The scorching summer heat has made outdoor activities nearly
unbearable for a few days now, and people are coping with the tropical conditions in a variety of ways. Late this Saturday afternoon, families’ crowded tables at Betterton Beach, enjoying outdoor picnics while hopefully catching a cooling breeze from the Chesapeake Bay. Elsewhere people outside quickly scattered for whatever shade they could find and restaurants were crowded.
Over forty years ago, Cecil Whig Photographer Jim Cheeseman caught
this picture of a young-man attempting to escape a 1969 summer heat-wave by resting briefly in a self-serve ice-box at a business in the county seat. Elkton had a National Weather Service Observation Station from 1927 to 1976, by-the-way. H. Wirt Bouchell, the local weatherman, recorded the highs and lows every day for nearly 50 years and the highest reading  he recorded in Elkton was 106-degrees on July 10, 1936.
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