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As the sun went down on this beautiful late winter Saturday the Beehive, the ruins of an 18^th century commercial complex, caught my attention.  These stone buildings are located at the intersection of Telegraph and Little Elk Creek roads near Fair Hill.  Some long forgotten stonemason and his helpers displayed fine skill in cutting and placing stone to build these sturdy walls, which, although worn by time, weather, and neglect, managed to survive into the 21^st century.  A cooper’s or blacksmith’s shop, workers houses and Michael Wallace’s store, made up elements of the complex, according to the Maryland Historical Trust   Dennis Griffith’s Map of Maryland (1794) shows Wallaces on the bank of the Little Elk Creek.  The Elk Creeks Perservation Society is presently conducting an archaeological study on this parcel.

Erica Jesonis, Web Manager and Graphic Designer at the Cecil County Public Library has been named a “Mover and Shaker” in the library industry by the national publication, Library Journal.

 In its March 15, 2012 issue, Library Journal named 53 outstanding professionals committed to providing excellent service to meet the needs of the people they serve.

Library Journal honored Erica Jesonis, Web Manager and Graphic Designer at Cecil County Public Library in Elkton, MD.  She was selected because of her commitment to the profession and her innovative approach to the management of the library’s comprehensive website, blog and advocacy efforts.

When Salem Press awarded its 2011 Local Library Blog prize to the library, staffers there knew the credit should go to Jesonis as the driving force. In the last two years, Jesonis “has taken the website to new heights and made striking photography and graphic design an integral part of our marketing and publications,” says CCPL director Denise Davis. She was also responsible for the My Library, My Lifeline tree-inspired logo used as part of a successful postcard marketing campaign aimed at telling local officials how vital the system is to its community.

“Being recognized as a ‘Mover & Shaker’ indicates that, as a professional, one has the passion, dedication and desire to serve the public,” said Francine Fialkoff, Library Journal Editor-in-Chief.

A native of Cecil County, Ms. Jesonis graduated from Perryville High and attended the University of Delaware. She has worked at CCPL since 2006.

The 2012 Movers & Shakers were selected by the editors of Library Journal, the profession’s leading trade magazine. Each of the Movers & Shakers will be prominently featured in the March 15^th issue of Library Journal and celebrated at a special luncheon in June during the American Library Association’s annual conference in Anaheim, CA. The print feature’s companion website is sponsored by OCLC and available at www.libraryjournal.com/movers2012. The luncheon and awards ceremony is made possible by the support of sponsors, including ABC-CLIO, DEMCO, ProQuest, Reference USA, and Rosen Publishing.

Read more about new inductees at www.libraryjournal.com/movers2012.

ABOUT THE LIBRARY

 The Cecil County Public Library operates seven branches located throughout Cecil

County, MD. The library serves over 50,000 registered borrowers. The mission of the Cecil County Public Library is to provide access to educational and cultural resources for all and to promote individual and community success.

 About Library Journal

In its 136^th year of publication, Library Journal is the oldest and most respected publication covering the library field. Considered to be the “bible” of the library world, LJ is read by more than 100,000 library directors, administrators, and staff in public, academic, and special libraries.

During a disastrous fire that swept through a large part of Elkton’s central business district in 1947, an urgent telephone call was made to the Wilmington Fire Department.  One of the city’s ladder truck was desperately needed to help control the blaze that was ripping through Main Street businesses.  The firefighters from Delaware’s largest city answered the call, coming to the aid of the local volunteers.

A few years after that insurance rating agencies recommended the growing town  purchase an aerial unit to protect commercial buildings and taller structures.  In 1966, the county’s first aerial unit, an 85-foot Pitman Pirsch Snorkel, was put in service by Singerly Fire Company.  A photographer snapped this picture of the unit on the ramp of the old Station 3 on North street in the summer of 1972.

Also See Cecil County’s First Aerial Unit Arrived in Elkton in 1892

The Historical Society of Cecil County is pleased to announce the addition of an important new collection of Civil War and 19th century material directly related to Port Deposit and Snow’s Battery.  Thanks to the generous donation of materials from Dr. Davy McCall, professor emeritus at Washington College in Chestertown and an accomplished historian, these documents will now be available for future generations of researchers.

The McCall Collection contains extensive documents related to Civil War Cecil County. These materials include letters and other documents, as well as journals and diaries. Many have a particular focus on Snow’s Battery, one of the most distinguished artillery units in the Union Army. The battery’s officers and enlisted men were mainly volunteers from the Port Deposit area. The unit fought in many battles, and today, a historical marker in Port Deposit recognizes the contributions of these Union volunteers. Dr. McCall collected these documents around 1990.

He was for many years a professor of Economics at Washington College.  Teaching was his second career. After receiving his Ph.D. From Harvard University, he had a long and distinguished career in the Foreign Service, focusing on economic development, and spending many years abroad with the World Bank.  After joining the Washington College faculty, he became very active in matters of regional history. He has authored a book on the 300th anniversary of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Kent County, and has restored three 18th century homes on the Eastern Shore. He has undertaken a great deal of research into African American families in Chestertown, Md.  He was the founding chair of the Kent County Historic Preservation Commission, and currently serves as vice-chair.

The Society has had the McCall Collection professionally catalogued and indexed by Jenifer Dolde.  Click here to view the detailed finding aid.  “This collection is a treasure, it’s a gift, and thanks to the generosity of Dr. McCall, it has returned home to Cecil County,” said David Healey, Society president.

Press Release – Histroric Elk Landing Foundation

Elk Landing is proud to play host to the Archaeological Society of the Northern Chesapeake’s 2012 Field School from May 25th to June 5th 2012

It’s been forty years, but the Archaeological Society of the Northern Chesapeake’s “Archaeological Field School” is returning to Cecil County!  And the Historic Elk Landing Foundation is proud to announce Elk Landing will be the site of this year’s field school!

The 2012 field school will have a War of 1812 theme to it. The Society’s President, Dan Coates says between fifteen and fifty members will participate in the effort. “Locating Fort Hollingsworth will be at the center of this year’s school. With this being the bicentennial of the War of 1812, there is much interest in everything ‘War of 1812’ and Fort Hollingsworth was a key to the defense of Elkton when the British attempted to invade and burn it in 1813. This represents a great opportunity,” Dan added, “for the northeast Maryland community to expand the discovery and preservation of local history.”

According to Dan, the school, which will operate between May 25th and June 5th at The Landing, will be open to the public. Area schools will be encouraged to participate too; but it will be more than just a field school. “There will be lectures during the day and some evenings explaining the history of the area, what artifacts the archaeologists are looking for, and what is found.”

Speaking of artifacts, anything found at the dig will be carefully logged, catalogued, and examined for significance. That effort could last as long as two years. Elk Landing will own the documentation resulting from the school and will post them on our web site. The artifacts would also be available to Elk Landing for future exhibit purposes at The Landing.

“We’re very excited about the project,” said Foundation President, Josh Brown. “This school represents a tremendous opportunity to generate interest in the War of 1812, reveal more about what happened here nearly 200 years ago, and hopefully focus much deserved attention on Historic Elk Landing. We look forward to working with Dan and his team.”

As a prelude to the May field school, Dan says several mechanical and digital studies will be done of the area prior to the dug. “During the month of March and April, the Society will conduct a couple of preliminary survey projects at Elk Landing. These should involve metal detection, ground penetrating radar, and soil core sampling. The Archeological Society of Maryland,” Dan noted, “will also manage the field session and its members are a large portion of the participants”

To learn more about the Archaeological Society of the Northern Chesapeake – CLICK HERE

For more information about archaeology at Historic Elk Landing, including all of the previous studies done there – CLICK HERE

For more information, please leave The Historic Elk Landing Foundation a voicemail at 410-620-6400.

We recently received a press release from Chester County Parks & Recreation  advising that the organization is sponsoring a lecture on the 1851 kidnapping of Rachel Parker, an African-American. A slave catcher from Elkton, Thomas McCreary, was involved in the abduction, which alarmed Pennsylvania and galvanized popular opinion against the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850. 

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In December 1851, Rachel and Elizabeth Parker were kidnapped from Nottingham. The two free, young, black women were accused of being slaves and taken to Baltimore where they were imprisoned. The local community sprang to their defense and rescued them. Hear the incredible story, then walk at Nottingham County Park to see the mining site that gave rise to the intentional false accusation. Part of the Town Tours Walks & Talks. See page 6 for more information.

Date: Saturday, May 19

Time: 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM

Talk Location: Union United Methodist Church

Walk Location: Nottingham County Park

Fee: $4 per person; under 12 free

To Register: Please call 610-344-6923

Click here for a related post on the dedication of a Chester County Historical Marker

Making A Difference, a video for a Cecil College photojournalism class, was produced by Robert Moreland.  In this production, the videographer takes a look at the Historical Society and the county’s heritage.  Thanks Robert.  We enjoyed watching this creative work.  It’s good to see a new generation starting to use new media to present the county’s story.  This is the future medium for sharing history and we hope to see much more of this work coming out of videographers.   We’d previously noted one you did that examined the development of the county.

The Tuskegee Airmen were the first African American military aviators in the United States Armed Forces.  In the ranks of that famed group was one Cecil Countian, 2nd Lt. Calvin Theodore Warrick.  He was born in Chesapeake City in 1921 and graduated from the George Washington Carver High School in Elkton.

After graduating, he worked at Triumph Industries in Elkton before going to the Army in 1942, where he was sent to Tuskegee to be trained for service in the Air Force.  “Lt. Warrick is to be commended for he was one of the outstanding trainees of a class made up for the most part of college graduates,” TNT, the Triumph Company magazine, proudly wrote in May 1945.

“From Triumph and from Cecil County, Happy Landing Warrick,” the editor wrote.

Lt. Warrick passed away on March 26, 2008.   He achieved distinction as an Air Force Second Lieutenant & Pilot during World War II, Find a Grave reports. He was buried at Quantico National Cemetery.

Family members still live in the county and his sister-in-law Jennie Matthews recently talked to me about the aviator’s pioneering experience as one of the Tuskegee Airmen

This quaint house on Route 213 south of Cecilton intrigued Baltimore Sun photographer Richard Stacks so in 1966 his picture of it made the cover of the paper’s Sunday magazine.  It was occupied by June Washington.  After the photo was published Lilly O. Ferguson, the property owner, wrote to say that while there while were many beautiful homes in the area, none had made the cover of the Sunday Sun Magazine as June’s house of contrasts did that spring in ’66.

Public safety officials used ten-codes as a precise, short way to communicate information on the county’s public safety radio network, in days gone by.  When someone wanted to say okay, it was 10-4.  That universal shorthand worked fine, but an automobile accident was a different story.  Fire & EMS dispatchers’ intoned 10-10 on the radio when there was a vehicle collision.  But in police parlance that meant a fight as their signal was 10-50 for a wreck.  An earlier generation of county emergency personnel used other schemes so that signal 9-I informed units to respond to a car wreck with injuries.

The change came after 9/11 when Homeland Security recommended the use of plain language as there were many different versions of these signals, which was creating confusion when multiple jurisdictions worked together.  As public safety codes quickly become a thing of the past, this old pieces of ephemera documenting that era has historical interest.  Weaver’s Discount Liquors in North East published it for curious customers and as an added value to patrons Weaver’s added the fire company equipment roster.