This was largely thanks to the efforts of Monroe Crannell, known as the "father of the bridge," who facilitated the "poor man's short cut to town."

Upon completion, a plaque bearing the inscription "Hawk St. Bridge" was installed at the apex joint of the central arch.

Owing to this height, the bridge was the scene of a number of suicides during its history, wherein people leaped from the railing to the pavement below.

[1] Construction of the Hawk Street Viaduct was considered a "genuine architecture wonder", heralded the spread of the cantilever arch, and at 1,000 feet (300 m), was a great engineering experiment of the time.

[2] It was much admired and copied in Europe and America, in spite of being a dry-land structure that lacked the romance and boldness of bridges across water.

In subsequent years, major cantilever arches were erected over the Seine and Viaur in France, over the Elbe Canal at Molln in Germany, and on railways in Alaska and Costa Rica.