Window on Cecil County's Past

As evening arrives on this autumn day in 2010,  and another November 22^nd slowly begins to fade into the past, it’s hard to believe it’s been 47 years since the county’s tranquility was disturbed by broadcasters sorrowfully announcing “From Dallas, Texas, the flash, apparently official, President Kennedy died at 1 p.m. Central Standard time. . . .”  Practically everyone alive remembers those unforgettable moments as shock turned to sorrow while radios carried a near continuous stream of bulletins. 

Most people immediately recalled that it had been eight days earlier that President Kennedy had been in the county to snip a ribbon, marking the ceremonial opening of the Northeastern Expressway (I-95).  As the sun sank behind the western Cecil horizon on that joyful day, he lifted off in his helicopter.  With those memories fresh on everyone’s mind, news that an assassin’s bullet had struck down the President was even more shocking.    

The late November day got off to a foggy, mild start in Elkton as Police Officers Jerry Secor & Thomas Dunford reported for the day-watch.  During an uneventful morning, by law enforcement standards, the handwritten police blotter, providing a cops-eye view of activities that unforgettable day, shows they escorted a  DuBose Funeral Home detail, arrested a man for shoplifting, and recovered a stolen car.

The patrolmen dutifully scrawled notations on the blotter, all largely unremarkable, but the entry at 1:30 p.m. was jarring as it marks a change for the Eastern shore and the nation.  In a careful hand in the official police record for the county seat, one of the men wrote,  “President Kennedy shot and killed in Dallas Texas.” For the remainder of that heartbreaking day, there is something about the unsettling quiet reflected in the complaint register as a deep dark, sadness penetrates the town and few calls come in for the remainder of the evening on that dark, dark night nearly 50 years ago.

Elsewhere, one of Rising Sun’s telephone operators recalled a slow morning as the new automatic dialing system for the Farmers Telephone Company handled the few calls that came over the system  that Friday morning.  But suddenly, there was an enormous surge, as people used to talking to the operator or needing assistance with long distance connections called to ask if the ladies had heard the news.  As the entire system lit up, she recalls she’d never seen anything like it.  People were saying have you heard, President Kennedy was shot or something like connect me with my husband in California, Massachusetts, or some other place. 

In Chesapeake City, a couple living along the canal, said they’d never forget the day.  Just before the news broke from Dallas, two federal men in dark suits visited their home.  Representing the Army Corps of Engineers, they were there to discuss the purchase of their property in Bethel as the canal was being expanded.

Back in the county seat, H. Wirt Bouchelle, the county’s weatherman, dutifully recorded Friday’s metrological conditions, confirming the observations of the Elkton police as they started the 8:00 a.m. shift.  The temperature climbed to an unseasonably high of 63 degrees F., while sinking back to 40 overnight.  There was no precipitation on that gloomy day in Elkton.

Since it was the middle of the workday many people first received news from the radio. At Elkton’s top 40 AM Station, WSER, the mid-day disc jockey worked the turntable playing the hits of ’63 when a network flash interrupted his entertaining routine.  Once the first flash got everyone’s attention, listeners huddled near receivers at home, work, and in cars to hear the latest.  As the hours unfolded the network kept up a steady stream of bulletins and flashes.

This Sunday evening, there’s a bright Blue Moon rising over Cecil County.  This term means it’s the third of four full moons in a single season or the second full one in a calendar month, according to the website earthsky.org.   So on this beautiful evening stroll outdoors for a few moments and enjoy the gentle glow that is softly illuminating this late November evening, as darkness descends on Cecil County.  The opportunity only comes around “once in a blue moon.”

While Cecil County once had dozens of one-room schoolhouses serving rural areas and small villages, many have disappeared in recent decades. The most recent one, the old Cherry Grove School near Sylmar, was leveled during the past week.  Built in 1881 for $680, it closed on October 24, 1931, when pupils were transferred to Calvert.  For years it served as a private dwelling.

We were first informed that it would be demolished in August,  and over the past weekend, we drove down Little New York Road to check on the old place.  It had been razed.  Click her to see what we wrote about it in August.

If you are interested in looking for your family roots, you will definitely want to attend Genealogy Detectives: Tracing Your Family Roots, a “how-to” primer on many of the resources available for tracing your family tree, Wednesday, November 17 at 7pm at the Elkton Branch of the Cecil County Public Library. Emilie Braeuning will discuss how to use the Census, vital statistics records and online resources as well as give tips on other organizations that might provide insight into your family roots. This event is free and open to the public. To register for this event, call 410-996-5600.

Hear about the Mason Dixon Line, the Story behind a Geographic Boundary in a free program at the Rising Sun Library at 1:00 p.m., on Saturday, Nov. 13, 2010

Born as a result of a bitter territorial dispute over royal land grants, the Mason-Dixon Line was surveyed between 1763 and 1767 to settle the boundaries for Pennsylvania and Maryland. After 1820, when the Missouri Compromise
created political conditions which made the line important to the history of slavery, it became associated with the division between the free
and slave states. Today the line is still seen by many as a symbolic dividing line for regional attitudes and customs.

Historian Mike Dixon will explore
the stories of the line, which runs through our land and our history, along with the perceptions that have developed about the boundary.

Registration with the Rising Sun Library is required.  Phone 410-685-4025.

J. Polk Racine, an Elkton native, served four years in the Civil War. Some thirty years after those trying times, he wrote “Recollections of a Veteran or Four Years in Dixie,” telling about what an old veteran saw while serving in the Army of the Potomac. He was illiterate when he enlisted but Col. I. D. Davis took Racine on as a willing pupil and soon he was an accomplished reader and writer. In addition to the fact that the private witnessed such well-known battles as Gettysburg, his account is appealing for its sidelights. Also since the writer talks about familiar places locally, his account intrigues readers in Cecil County.

Join an evening book discussion of this title at the Rising Sun branch of the Cecil County Public Library on October 13 at 7:00 p.m. Historian Mike Dixon will lead the discussion.  Books are available from the Library and call the branch for additional information at 410-648-4025.

Thousands of these dusty, time worn, old newspapers were published here beginning in 1823.  In addition to the Cecil Whig, titles included serials such as the Midland Journal of Rising Sun, the Chesapeake Chesapike of Chesapeake City, the Perryville Record, the Port Deposit Rock, and the Cecil Star of North East.  In addition to the Whig, Elkton had the Cecil County News, the Appeal and the Cecil Democrat as well as a dozen of smaller titles.  

This week-by-week record of happenings, all from a Cecil County perspective, is invaluable since a newspaper with a dateline from another century is a voice from another time.  Fortunately, there were over 40 of these voices here.  All the incorporated towns, except Charlestown and Cecilton, had one or more commercial publications.  

When you’re researching something don’t just rummage through the Elkton papers for the other small town weeklies covered their beat thoroughly in their day, producing a four page broadsheet full of local content about Rising, Perryville, North East or other towns.  Also don’t forget the weeklies from other nearby points.  Those publications often covered corners of the county more systematically than the distant papers in the county-seat.  One example is the Middletown Transcript, which had lots of content from the first election district around  Cecilton, Warwick, Earleville and other places south of the canal.  It is available at the Corbitt Calloway Library in Odessa. 

The Oxford Press is particularly important as it covers northern Cecil County and its smaller villages in detail with weekly columns filled with social happenings and smaller news pieces.  Special correspondents wrote in from Sylmar, Liberty Grove, Rowlandsville, Calvert, Port Deposit, Rising Sun, Fair Hill and other villages, making sure virtually nothing was missed.   But in addition to the village social goings on, there’s a strong weekly column of local news from south of the Mason Dixon Line.  I find that especially helpful when investigating political topics or sensitive matters since the distant paper may cover the issue more openly.  This product is available at the Oxford Library from 1866 to 1970s and its local Cecil County news content is particularly strong. 

Finally, don’t forget the Havre de Grace Record.  That broadsheet covers the Perryville, Port Deposit and Susquehanna areas carefully and it is available at the Historical Society. 

Mark your calendars for October 23 & 24 since “The British are coming to Cecil County…..Again.” Mount Harmon is hosting a full-scale Revolutionary War Re-enactment and Colonial Festival featuring over 200 re-enactors and an array of colonial craft vendors and activities for our members and the public to enjoy.

Each day will feature an exciting array of military skirmishes, tactical demonstrations and drills, colonial crafts, and much more. Colonial vendors, food, music, nature trails, manor house tours and of course a full fledged Revolutionary War encampment of both British and “Rebels” (the good guys, continental and militia groups) will be at hand. Don’t miss your chance to see history come to life.

Click her for more details and a full schedule of events.

More than a dozen Cecil County stories are featured in Ed Okonowicz’s newest book, “The Big Book of Maryland Ghost Stories.” Published by Stackpole Books, the 417-page, hardbound volume includes more than 150 ghost stories from throughout the state of Maryland.

Divided into six sections, the book features stories from every county throughout the state, as well as a number of legends set in Baltimore and Annapolis. Okonowicz, a county resident, said the strong connection between history and folklore is present in a large number of tales.

While stories set in old mansions and historic sites were expected, some of the more unusual tales involve a headless “horse,” a court case with a message from a ghostly witness, and “dancing” spirits that made regular visits to a rural home along the Mason-Dixon Line. The incidents retold in the book include both historic and contemporary reports. And while Cecil County’s spirited activity is well represented, several inns in nearby Havre de Grace, plus rural legends in nearby Harford County, also command significant space.

Although old newspapers and documents are the basis for the older tales, interviews provided stories with more personal details. “”I talked to a lot of people who shared some rather amazing experiences,” Okonowicz said. “They shared their encounters in regular houses you and I pass by every day, and several said they never imagined such unexplained events would happen to them. But when they found out someone had been murdered in the house, or it was built over an abandoned cemetery, they were actually pleased. Because those facts offered a possible reason for the strange incidents.”

The hardbound book, at $24.95, is available at Kathy’s Corner Store in North East, Md., on amazon.com or contact the author at edo@mystandlace.com