Zumbrota Covered Bridge
Goodhue County, Zumbrota. Built 1869, 116 ft. long. Minnesota's only surviving historic covered bridge, twice relocated and restored after a 2019 roof collapse.
Zumbrota Covered Bridge is Minnesota's last remaining historic covered bridge, built in November 1869 to replace the town's original crossing after it was destroyed in that spring's flood. Constructed with latticed wooden trusses and deliberately built to resemble a barn — a design choice meant to encourage nervous horses to cross without hesitation — the bridge stretches 116 feet with a 15-foot-wide roadway. Its covered roof wasn't part of the original 1869 construction; that was added in 1871, two years after the bridge itself went up.
The bridge served Zumbrota's road traffic until 1932, when it was moved to the local fairgrounds, and it wasn't until 1997 that it was relocated a final time to its current home in Covered Bridge Park, about 100 yards from where it originally stood. Its story took a dramatic turn in February 2019, when the roof partially collapsed following one of the snowiest months in Minnesota history; the bridge has since been fully restored and continues to serve as a pedestrian crossing and a genuine piece of Minnesota pioneer heritage, its timbers reportedly carved with generations of love notes and initials left by visitors over the decades.