December 2004
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To visit past Bridges of the month, click on the links above.

	There was a bridge across the River Tay in Perth, Scotland in the early thirteenth century that was destroyed by flood in 1209. Records also show rebuilt bridge or bridges at or near the High Street site over the next four hundred years. According to a plaque at the site, King James VI, in 1604, commissioned John Mylne to build a new bridge, which was completed in 1616. It was destroyed by flood in 1621, shortly after Mylne's death that year. Without a bridge across the Tay, the city’s economy was negatively affected, so in 1771, as the result of the financing and efforts of Thomas, Earl of Kinnoull, architect John Smeaton (1724-1792) completed the present arch bridge, known as the Perth Bridge or Smeaton's Bridge.  It is built of red sandstone.  Smeaton is considered the founder of civil engineering in the United Kingdom.