London Bridge

John Rennie designed the London Bridge that opened across the River Thames in 1831, replacing a stone bridge that had stood since 1209. By the 20th century, the growing weight of London traffic was causing the bridge to sink into the riverbed at roughly an inch every eight years, and engineers determined it could not be widened or reinforced further. The City of London put the bridge up for sale in 1967.

Robert P. McCulloch, a chainsaw and outboard-motor manufacturer who had founded Lake Havasu City on the Colorado River four years earlier, won the auction with a bid of $2.46 million in 1968. McCulloch had the bridge's roughly 10,276 exterior granite blocks individually numbered, then shipped them through the Panama Canal to Long Beach, California, and trucked them to Arizona. The stone was used to face a new steel-reinforced concrete structure built on land, rather than reassembling the original engineering — a decision that let the bridge carry modern vehicle traffic.

McCulloch spent an additional $7 million dredging the Bridgewater Channel beneath the reconstructed bridge, connecting it to Lake Havasu. The rededication took place October 10, 1971, three years after the stone arrived. McCulloch Properties built the adjoining English Village, an open-air shopping and dining district styled after the bridge's country of origin, which still operates as a tourist destination. Today the bridge carries McCulloch Boulevard traffic and pedestrians across the channel and ranks among Arizona's most-visited attractions outside Phoenix and Tucson.