Built in 1938. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996.
From the record
“The Rainbow Bridge and Veterans Memorial Bridge are two bridges that cross the Neches River in Southeast Texas just upstream from Sabine Lake. It allows State Highway 87 and State Highway 73 to connect Port Arthur in Jefferson County on the southwest bank of the river.”
Wikipedia article Rainbow Bridge & Veterans Memorial Bridge (Texas), CC BY-SA 4.0.
One of 27 National Register listings published here for Jefferson County · listed in 1996 · category: Structure · built in 1938.
National Register reference number.96001127- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
Fires near this property
4 since 2000
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 4 fires within 5 miles of Port Arthur-Orange Bridge
between 2000 and 2009, burning about 30 acres in total. None started naturally. 1 was recorded as arson.
Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted
here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
Reported cause
Fires
Debris and open burning
2
Arson/incendiarism
1
Railroad operations and maintenance
1
The most recent of
them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service
that recorded it.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
1 working within 5 miles of Port Arthur-Orange Bridge: 1 producer.
All of them still produce. What was taken out: Sulfur. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Groves, the town this property stands in, in 20 storm reports between 1995 and 2024: 8 thunderstorm wind, 7 hail, 2 funnel cloud, 1 tornado.
No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office
filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date
opens the federal record of that event.
Pictures on social media indicated standing water and stalled cars along Jimmy Johnson Blvd shortly after 6 AM. Heavy rain continued with one rain gauge reporting 10.18 inches in Groves and another reporting 7.68 inches in Hampshire. Many streets were flooded during the event with numerous homes becoming flooded in Port Acres where some were being remodeled from flooding due to Harvey.
A house that was struck by lightning caught fire in Groves. The fire started in the attic of the two story home, and caused considerable water damage on the first floor and fire damage on the second floor.
Jefferson county 911 dispatch relayed reports of a funnel cloud near the Rainbow Bridge between Bridge City and Port Arthur. The funnel cloud was associated with a shower moving inland from Sabine Lake.
Trees were knocked down in western Beaumont and in Groves. In Port Arthur, a microburst produced wind gusts estimated at 70+ mph. It caused structural damage to some buildings, broke many windows, and knocked numerous trees. The storm path was 200 yards wide and 2 miles long. Two people were slightly injured by flying glass.
No historic map-sheet match is published
for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs
a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
Browse the county's mapped places while that work is
pending.
Listed places nearby
6 within 8 miles
Other National Register properties close
enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both
positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties
to their map sheets.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.
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