About
The Slaughterhouse Covered Bridge carries Slaughterhouse Road, a dead-end road, over the Dog River just outside the village of Northfield Falls. It is a single-span queenpost truss bridge, about 60 feet long, built about 1872. It carries one lane of vehicle traffic. The name comes from a slaughterhouse that once stood nearby.
History
The bridge was built about 1872; its builder is unknown. It was painted barn red inside and out in 1978, and around 2002 some roof boards were replaced and a standing-seam steel roof was put on. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on June 13, 1974. In August 2025 an engineer from Vermont Heavy Timber found significant structural problems, and the town lowered the weight limit from 16,000 pounds to 6,000 pounds. The Select Board approved emergency stabilization with temporary steel beams, with longer-term repairs to replace rotting beam supports planned for that autumn.
Design
The queenpost truss uses two vertical posts joined by a horizontal beam. The trusses are about 59.5 feet long and the bridge is 14.5 feet wide. Its dry-laid masonry abutments are described as one of the best examples of that work, and its rounded portals are unique among Northfield's covered bridges.
Visiting
The bridge is on Slaughterhouse Road in Northfield and was still open to one lane of traffic in 2025, under the reduced weight limit.
Sources: Slaughterhouse Covered Bridge (Wikipedia), Slaughter House Covered Bridge (Vermont Covered Bridge Society), Northfield Select Board minutes, August 2025
Photo: Steven Bergeron, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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