To supply materials for its construction, ironmakers Josiah White and Erskine Hazard built a rolling mill along the river near its eastern abutment.

[4] Although Finley patented his Falls of Schuylkill bridge and publicized it widely, it was not a success: "Part of the superstructure broke down in September, 1810, while a drove of cattle was crossing it, and in January, 1816, the bridge fell down, occasioned by the great weight of snow which remained on it, and a decayed piece of timber".

[9] A British Army officer visiting Philadelphia in 1816, Captain Joshua Rowley Watson, saw potential for military use in what he called the "Spider Bridge".

He recorded its length as 407 feet (124 m), drew an elevation and plan of it, and described it in his diary: [June] 15th.

There is at this spot a manufactory of Wire, the proprietor, a very ingenious man, has constructed a Spider bridge across the Schuylkill to enable his workmen to go to & from their work—his name is White, a quaker.

I crossed the Wire Bridge, before discribed [sic]; the vibration is great, and to a person not used to such sort of motion, the walking on it is attended with difficulty.

[11] The two main cables were anchored about 50 feet above the water to the top story of White's manufactory on the east shore and to boughs of a tree on the west.

[13]Mid-19th-century photographs of Falls of Schuylkill show two- and three-story buildings lining the river's banks.

One of these may be White & Hazard's rolling mill, the building to which the Spider Bridge's main cables were anchored.