Around 1824, before the first shovel of earth was moved to dig the C & D Canal, there was a flourishing village a few hundred yards from the Delaware State Line called Bethel or later Pivot Bridge. It clustered around an old church with an ancient graveyard. Before Chesapeake City, its neighbor two miles to the west began to grow, Pivot Bridge had a tavern and was a place for elections. The stagecoach conveying mail and passengers on the daily run down the Peninsula passed through Pivot Bridge and kept it quite a busy spot for that period in the 19th century.
A map of Pivot Bridge in 1877 (Source: Atlas of Cecil County, 1877)
At the center of this beautiful spot along the canal was the original Methodist Church for the area, built about 1790. A newer edifice replaced the aging house of worship in 1849. The new church was built by John Pearce, a contractor, who received $3,000 for the construction. Bordering the church and the canal was an old burial ground, the final resting place for many of the area’s oldest inhabitants.
The entrance to the Bethel Cemetery (Historical Sketch of Bethel Cemetery, 1908)
Pivot Bridge boasted of a dozen dwellings, one dry goods and grocery store, one wheelwright and blacksmith shop, and a public schoolhouse in 1869, the Cecil Democrat reported. Yet it didn’t have a rum shop “so they were free from all those drunken brawls and disturbances.” By 1902, thirty people lived in Pivot Bridge and James R. Kirk had a store there, according to the 1902 Polk Directory. For a few brief years (1892-1893 and 1905-1907), James R. Kirk Sr. served as the postmaster. During part of the 19th century, Stephen H. Foard operated a store and built a wharf for shipping grain to the city. A steamer stopped regularly to take in freight and passengers.
When the waterway across the Peninsula opened, it created a ditch that bisected the community, separating some of the residents from others and the church, school and store. Gradually over time, the thriving spot along the canal disappeared as the ditch kept getting wider and wider, taking away adjoining land. Although businesses and families came and went and generations of residents passed on, the arrangement with the intersected village worked satisfactorily for about 100 years.
Once the federal government purchased the route across Delmarva in 1919, it gradually started knocking off pieces of the settlement as it widened the waterway. Before the loss of land took away most of the remaining structures, residents of Pivot Bridge faced a more immediate problem. The Army Corps of Engineers decided to abandon the bridge that connected villagers in 1925, justifying their decision by the fact that Chesapeake City wasn’t too far away.
Residents of the hamlet objected, pointing out that for centuries the road the government wanted to scrap had been the main highway for the Peninsula. From its origin as an Indian trail, it had served the people first using carts and wagons and then automobiles. Moreover, for shipping products, while their neighbors 200 feet away could send their product to Elkton, farmers on the south side would have to use the railroad depot at Mount Pleasant, Del. The freight rate from Delaware was almost double that of Elkton. They also noted that the church had an average attendance of 75, of which more than 50 came from the other side of the canal — a trip that would be 12 miles without the bridge.
The pleas moved Uncle Sam some, though they didn’t get to keep the connecting bridge. As a substitute, the Army Corps of Engineers started running a ferry between the north and south sides. That lasted for a few more years before it, too, was discontinued.
Moving part of the Bethel Cemetery (CecilWhig, July 14, 1965)
By the 1960s the canal needed to expand again and most of the remaining structures, including the church, were demolished. Old Bethel’s graveyard with its 1.67 acres also disappeared under a federal order which condemned the land for the widening of the C & D. About 500 graves were supposed to be opened and the remains reburied in a section of the adjoining newer cemetery. But when the job was finished in 1965-66, workers had counted 1,137 graves that had been moved back from the water’s edge. Some of the graves dated back to the earliest years of this nation. One of the most famous was Joshua Clayton, president of Delaware from 1789-93. He died in 1798 at the age of 54 from yellow fever.
Today, Bethel Cemetery Road stops abruptly at the canal’s edge, and little remains to inform 21st-century travelers that a thriving hamlet once existed in this area. Near where the old burial ground stood at the canal’s edge, a tall, simple cross memorializes the church.
A SERIES— This is the second part of a series examining the role of the coroner, the lead officer in charge of investigating suspicious deaths for centuries in Maryland. For the first installment about the history of the coroner’s office click this link. This article examines how a murder investigation progressed in one case in 1886.
The murderously battered body of William Green, an old man living on a barge on Back Creek at the edge of Chesapeake City was discovered on March 18, 1886. Incoherent and urgently needing medical attention, people carried the insensible fellow to George Whiteoak’s home in town, where he lingered for a few days.
How Billy the Joker was Killed, Cecil Democrat, Oct. 2, 1887
As news of the grisly assault spread, lawmen hurried to the desolate cabin at the edge of the marsh. First, they came in ones and twos, Town Bailiff Foard and County Constable Carpenter arriving promptly. And when word of the cruel assault traveled to Elkton, Cecil County’s entire criminal justice system, the sheriff, state’s attorney, magistrate, coroner, deputy sheriff, and more constables bolted into action.
The local officers scoured the abandoned canal boat cabin at the edge of Chesapeake City for clues. On the floor, they discovered a stonemason’s hammer covered with blood, and in a trunk the man’s revolver, its chambers fully loaded. Otherwise, the assailants left no trace of their identity, and there were no witnesses.
Working off slender leads, the officers chased down suspects, questioning a local stonemason, interrogating canal boat crews, and rounding up a few wayward types. However, it was fruitless, mystery surrounding the crime as nothing viable developed. Only the incoherent victim knew what happened.
William Green, also know as Billy the Joker, was murdered in the cabin of his abandoned canalboat grounded on the northside of Back Creek at the edge of Chesapeake City (Source: Atlas of Cecil County, 1877)
Green lingered on his death bed until 8 a.m. Sunday, March 21, when officials sent for Coroner Perry Litzenberg. He dashed to Chesapeake City to hold an inquest upon the remains, State’s Attorney William Bratton coming down from Elkton with him.1
Murder Investigation Begins
In the hands of the Cecil County Coroner, the investigation into the violent and untimely death began that afternoon at the Whiteoak house. Chesapeake City Magistrate Christfield rounded up twelve good and lawful men to serve on the coroner’s jury, and Litzenberg swore them in. Upon their oath, the panel swore they would inquire on the part of the State of Maryland when, how, and what manner Green came to his death.
The inquest began when the jurors viewed the body in the dining room. They carefully eyeballed it for marks of violence, taking note of the wounds, before retiring to the parlor to continue the inquest. Some 30 witnesses testified and evidence was exhibited as doctors Bratton, Krasner, and Wallace conducted the postmortem in the next room. After finishing the autopsy, the physicians testified that blood on the brain and a crushed skull, a piece about the size of a quarter pressing into the brain, caused death. His jawbone was also broken, and they were satisfied that the hammer was the instrument that took him down.
Four hours after the inquest started, the jury presented the verdict. Although they were unable to connect anyone with the murder, they swore upon their oath that “William Green came to his death from compression of the brain caused by blows upon the head by a blunt instrument in the hands of persons to the jury unknown.”
This murder ruling triggered a full homicide investigation, all the elements of the county’s criminal justice system sprinting into action to pursue leads while grilling suspected assailants. However, the murder investigation grew cold, the local officers exhausting every avenue as they ran down suspects.
Pinkerton Detectives
Therefore, the Cecil County Commissioners hired the Pinkerton National Detective Agency. One sleuth worked the case around town, spending the entire month of April and part of May combing through tips, leads, and clues while working up suspects. Nevertheless, after a “patient investigation” of weeks, he was unable to make any viable discoveries, so an undercover agent was added to the case. In the dry town of Chesapeake City, this gumshoe started a “pear cider saloon,” covertly listening to the “class of the community who spent their time in drinking and playing cards” for clues.
This approach to criminal investigations was a waste, the Cecil Whig reasoned. “Instead of asking the governor to offer a suitable reward open to competition among professional detectives for the discovery of the criminal,” they hired two private eyes from the Pinkerton National Detective Agency to work up the case with a “vengeance” at the expense of the county. One took it in hand and masqueraded in the role of a detective for quite a time in Chesapeake City, while the other worked as a “blind,” the paper remarked.
Weeks after the “miserable failure in detective work”, one of the participants in the crime confessed his guilt and an arrest of his associates followed. This big break came when Alfred T. Mannon took his son, George, to State’s Attorney Daniel Bratton. There he admitted to being one of the parties involved in murdering the “old Englishman.” He along with Paul Reed came upon a stonemason’s hammer in the road and they carried it to the desolate cabin in quest of whiskey and money, he reported.
Meanwhile, Reed had slipped out of the county and the Pinkerton man collared him near Annapolis. The detective brought him to the jail and put him in the custody of Sheriff Robert Mackey and Deputy Harvey Mackey. Both made confessions implicating each other.
Not one clue, trace, or step in the case was due to the gentleman who “mulcted” the county for the nice little sum of almost $600, doing practically nothing except to aid in defying the law in Chesapeake City and in doing police duty to bring Paul Reed from Annapolis to Elkton, the Cecil Whig noted following Mannon’s confession.2
Murder Trial
Reed waived his right to trial by jury, opting instead for a bench trial, while Mannon put his case in the hands of jurors. Owing to the great interest in the matter, Judges Stump and Thompson ordered Sheriff Mackey to summons “forty talesmen,” as the pool for jury duty.
At 11 p.m. on October 1, 1886, George Mannon, 19, walked out of the courtroom, a free man having been declared not guilty by the jury. As the foreman announced the acquittal, friends of Mannon applauded and shouted vigorously. At the time of the disruption, Judge Robinson made a remark that caused controversy. Some thought he said this verdict was an outrage on all decent people.3,4,5,6
Reed was convicted of murder and sentenced to death, Judge Stump remarking:
A more deliberately planned, premeditated, cold-blooded murder was never perpetrated in this or in another community, than that of which you stand convicted. After numerous consultations with your confederates . . . you twice walked seven miles with the deliberate purpose to murder and rob. . . . . After the second visit George Mannon was your companion. There was no hesitation then. He was possessed of the nerve that was wanting in you and Goffney. I have no doubt that he struck the blow, which deprived William Green of Life. You were present, aiding, abetting, counseling, and robbing. But you are as guilty as he. The conviction of Mannon would have added nothing and his acquittal can subtract nothing from the full measure of your guilt.7
A Wilmington newspaper, the Daily Republican, had this to say about the shocking murder verdict:
Read, it was proved, was an accessory to murder, while Mannon was the real conspirator. But Reed selected to be tried by the court and Judge Robinson adjudged him guilty. Then came Mannon’s trial and availing himself of the same privileges selected to be tried by a jury and that jury, though he was the real murderer, brought in a verdict of not guilty. Reed was an African American and Mannon was white. While there was no doubt of the guilt of Reed, there was, if such a thing could be, less doubt of the guilt of Mannon. But the latter knowing his guilt and knowing that Judge Robinson would not have spared him on account of his color, knew he would be in safe hands of a white jury, and that was his choice. This is a sad commentary on the justice of trials by jury, and if this is the way they work the sooner they are abolished the better. Governor Lloyd, however, will display good sound reason and judgment by never setting a day for Reed’s execution.8
Reed Pardoned
Under the circumstances associated with the verdict, State Senator Clinton McCullough States Attorney Daniel Bratton, and several Elkton lawyers went to Annapolis to present Governor Lloyd a petition “signed by all the officials and most of the prominent citizens of Cecil County” urging a commutation of the Reed sentence. Governor Lloyd commuted the sentence to life in prison.9,10
On De. 24, 1907 Governor Warfield pardoned Reed. He had been in the penitentiary since 1886 for the murder of William Green, also known as “Billy the Joker.”
The Cecil County Trial Docket for Paul Reed, convicted of the murder of William Green
Endnotes
“Death of William Green,” Cecil Democrat, March 27, 1886[↩]
“Something Else to Show,” Cecil Whig, Nov. 5, 1887[↩]
As spring rolled around in 1946, a petition circulated in Rising Sun favoring the establishment of Daylight Savings Time. Once a majority of the businesses signed the circular, the municipality went on what some called “fast time” on Monday, April 29, 1946.
As most people inside the corporate limits retired on that Sunday evening, they pushed their clocks up an hour. Those that did were on time as a new work week started, although they had lost an hour’s sleep.
This “War Time,” used during World War I and II, sought to snatch an extra hour of sunlight so productivity increased. However, this difference of an hour between the town and the countryside caused considerable confusion in northern Cecil County as it was strictly a very local affair.
People from Colora, Conowingo, Calvert, Farmington, Sylmar, and farms across the rural areas having business to transact had to keep in mind that they lost an hour when they crossed the town line. Also, farmers generally did not favor the measure as they already were up taking care of chores before the sun came up and they could use the extra light in the morning.
As it happened, a town meeting had been called for Tuesday evening, April 30, at Firemen’s Hall to nominate candidates for the upcoming town election in May. There as townspeople considered nominating a slate of candidates for the election, a lively discussion developed concerning time. The sentiment was that as this was a farming community where daylight savings time was not popular, the rural public was entitled to consideration so “fast time” should be shelved in town.
The hub of Rising Sun in the 1940s (Source: Undated Baltimore Sun Newspaper Clipping)
Notes: Article Source: Midland Journal, May 3, 1946; Photo Undated from the Baltimore Sun (circa 1940s)
In the Elkton Cemetery on Howard Street, a small stretch of grass alongside Howard Street has served as the firemen’s plot since 1892. Here is the story behind this little plot of land in the old burial ground.
The Singerly Fire Company was incorporated on Jan. 22, 1892, and in early November of that year, the department’s first president, Richard Thomas, died. The Elkton firefighters promptly called a special meeting to arrange the funeral.
The men voted to purchase land in the cemetery for $14 to serve as the final resting place for President Thomas. The deed to Singerly notes that Mrs. Thomas had the privilege of being buried beside her husband in the fireman’s lot.
O.R. Chaytor was appointed to serve as the marshal at the fire service funeral. The company also draped the fire apparatus in mourning for 30 days.
Mr. Thomas, 73, a native of England, had settled in Cecil County in 1842. For many years, he was engaged in the lumber and canal boat business at Port Deposit, and in 1871 he was elected sheriff of the county, filling the office for two years. He died suddenly of heart disease on November 1. 1892, while sitting in a chair at his home on Main Street (Evening Journal, November 2, 1892).
Mrs. Thomas was buried there in 1928.
Several years ago, Ed McKeown of the Elkton Monument Company donated a monument to formally mark the firemen’s plot at the cemetery in Elkton.
The memorial for the Firemen’s Lot at the Elkton Singerly. Ed McKeown donated the monument
For additional photographs of the Firemen’s Lot at the Elkton Cemetery, see this album on Facebook
In the years after World War II, community pools were the in thing, a great civic improvement providing a place to take a dip to cool off on scorching summer days. Across the region, private clubs, community groups, and municipalities opened those refreshing spots so young and old could find a little relief from the oppressive heat and humidity.
Here in Cecil wrecking crews made room for a pool in Port Deposit by demolishing Jacob Tome’s mansion in August 1948. Once the lot was cleared, volunteers from the Port Deposit Lions Club got busy, excavating the space and digging out the rocks. The eagerly anticipated attraction unofficially opened on July 15, 1950. The formal dedication of the Jacob Tome Memorial Swimming Pool took place on Saturday, August 26, 1950. Capt. J. J. O’Donnell, USN, the former commanding officer of the Naval Academy and College Preparatory School at Bainbridge was the principal speaker. Other remarks were offered by Donaldson Brown of Mount Ararat Farms, Frank D. Brown, Jr. president of the Lions Club, and Robert F. Ryan president of the town council.
Practically the entire town turned out for the event, and after the dedication, the crowd was entertained with a water pageant, with exhibition swimming and diving and formation underwater maneuvers. The ten acts featured a special swimming team from the University of Maryland (News Journal, Aug. 26, 1950). For decades after that, the sounds of laughter, splashing water, portable radios, and general merriment filled the street on the south end of town as people found summertime relief.
But by February 1981, the days for this place of summer were numbered. It was “sink or swim for Port Deposit Pool” as the Lions Club approached the town about assuming responsibility for operations, the Cecil Whig reported. The town wasn’t interested in taking on the obligation for the 40-by-100-foot Olympic-style pool but needed time to consider things. The pool didn’t open for the 1983 season.
The opening of the Port Deposit Pool in July 1950 (Source: News Courier, Oxford, Pa. July 1950)
One of the highlights of August for many people living in Cecil County in the decades around the turn of the twentieth century was the annual Woodlawn Camp Meeting. For two weeks in the heat and humidity of summer, many families vacationed there, escaping the chores of farm life, socializing, and listening to worship services.
Established by the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1871, the encampment continued for more than 42 years, annually drawing people to the cool shade of the grove. It was located on what is now called Camp Meeting Ground Road near Woodlawn on a 15-acre grove of tall timbers, which was purchased from F. Marion Rawlings and Theodore J. Vanneman.
There were two long avenues of tents extending on either side of the wooden tabernacle, where a pavilion for preachers and benches were located. While most campers resided in tents there were a few frame structures, such as the boarding tent and ice cream and confectionery stand.
The local Methodist ministers took charge of the camp, and it was their duty to provide preaching talent throughout the week. From morning to evening, there was preaching, praising, and fellowship. Of course, there was an active choir, supplemented by a fiddle and a coronet. “The old hymns of the church were sung lustily and with great fervor,” the Cecil Democrat reported.
The camp meeting also played an important social role. The young people met to promenade up and down the avenues on those hot, sticky August nights. Hopefully, they caught a gentle breeze as they stopped at the picture gallery for photographs or at the ice cream stand for refreshments. Many of the campers resided in tents, but there were two frame cottages.
The boarding tent, and ice cream and confectionery stand were also frame. The boarding tent was under the management of “Uncle Al Boyd,” a former baggage master on the railroad and a former sheriff. The camp bell called camp goers for meals and meetings and the “never failing pump” was a popular spot. With the arrival of the automobile and the accessibility of attractions at greater distances, camp days waned.
The annual camp meeting went out of style in Cecil County in 1913. The ground was sold by receivers in 1915.
* * * * * *Sources & Notes
* The Historical Marker Database — Woodlawn Camp Meeting https://www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=24111 ** At the Head of the Bay: A Cultural & Architectural History of Cecil County* Period articles in the Cecil Democrat and the Cecil Whig
A long avenue of tents extended on both sides of the tabernacle at the Woodlawn Camp Meeting. (photo credit: Mike Dixon)
For additional photos of Woodlawn Camp Meeting as this album on Facebook
As the summer months heated up in the late 19th century, residents of nearby cities often took extended vacations. Seeking out the cooler, fresh air of the countryside or the fresh breezes from the ocean or bay, they escaped the city’s heat during the sweltering months. Many towns on the Chesapeake Bay capitalized on this growing trend and Rising Sun was one of the places ready to host vacationers from Philadelphia, Chester, Wilmington or other nearby points in 1870.
After S. C. Konigmacher, an experienced hotelier, took over the management of Rising Sun’s hotel, the Maryland House, in 1870, he promoted it as a summer resort. An experienced innkeeper, he formerly managed the Ephrata Mountain Springs in Ephrata, PA, and the Seaview House in Atlantic City, NJ.
Koningmacher’s advertisement noted that the Maryland House was the most modern, attractive summer place between Philadelphia and Baltimore. In the “midst of a highly cultivated neighborhood — settled by followers of William Penn — the air was unsurpassed, there was pure water and good health, and the area was entirely free of mosquitoes,” the advertisement added.
Plenty of amusements awaited the seasonal visitor. Game and fish abounded, giving those wishing to engage in hunting or fishing opportunities. “Gilpin’s Falls, Octoraro Creek, and the Susquehanna River, “all celebrated for their romantic scenery” were in the immediate neighborhood. At the hotel, a fine shaded lawn was fitted up for outdoor exercise, and good band music frequently enlivened the place.
In 1872, a destructive fire quickly spread to the hotel and its stables, destroying the buildings. An urgent appeal for aid went out on the telegraph wires to Oxford requesting that the Union Fire Company load a steam engine on a special train and rush to Rising Sun. But the Oxford telegraph office was closed at that hour, so the fire department did not get the message until the next morning, according to the Oxford Press.
The summer resort, the second Maryland House, was destroyed by the blaze. A fire had also destroyed the first one, but another lodging facility would soon be built.
A handbill for the Maryland House in Rising Sun on the Philadelphia and Baltimore Central Railroad. First-class accommodations included warm and cold baths.
ELKTON – July 23, 2021 – On this sad Friday in late July, hundreds of first responders, public officials, friends, and family gathered at the Elkton United Methodist Church to say a final goodbye to Firefighter Roger Morton McCardell, Jr. Born on October 10, 1957, the 63-year-old public servant passed away on July 17, 2021.
As soon as he was old enough, the sixteen-year-old followed his childhood dream, entering the service as a probationary member in the Singerly Fire Company on October 14, 1973. The vibrant, energetic, well-liked rookie started riding the back step of the engine and staffing the ambulance immediately as he quickly learned the ropes while handling a hose at a blaze or assisting a stricken patient en route to the hospital. Twelve months later, he was promoted, having earned the rank of full firefighter.
That point 47-years ago marked the start of a long service career, professional and volunteer, spanning six decades. After graduating from high school Roger took a paid summer position with the Ocean City Fire Department, serving the resort as a firefighter and Emergency Medical Technician (EMT), while also becoming certified to provide prehospital advanced life support, a newly emerging discipline for first responders in the State.
Later on, as his career progressed, he became a national sales representative helping small volunteer companies and large urban departments with their fire suppression needs. Roger was an expert in this field, traveling throughout the nation to consult with public safety agencies seeking to select hose and appliances for fire suppression. Over those 33-years on the road, he made many friends, attended national fire department trade shows, and worked with major fire departments across the country. Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, and Boston were some of the clients that came to Roger when they needed hose for attack and supply lines .
Roger continued in the fire service through his adult life, committing much of his life’s work to protect the community and serving the nation’s fire departments. He recently retired from Key Hose as their North East Regional Sales Manager.
“. . . But with all that spectacular background, Roger liked talking about his experience with Singerly and Ocean City FD the most. . . .” — Sam Goldwater
Eulogizing Roger this afternoon, fellow Elkton firefighter and Key Hose Sales Representative Sam Goldwater remarked: “. . . Roger worked on projects with the International Fire Chief’s Association and many fire departments across the nation. He worked at [New York City] shops during 9/11 and fought forest fires on the west coast. He was in the command center for the largest rice fire in history. But, with all that spectacular background, Roger liked talking about his experience with Singerly and Ocean Fire Departments the most. . . .”.
Firefighter/EMT and good friend Roger McCardell will be missed.
Around 1974, Firefighters Roger McCardell (2nd from left), Jack Everett and Pete Swyka complete a water rescue on Appleton Road. (Source: Singerly Museum)
For more on Roger See the following
Here’s a link to a 2016 interview Roger did with the Singerly Listening Station
For additional remembrance photos see this album on Facebook.
For its centennial celebration in 1992, the Singerly Fire Company commissioned an oil painting that showed the company racing out of the North Street station on a cold winter evening in 1892 to answer its first alarm. A team of galloping horses pulled the Amoskeag Steamer past the old courthouse at the corner of Main and North streets as an early evening February twilight descended on Cecil County. Immediately behind the engine, a group of men tugged strenuously on the Gleason and Bailey Hook and Ladder as a fresh coating of snow made their work slippery. The old hose cart wasn’t going to be too far behind for it is just rolling out the firehouse door.
The toiling fire bell had called out Elkton volunteers for their first general alarm on this winter day. These pieces of newly acquired equipment, and one additional hose cart, which hadn’t answered the alarm yet protected the county seat from the ravages of flames for decades until they were retired as motorized units came into general use three decades later.
In preparation for the celebration of 100-years-of-service, the Elkton firefighters commissioned Doylestown PA artist Gil Cohen to produce the Singerly Fire Company painting and the company sold a limited-edition print. When the company decided it wanted a unique scene showing the 19th-century volunteers answering the alarm, the board launched a search for an artist who could accurately depict the technical nature of the setting and capture the mood.
The nationally recognized artist, a member of the American Society of Aviation Artists and an illustrator for major publishing companies, had done work for the United States Coast Guard Bicentennial and for other major celebrations. He is acknowledged as one of the world’s leading aviation artists, known for his profound interest in history and his sensitive portrayal of the human element. Thus a company representative drove to Bucks County to meet with the artist, and after examining his work he was commissioned to produce the canvas.
A stickler for historical accuracy, Cohen did lots of research to recreate this scene from another century. His first visited Elkton to get a feel for the town and begin research for the project. He walked down Main Street with Mike Dixon, a member of the fire company, studying old pictures and looking at modern vantage points. “I conjure up images in my mind. It’s almost like entering a time machine, where I’m here but trying to visualize the street as it was before the turn of the century,” he told an Elkton newspaper, the Times.
Singerly firefighters pose for the artist. L to R Walter Trego, Vince McMahon, Bill Baker, Walter Morgan, and Mike Dixon. Photo credits: Gil Cohen in the collection of Singerly Fire Company Museum
He next utilized company members dressed in turnout gear to pose for him as he dramatically portrayed their 19th-century counterparts. So on a cold Monday afternoon in February 1992, one-hundred years after the department was formed, Cohen had firefighters running down North Street and hanging off apparatus as bystanders leaned over the railings on the Howard House porch. As the sun went down on this winter evening long shadows became more apparent on the buildings. It was just the look and mood Cohen was after. His research also took him to fire museums in Philadelphia and in New York as he interviewed experts on 19th-century apparatus and viewed old photos.
One of the awards he received commented on his portrayal of the “human element – the nuances of facial expression and body posture – set against the background of wartime field activity, which brings each canvas to life”. Singerly saw that first hand as he put the members through the paces to create the artistic image of the first alarm.
Once he completed his research and had visualized the twilight in that winter of long ago, he submitted several rough sketches for the board’s approval. After the drawing was approved, the artist started painting the scene. Later that year, the company unveiled Singerly’s Call to Alarm, a fitting tribute to past firefighters who established a tradition of service and to the present members who faithfully serve the community, at a special centennial event. Artist Cohen was on hand to personally sign those first editions for Elkton’s first responders.
An article in the Singerly Connection, the official newsletter of the Singerly Fire Company, Autumn 2016
JUNE 22, 2021 – On this rainy afternoon in late June, the doors to Chesapeake City Elementary swung open for friends, alumni, and former faculty to stroll through the hallways one final time. Children returning this fall will report to the modern, new facility south of town.
Chesapeake City Elementary School in the autumn of 2020 (Oct. 28, 2020))
The walls of this eighty-two-year-old schoolhouse went up on the south side of the canal in 1939 as people struggled to survive the Great Depression. One of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal programs financed the $135,000 job, which was awarded to Lang Brother Construction of Baltimore. They also built the Cecilton School.
That autumn in 1939, a couple of years before World War II disrupted the nation, youngsters reported to the combined school, which contained both the primary and upper grades. Edwin B. Fockler served as the principal of the high school.
The old center of learning, which had served the town since 1886, was dismantled by a Wilmington Contractor in July 1940. The wrecking company agreed to do it at no cost if they could salvage construction materials from the debris.
In 1958, Bohemia Manor High School opened and after the upper grades moved south of town this became Chesapeake City Elementary School.For eighty-two years the hallways, gym, and classrooms buzzed with activity, creating so many memories.
For additional photos see the Chesapeake City Elementary School album on Facebook.
