Vandiver Bridge was erected by the states of Georgia and South Carolina and the Federal Bureau of Roads and was named in honor of Samuel Ernest Vandiver, a beloved Georgia leader and member of the Georgia Highway Board, who lived from 1876 to 1951 and was the father of Hon. S. Ernest Vandiver, elected Governor of Georgia on Sept. 12, 1958. By authority of the Georgia General Assembly and the Highway Departments of South Carolina and Georgia, it also recalls that near this historic site on the Tugaloo River stood Knox's Bridge, built in 1852, and Walter Harrison Bridge, built in 1948 and named for a distinguished Lavonia civic leader; both sites are now covered by the waters of Hartwell Lake.