Local residents had sought a bridge since the 1920s. Construction of a toll bridge began in 1931; but it was ended by the Great Depression. In 1939, President Franklin D. Roosevelt vetoed a bill passed by the U.S. Congress that would have allowed construction to proceed; in 1940, he signed a revised bill to permit construction, but the shortage of materials caused by World War II thwarted it. A third effort was stymied by the Korean War; a fourth attempt failed in the early 1980s.