The Ultimate Attraction During Your Lake Havasu Vacation.

PURCHASED: The London Bridge was purchased on April 18, 1968 for a bid of $2,460,000 from the City of London by Robert P. McCulloch, Sr., founder of Lake Havasu City.

ANTIQUE: To avoid taxation, the Bridge was declared an antique and has been identified as the world’s largest antique by the Guinness Book of Records.

SHIPPED: The 22 million pounds of granite (10,276 pieces) was shipped from London through the Panama Canal to Long Beach, California, and then trucked to Lake Havasu, a 10,000 mile journey.

ARCHITECTS: The architect of the Bridge (in 1824) was John Rennie. The architect supervising reconstruction was engineer Robert Beresford, from England. Mr. Beresford used copies of Rennie’s original plans. He soon discovered that the stones taken from the quarries to the London site were marked in the same manner as he had marked them to get them from London to Lake Havasu.

CONSTRUCTION: The five arches were formed by carefully formed sand mounds (like molds). After the stones were in place, the sand was removed and a one-mile channel was dredged to form the “island”. Due to the weight of solid granite, the interior section is concrete and allows a way to provide several different utility services to the “island”.

RECONSTRUCTION: Total reconstruction time was three years, from the laying of the cornerstone (September 1968) to dedication (October 1971).

BRIDGE LENGTH: In Lake Havasu City the Bridge measures 952 feet, while in London it was 1,005 feet long, including on and off ramps.

BRIDGE LIGHTS: The lights on the Bridge were constructed from Napoleon’s cannons, which had been seized and kept in storage. The cannons were then melted down and forged into lamps for the Bridge.

PITTED STONES: During World War II the Germans attempted to blitz London with air attacks. Although the Bridge never sustained heavy damage, it was strafed by machine gun fire.

ONE ACRE OF LAND: Mr. McCulloch donated back one acre of land to the City of London. The City of London, Arizona Corporation was formed and each October, during London Bridge Days, a “Quit Rent Ceremony” is performed and dignitaries of Lake Havasu present a Hopi Kachina doll to visiting English dignitaries. The one acre of land begins at the pillars at the main gate entrance to the English Village.

OWNERSHIP: The London Bridge is owned by the City of Lake Havasu.