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With the acceptance of a deed transfer Tuesday by the Kosciusko County Commissioners Tuesday, the county is now the owner of the property out at Chinworth Bridge along Old 30 and the Tippecanoe River.
The Kosciusko County Parks and Recreation Department and Board will work to seek grants to make the area the county’s first park, the Old Chinworth Bridge Trailhead Park.
County attorney Ed Ormsby told the commissioners, “We have a deed from the (Kosciusko) Historical Society for the Chinworth pavilion that’s near the Tippecanoe River. This is being transferred by the Historical Society to county so that the Parks can use it and maintain it. For that to happen, for the county to accept the property, we just need a motion to approve that acceptance.”
Commissioner Cary Groninger made a motion to approve, Commissioner Sue Ann Mitchell seconded the motion and it passed 3-0.
Mitchell then said there is a cost of $8,500 to get paperwork started for a grant for the park project. She asked that the commissioners approve that spending of the money out of Parks & Rec. funds set up in the Economic Development Income Tax fund to finance that “with the possibility of getting a grant to work on this Chinworth Bridge and bring it forward to the standards that it needs to be.”
Aggie Sweeney, one of five appointed members of the Kosciusko County Parks and Recreation Board, said, “We’ve been working for a number of months on plans for the Chinworth Bridge park area, and appreciate that the Kosciusko Historical Society has been willing to turn that land over to the county.”
She said because of the trail that runs through it, and with the river also running through it, “it’s a really wonderful opportunity for us to develop it into a park for even more uses. And, it also is historic. It’s the first park in our county.”
Sweeney said the board appreciated the commissioners’ consideration of a grant to help develop a master plan for the use of that area.
“It’s approximately an 1-1/2-acre parcel of land and it is next to the historic Chinworth Bridge, so there’s a lot of opportunity and it’ll be great to be able to move the plans forward,” she said.
The Friends of Trails, a volunteer group, have already started doing work out there, she mentioned, to remove some of the invasive species and to help clean up the river shoreline. The Kosciusko County Highway Department also has been tremendous in helping with that, she stated.
“I want to thank (KCHD Superintendent) Steve (Moriarty) and his team because it’s really provided the volunteer work to go a lot further than it otherwise would have,” Sweeney said.
Commissioner Bob Conley said when a person comes into Warsaw from that way the bridge is one of the first things they come across. He said it is a bridge in the county that the county is responsible for.
Commissioner Cary Groninger provided the second to Mitchell’s motion and said, “I think it’s one of those iconic pieces that we have in our county. I know that even some of the latest videos that Slate (Auto) has out there talks about having this cute little iron bridge, the walking trails, the other stuff. It’s something that’s even seen some national recognition. To be able to bring that bridge up to the standard that we all can be proud of ... there’s a lot of history in this.”
The motion passed 3-0.
After the meeting, Sweeney said the Chinworth Bridge property had been a rest area along the Lincoln Highway when Old 30 was still U.S. 30.
“This conceptual design of $8,500, we realized having this conceptual design is necessary to really be able to communicate what we would like to do in this park area. We are planning to apply and we have already submitted a letter of intent and have permission to submit a proposal, but we haven’t yet submitted a proposal for OIRI (Orthopedic Industry Retention Initiative) Community Amenity Program (CAP) funds,” she explained.
Sweeney said the Parks Board has a pretty good idea of what they want to do.
“We’ve had conversations with three different engineering firms about what might be preliminary costs, but we realized what we were missing was having this basic conceptual design, and it is a county property. It was important for the county to commit to doing the conceptual design,” she said.
They have a “pretty good idea” of what they want to do out there, but they don’t have it down on a diagram. “Now we’ll have the benefit of the engineering firm that will help us with planning it out rather than just the five of us volunteers on Park Board,” Sweeney stated.
Once the conceptual design is started, she estimated it’ll be completed within 10 weeks. Following that, “we’ll be able to finalize the completion of the proposal for OIRI CAP. Based on information we’ve already gathered, we may need additional funds beyond what OIRI CAP would be able to provide. We recognize that at some point in time, improvements to the historic bridge also will be needed. Whether or not that happens at exactly the same time or not, we’re not sure yet,” she said.
Now that the county owns the land around the Chinworth Bridge, any park created out there will be the county’s first park. The county has only had a parks and recreation department and board for about four years.
According to a timeline of the Chinworth Bridge Trailhead, Old 30W and CR 350W, Warsaw, provided by Sweeney, in 1884 a bridge was requested to connect Warsaw with Atwood and Etna Green.
The timeline states that in 1897, “Bellefontaine Bridge & Iron Co., 140 foot Iron Pratt through Truss Bridge - $2,250. Township line that separated Chief Mota’s from Chief Checosee’s reservation. Yellowstone Trail passes on the south side of the bridge.”
In 1924, under the National Highway Act, U.S. 30 route was moved to go through Warsaw (Lincoln Highway). In 1975, U.S. 30 (four-lane) was established north of the Chinworth Bridge, and on July 6 the Chinworth Bridge was dedicated as a historical landmark. Also in 1975, the bridge was closed to vehicle traffic and leased to the Kosciusko County Historical Society.
In 1997, the bridge was listed on the National Register of Historical Places.
The trailhead extension groundbreaking took place in 2025 with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Oct. 9.
Sweeney indicated in an email that a work party is scheduled for Saturday, Aug. 1 at 9 a.m. to continue work to clean up landscaping at the park, with a focus on the area around the Kiwanis pavilion. The community is invited.
