A surprise for Barbara and Bruce

Barbara and Bruce Mapes had no idea what was awaiting them at the toll booth this morning as they crossed the International Bridge.

Their son works at YES-FM, which has been blabbing for days about how bridge officials were planning something nice for the 75 millionth vehicle to cross the 41-year-old structure.

But the Soo, Michigan couple had heard nothing about it.

Barbara, who's a computer systems guru at the Chippewa County Health Department, and Bruce, a lieutenant at the Chippewa Correctional Facility at Kinross, figured something was up when they spotted a SooToday.com photographer and a gaggle of International Bridge Authority (IBA) staffers freezing outside the toll booth.

And earlier in the morning, during their crossing into Canada, they'd started to suspect some kind of historic crossing, based on the unusual number of people they noticed around the border crossing.

IBA general manager Phil Becker greeted the Mapes with the news that theirs was the 75th million vehicle to cross since the bridge opened on October 31, 1962 and invited the couple inside.

There, they were presented with more than $500 in gifts including a framed memento of their visit, getaway packages from Algoma's Water Tower Inn and Kewadin Casino, and a debit card good for 75 round-trip crossings.

The see the Mapes accepting a photo of the bridge from Phil Becker, please click here.

If you'd like to try to be the 100 millionth bridge-crosser, we're advised by Peter Petainen, the IBA's chief number-cruncher, that you should come back sometime around 2016.