What the Heck is MOBRIDGE?

The bridge in this post card picture no longer exists. But before I tell you why, let me give you a bit of history. The bridge was built by the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific Railroad. The following history was taken from this website: https://southdakota.com/cities/mobridge-sd/ In the late 1800’s white settlers began to move onto the land that is presently Mobridge, standing on land that was once owned by General S.E. Olson. A thought came to him when he was goose hunting in 1885 that this was the place the Milwaukee Railroad would cross the Missouri River. He remarked to his friends this would be a grand crossing for the Milwaukee. The phrase grand crossing stuck and a corporation was formed named Grand Crossing and Improvement Company. A telegrapher’s dots and dashes gave Mobridge its name when the town formed, as railroad crews were building the railroad bridge across the Missouri River. He ended his telegraph transmissions with M.O.Bridge. The Milwaukee Railroad reached Mobridge on September 9, 1906, and the first lot was sold on October 3, 1906. The bridge was demolished by the Corps of Engineers in the early 1960s and replaced by a higher bridge due to the construction of the Oahe Dam. From this website I picked up the following tidbit of information "MO.Bridge" Historical Marker (hmdb.org) There is a historical marker at the site of the old bridge. It reads, “In 1906, one hundred years after the Lewis and Clark Expedition passed through this area, Milwaukee Railroad crews labored to build a bridge across the Missouri River. They carefully worked, balancing themselves on high metal beams as the sound of hammers resonated across the water. Once completed in 1905, trains filled with homesteaders could now venture to the last of the open range. This bridge, though no longer standing, was an icon for western movement and the town's namesake. An unknown telegraph operator sent word of the bridge's location as succinctly as possible, and with his abbreviated dots and dashes, he intended to convey "Missouri Bridge," and consequently gave MO.Bridge (Mobridge, South Dakota) its name.

The post card was printed and published by the same company as last week's post card: The Detroit Publishing Company. This one, too, is a PHOSTINT CARD.