Several bridges have spanned the Kaskaskia

According to the Jan. 18, 1823, issue of the Illinois Intelligencer newspaper, a bridge built by A.H. Muckel spanned the Kaskaskia River by that date.

The exact location of the bridge, which was tolled until September 1829, is unknown. This was probably the first bridge on the Kaskaskia River at Vandalia.
Before this time, ferries transported people across the river. William Middleton was an early ferry operator here, as were John Jordan (1819) and Cupid Smith (1823).
In 1828, the surveying crews for the National Road, under chief surveyor Joseph Shriver, made their first reconnaissance survey from Terre Haute, Ind., to Vandalia. In his notes, Shriver mentions crossing a bridge to enter Vandalia, where they took a stagecoach to St. Louis.
Work on the National Road began at the state line and progressed slowly westward. William C. Greenup, whose home was in Vandalia, was superintendent of construction of the road in Illinois. In the July 23, 1832, Vandalia Whig & Intelligencer newspaper, Greenup posted a public notice asking for bidders on 28 bridges to be built along the road in Illinois, beginning at the state line and ending at Mile 90 – Vandalia.
“It is intended to construct the bridge across the Kaskaskia River on the 90th mile,  opposite Vandalia, according to the Jackson plan, of which there are several now constructing on the road and are justly admired as a great improvement in the architecture of wooden bridges,” the notice read.
The first bridge was constructed at mile three. The Jackson Bridge at Vandalia would be by far the longest on the Illinois portion of the road at 160 feet long, and was 6 feet wider than all other bridges built on the National Road in Illinois. One thousand perches of stone would be used in its construction, with a perch estimated to contain 25 solid feet of stone.
The stone for the bridges at Vandalia came from John Hall’s quarry, nine miles north of Vandalia near Boaz Creek, later known as Ramsey Creek.
The two covered bridges between Vandalia and Bluff City, one of which was painted red, were remembered by old settler, Charles Lincoln Phifer. He also wrote about the Plank Road, which was nothing more than logs laid crosswise over the ground with planks, or "stringers," over the top to fit the wagon wheels.
When Nathan Kistler died on March 18, 1880, among his assets was $5 in “Plank Road” stock, allowing him to pass over the road without paying the tolls.
The Jackson-style covered bridge, built in 1839 at Vandalia, was replaced in 1878 with an iron suspension bridge, pictured above.  In early 1921, this bridge was blown up and sold for scrap, realizing $150.
The new bridge, named “Independence Bridge,” was dedicated on July 4, 1921, before a crowd estimated at 6,000 people.  Little Josephine Burtschi, the mayor’s daughter, christened the bridge with a bouquet of flowers, gathered hurriedly from a neighbor’s yard, after it was found that the commemorative bottle of wine had disappeared.
At that time, it was the largest steel bridge to be built by the state highway commission,  just as its wooden predecessor was the longest on the National Road 80 years before.

The original bridge that spanned the Kaskaskia River at Vandalia was replaced in 1878 by this iron suspension bridge. It was itself demolished in 1921.