Wilkins Mill Covered Bridge

The Wilkins Mill Covered Bridge was built in 1906 by William Hendricks, the second of three bridges Hendricks constructed in Parke County, sharing the same distinctively shallow portal design as his Rush Creek and Mill Creek bridges. The single-span Burr Arch Truss structure crosses a waterway historically labeled Mill Creek on an 1874 county atlas but now generally known as Sugar Mill Creek, located north of Rockville near the northwestern edge of Turkey Run State Park. The site takes its name from a mill built along the creek in 1835 by Solomon Jessup and Zimri Hunt; George Wilkins later opened a store there in 1853 and purchased the mill outright in 1855, giving the location, and eventually the bridge, its lasting name. That mill burned in 1877 and was rebuilt, continuing operation until 1947. Over time, flooding has shifted the course of Sugar Mill Creek, at points leaving the bridge spanning what appeared to be a dry bed, though the channel has since returned beneath the span. The bridge was resided and reroofed in a 1991 restoration costing about $6,000. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places on December 22, 1978, the Wilkins Mill Covered Bridge remains standing and accessible near one of the county's most visited state parks.