He revived a technology of Childs truss bridges, of which only a handful of examples—perhaps only seven according to a 2003 report—survive in the United States. The Childs truss was patented by Horace Childs in 1846. It never became popular, but, after its patent expired, was adopted by Sherman for bridges in Ohio late in the 1800s. Sherman adapted the Childs design to vary the size of beams according to loads carried by them, rather than using uniform beams.[1]
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.