number of Whipple truss bridges surviving.

The Squire Whipple article says that at least seven Whipple truss bridges still survive, but the Whipple Cast and Wrought Iron Bowstring Truss Bridge article says there are only two. Cptbutton (talk) 07:24, 29 December 2020 (UTC)

Minor edits 8-3-2023

Some minor edits (in the scheme of things) were made this date. It is only being mentioned here as it is the only way for an unregistered user to communicate with editor/administrator User:Daniel Case (as his talk page is locked to them).

Checked to see you are still active as of this date, DC. Am not singling you out to make a required clarification needed edit here, rather to acknowledge the awesome amount of effort you have put into this very welcome article over the years. And to just drop in while I'm at it and have your attention that I love seeing your pictures at any article, many of which are absolutely the bomb.

Feel free to delete this as you please. 2601:196:180:DC0:9587:2AEC:4865:1DA0 (talk) 21:22, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

No problem. Yes I'm still very active. Daniel Case (talk) 21:40, 3 August 2023 (UTC)

Article title, etc.

Per edits 6-18-2025 and their amendments by User:Daniel Case, there are indeed some conundrums involved here. As HAER did not anticipate Wikipedia, and an accidental and incidental overreach by it (in giving this bridge the all-uppercase title the article ended up with, as if it was sui generis the ONE and ONLY example of a Whipple bowstring truss ever built) does compound things. Can you create a stub article called simply the "Whipple bowstring truss bridge", which can then absorb the rightful content for the bridge type (and its various extant examples), and leave this article (which includes the additional "cast and wrought iron" entitling) as it is (sans all the content that would migrate to an article on the type). It would be a Solomonic solution (and good encyclopedia building). And lets us move on from semantics and upper and lower cases.

As for the "Normanskill Farm" name, I've merely utilized the alternative name the article already had anteed up - its nothing of my invention. Which (its provenance) is a separate matter from disambiguating the bridge type from a singular example of it with an overblown name.

How about a stub on the bridge type - which certainly deserves its own (as there's no more on it than that scant paragraph at the truss bridge article)? I'm not sure how to ping Daniel Case, as his user page is protected and I cannot communicate with him there; hopefully this link will do so. 2601:196:180:DC0:742E:8B78:3DFF:EE82 (talk) 20:00, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Yes, you got my attention; I was going to leave a message on your talk page.

I have no problems with your idea. I think at the time I wrote that article, I had mainly the NRHP nomination (the link to which I will now have to update, as with so many other NY NRHP listings, to the National Archives page for it since the SHPO page no longer gives static links) to use, and since it was written over 50 years ago and didn't have to be as detailed as the same would be today it did sort of seem like it was the only bridge of that type left.

I'll get that stub created soon. Daniel Case (talk) 21:09, 18 June 2025 (UTC)

Thanks. It's great that one can count on someone to always be reasonable and positive like you. No mass reverts. No "Bring on the edit war, IP user!" I should have looked to see who the article creator was; that would have been a helpful leg up.

It's great to have a resource like HAER. Like similar photo documenting efforts underwritten by the Federal government during the Depression, we'd be so lost without them. Which in many ways seem so primitive and homespun today but were basically state-of-the-art when done. That was it in the field - no GPS, laser measurements, instantaneously "developed" (many as you like) digital photos, the whole wazoo. And back in the office - pens, pencils, rulers, maybe an electric typewriter, a Xerox machine with three settings: (way) too light, (way) too dark, both.

All that, and no Internet. Bricks and mortar libraries. "Hard copy". How would they even cast about to douse out another extant Whipple bowstring truss? A 3x5" card posted with a thumbtack on a bulletin board at some annual convention of engineering historians? A shot in the dark. No more, and no better. Social networks (as a way to link up)? Decades away.

Easy fix. Look forward to it. Thanks. Best, 2601:196:180:DC0:742E:8B78:3DFF:EE82 (talk) 22:32, 18 June 2025 (UTC)