Roseville-Coxville Covered Bridge

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The Roseville-Coxville Covered Bridge, also known as the Coxville Covered Bridge, is a historic two-span covered bridge in Parke County, Indiana. It carries County Road 325W over Big Raccoon Creek, southeast of Mecca.

Built in 1910, this Burr Arch bridge is the third bridge at the site. It measures about 281 feet in total length (263 feet of span with 9-foot overhangs on each end), is 16 feet wide, and stands about 12.7 feet high. The bridge was rebuilt in 1977 and later added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

History notes are a bit tangled. After the 1865 Roseville Covered Bridge burned, the county considered a concrete replacement, but the bids were too high, so the current covered bridge was built. The nearby Armiesburg Covered Bridge was replaced with a concrete span in 1917 and collapsed in 1930. The contractor for the Roseville/Coxville bridge was Jefferson P. Van Fossen (with his brother J. L. Van Fossen), and some accounts also credit J. J. Daniels as foreman or builder. Over the years, bridge portals have been repainted in different colors, and the arched portal openings are sometimes referred to as “Daniels Arches” due to the mixed history of builders. The Van Fossen family favored poured concrete for abutments, while Daniels favored stone.