Harford and Cecil counties shown in the map published in 1807 in Joseph Scott’s Geographical Dictionary
In the decades before state directories and other similar resources appeared, there were gazetteers or geographical dictionaries. These valuable titles, many over 200 years old, examined an area in some detail, presenting information about a community, its landscape, political economy, business enterprise, and natural resources.
Today Cecil and Harford county genealogists and local historians will find these works to be helpful as they offer detailed insights about the counties, towns and villages. Since hard to find details, such as social statistics, are contained in the works, I often consult the volumes when trying to understand the changes that have taken place in the area over the centuries.
In Maryland and Delaware “A Geographical Description of the States of Maryland” published by Joseph Scott in 1807 is helpful. As 18 pages focus on Cecil and Harford counties, it contains a large amount of productive information. In addition to details on most of the towns and villages of any size, there is lots of copy discussing the state and each county.
To give you an idea of the content, here is some of what Scott said about Bel Air. “Bellair” is a post town and seat of justice, 23 miles from Baltimore. It ‘has an elegant court house and jail, and a Methodist meeting house” and in the vicinity a county poor house. The town contained about 160 inhabitants in 1800 and there were four licensed taverns, three stores, two blacksmith’ shops, two joiners, one chair maker, one shoemaker, one wheelwright, and one taylor. By comparison, Abingdon had abou5 56 dwellings and 240 inhabitants. It also had about eight stores filled “with the produce of the West India islands, and the various manufacturers of Europe,” along with one tanyard, and several tradesmen’s shops.
This title was once hard to access. I purchased one from an antiquarian bookstore in New England decades ago so I could have it instantly available for my research needs. Before that I had to make a trip to a special collections library.
But now thanks to the Digital Public Library of America and other public domain e-content providers, we all have instant access to this and many more titles.
A handy online gazetteer from 1807 describes the state of Maryland and Delaware in detail. Source: www.hathitrust.org
Cecil County described in Joseph Scott’s Geographical Dictionary publisher in 1807.Harford County described by Joseph Scott in his book published in 1807
John Denver (center), in a photo from his time as president of the Maryland State Firemen’s Association. HIs two vice-presidents stand with him.
John Denver, a past president of the Maryland State Firemen’s Association, joined the ranks as a probationary member of the Singerly Fire Company in 1968. Over the decades, he served the company in many positions, and two years ago he served as in the senior leadership position with the State Association.
In this session with the Singerly Listening Station, an oral history project of the Elkton Fire Department, John shares his stories about the company. This is a brief outtake from a much longer interview, which is being archived for future projects and research purposes.
Since there is an enormous, rapidly growing body of research information available on the web, there is a need for a curated landing page, a place in the public commons on the net, to help someone digging into the past. This opportunity to help researchers is something I encounter often during public lectures and courses as I get questions about how to find helpful e-information. As a result, I beta tested some curated social media products and apps, such as Learnist and Liiist.
I have decided that the best way to point someone to valuable e-resources is to simply create a series of web pages, based on that test. Thus I have established this series, which focuses on linking to quality family and local history research resources related to the Delmarva Peninsula. This section of my website provides links to digital repositories, which have richly organized information and provide access to collections of quality resources for family and local history resources.
The landing page has general resources and the supporting pages are divided into major regions on the Peninsula. Select your region of interest and on the page you will find topical headings to direct you to rich content. The pages will concentrate on linking to high quality digital repositories of online data to help local and family history researchers.
Hopefully this helps you with your study of the past. If you have suggestions for additions or how to improve the product email me. I will continue to monitor the web and e-news outlets for developments, which should be added to the pages and add items as they come up, in order to help all of us with research in the region.
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and Esri, a geographic information technology company, have partnered to make the enormous collection of the Survey’s map readily available to everyone. While these resources have been downloadable on the Internet since September 2011, this new, user-friendly website is a significant improvement over the original system, which was more complicated.
The explorer brings to life more than 178,000 maps from 1884 to 2006, allowing users to easily access geo-referenced images, which can also be used in web mapping applications. The timeline allows visitors to easily explore the collection by place, time, and scale, and the sheets are easily downloaded.
Use of the landing page is simple. Visitors enter the desired location in a query box, and once you click on the map a convenient timeline comes up, showing the survey for that place. The user is able to visual see the products that were produced over time and move along the line to see the changes over time.
Check this out, as you will find lots to help with your local and family history research,
Darlington in 1950, after the construction of the Conowingo Dam.The Darlington area before the Dam in 1900. You are able to zoom in and download these products. Note the timeline at the bottom showing the available products.The modern edition base map is used to locate your point of interest.
In recent decades, modern condominium units have been built at the edge of Port Herman.
In the early part of the 20th century Port Herman was the place to be during the hot, humid months of summer. The small, waterfront community on the Elk River shore attracted city folks seeking to lighten the oppressiveness of the season by catching fresh breezes and enjoying the cooling water.
It all started about 1843 when Robert H. Thomas, an entrepreneur from Philadelphia, purchased a large tract along the Elk River from John Rawlings. He planned to develop the land that had been part of Augustine Herman’s vast Bohemia Manor estate, and in short order improved his holding. Streets, such as Cherry, Front, and Second, were laid out and land was subdivided into building lots.
The businessman also built a steam saw and plaster mill, while also commencing a large steam driven cotton factory, the Cecil Whig reported. Mr. Thomas’ involvement with steam and the capabilities provided by his saw mill must have created an interest in boat construction for in August 1852 the Whig noted that he was having a steam boat built.
Port Herman’s “little steamer,” the John C. Groome, was launched that year. The vessel needed no wharf because she was only 21 feet wide and with a shallow draft it was designed to run to Elkton, Head of Sassafras, Head of Bohemia and other narrow tributaries inaccessible to larger steamers.
Working out of Port Herman, the vessel was running up the waterways at the head of the Chesapeake when the next sailing season arrived. An auxiliary boat, she connected with the Philadelphia and Baltimore boat, the Lady Wilmer, at Port Herman.
Sometime In the 1850s Mr. Thomas sold his building lots to Thomas Marshall, James Van Horne (a steam boat captain), G. A. Thompson and others. During his time he built a few more boats. When the executors settled his estate in the late 1850s, there was one unfinished vessel on his Port Herman property.
Area farmers used Port Herman and its facilities to ship crops to city markets. There was a wharf, warehouses, and a store on the 1877 atlas of Cecil County.
The year the steamboat launched was a time for big happenings in Port Herman. A few months after that important event, the Postmaster General gave villagers a place to post and pickup mail. “Seventy inhabitants and fifty families living within two miles of Port Herman now had regular mail facilities, the Cecil Democrat observed.
Thomas C. Mashall served as the postmaster, according to government records. In his first half-year of business the postmaster collected $3.17 and received $3.28 in compensation. Somehow, about two months before the pivotal, bloody Civil War battle at Gettysburg, the federal bureaucracy found time to shut down the little station (April 7, 1863).
A school, the Town Point School, opened in 1877, just outside the village. Located where the road branches off to Town Point, it was adjacent to the store of W. S. Way, Esq, on land previously owned by Col. Joshua Clayton. It superseded an earlier one listed in county records as being in Port Herman. The building was sold for $166 in 1938, according to “Cecil County, Maryland Public Schools 1850-1958.
The Elk River House
A large boarding house or summer hotel, the Elk River House, opened in September 1888. Having rooms for 50 boarders, Thomas Griffin built it for Wm. J. Fears. Two years after the hotel opened, the Elkton Appeal editorialized that the number of city residents who could afford to spend summer time in the country was increasing. “This is seen in the numbers who have visited the few boarding places that have been open the past summer along our rivers.”
Port Herman’s hotel capitalized on the growing vacation trend, becoming an annual gathering place for long vacations. A July 1919 advertisement said, “Elk River House Now Open – boarding by meal, day or week. Automobile and yachting parties taken care of – WM. FEARS.”
The year before World War I was a progressive one. Citizens formed the Town Point Improvement Association, which had better roads for the area as its chief goal. Everyone residing in Town Point Neck was invited to join.
A sailboat glides past the Elk River House.
On the Fourth of July 1916, the Improvement Association hosted the “first celebration” on the banks of the Elk River, surrounding the hotel.” Celebration-goers were favored with the finest weather, as several hundred visitors in automobiles and boats attended.
It was a great day in the village. There was a parade, a patriotic speech, songs, and refreshments, in the morning. After lunch, boat and tub races and a ball game were featured. Illuminations, fireworks and a phonograph concert in the evening finished off a perfect day.
In the midst of a fierce storm of wind and rain, ground was broken for the new Town Point. M.E. Church in February 1916. By September, residents were invited to take part in the “most important event in the history” of the village, the laying of a corner stone of the new Methodist Church. Previously the church had met in a building that was either a vinegar mill or a blacksmith shop, old postcards indicate.
They weren’t going to miss a summer holiday that year before the Great War disrupted life. On Labor Day, the American Mechanics raised a flag and conducted a patriotic program at the school, which had been enlarged to accommodate the increasing population of the area. After the celebration everyone marched over to the church where a lawn party was held.
Today the Elk River House is on the market, according to a sign on Front Street. But in 1998 I had the pleasure of speaking with the elderly owners, Francenia Johnson. She recalled hearing older residents talk about the summer hotel. “The Ericsson steamer would bring vacations down from Philadelphia each Saturday during the summer and the hotel would send its wagon down to the wharf to pick up the guests.
After World War II, Mrs. Johnson recalled that Bob Fears had a public beach along the shore. To accommodate guests, he built a concession stand, a bathhouse and summer cottages. The cottages were rented for the season, she remarked. And each year when the summer months rolled around, the village freshened up as guests looked forward to a vacation here. Dips in the river, crabbing, canoeing, rowing and launching, all the favorite water sports were on the schedule. Of course, there were walks on the beach, dances, enjoyable meals, camping, music, picnicking and much more at this breezy spot on the Elk River.
A unique part of Cecil County’s history is preserved in this picturesque, little riverside community.
A USCT Reenactor at the dedication of the Charles Sumner GAR Post in Chestertown.
While attending an excellent event hosted by the Kent County Arts Council to mark the reopening of the Charles Sumner GAR Post # 25, we listened to an informative and engaging talk by Dr. Clara Small. The retired Salisbury University professor sketched out the history of the post, the United States Colored Troops in Maryland, and life before the modern-era Civil Rights movement. As we listened to her remarks, we thought about a little title from the days of slavery in Cecil County, the “Unwritten History” by Bishop Levi J. Coppin.
The Bishop was born in Fredericktown, Maryland thirteen years before the Civil War started. His mother, Jane Lilly, taught the youngster to read and write and at the age of 17 he began to study scriptures. After moving to Wilmington when he was 17, he joined the Bethel AME Church. In 1877, Levi became a minister, eventually becoming the 30th Bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church. During his life-time he also served as an editor, educator and missionary. Coppin University is named after his wife, Fanny Jackson Coppin. She was a noted educator.
The Bishop published his autobiography in 1919. “Intermingled with this ‘Unwritten History’ is the story of my life. . . Those who are fond of reading novels about men who never lived, and things that never did and never will happen, may enjoy a change to something that is historic and real,” the foreword notes. Of the nine chapters the first five concentrate on Cecil and Kent counties and his life here. The fifth chapter is entitled “Farewell to Cecilton.” He passed away in 1924.
This book is a helpful, seldom used local source for anyone studying the antebellum, Civil War and reconstruction eras on the Delmarva Peninsula. In the antebellum period many land owners in the lower part of the county relied on slave labor for harvesting crops and performing plantation work. This valuable title provides information on the families in the area, slavery, some insight on the Underground Railroad, the arrival of Union Troops in the town, news of Emancipation in lower Cecil, and life in general for African-Americans during the slave era in Cecil County.
“Imagine the feeling of our people at the first sight of colored men in soldier’s uniform” the Bishop writes. “When the call was made, generally, many responded. When later on, a recruiting office opened in Cecilton by Lieutenant Brown, some of our boys who had joined the army were selected to come, now as soldiers, to their own home and induce others to enlist. Under shoulder arms, they would march through the little village, “as proud as Lucifer and without fear. While Lt. Brown and his men remained, many volunteered. Some slaves, whose masters still held them in bondage, came to the recruiting office, enlisted and placed themselves under the protection of the flag. When the colored soldier came, it left no doubt as to whether or not freedom had some.”
In another section he talks about news of the Emancipation Proclamation. “Father Jones was promptly on hand with Lincoln’s proclamation, but there was no one present with authority to say to the slave, “You are free, so all were in suspense . . . .”
Speaking of the Underground Railroad, he writes: “The talk of war, so absorbed the thought of the people, and controlled public sentiment that the colored people were no longer the sole objects of attention. The fact is no one was buying slaves, for it began to look like they would be set free. This put the Georgia Trader out of business. The slaves were not watched so closely. Some masters boldly said if their slaves ran away, they would not try to find them. Under this influence of this changing sentiment quite a number made their escape, some going no farther than Pennsylvania, but even more going to New Jersey. But many concluded to stand still and see the salvation of God. . . “
This digitized e-book will help local and family history researchers investigating this era. It is available on the Internet Archive.
Tablet of Contents, the Unwritten history by Bishop Levi J. Coppin
Morris Rannels, Supterintendent of Cecil County Schools., 1952-1960
It is always exciting to obtain fresh perspectives and insights on Cecil County’s past, something that is often provided when scholars take a serious, fresh look at our history. These thorough investigations, requiring months of intensive digging into original documents and a critical evaluation of the sources, are valuable as they focus on specific research questions and use the highest principles of historical inquiry and analysis to piece together an understanding of things that came before us.
A Washington College graduate, Kyle Dixon, is one of those researchers bringing a scholar’s fresh eye to an unstudied subject, Cecil County School integration. Seniors at the Eastern Shore college are required to fulfill a senior capstone obligation by conducting a substantial investigation and write a thesis on the subject.
As an American Studies major he launched a study that sought to piece together the story of the integration of public schools in Cecil County. His Senior Thesis, Standing in the Schoolhouse Door: The Desegregation of Public Schools in Cecil County, Maryland, 1954 – 1965was just approved by the American Studies department and has been added to the Eva M. Muse Library at the Historical Society of Cecil County.
His investigation began at the Historical Society as he reviewed the literature on the subject, read newspapers from the era, and studied old school records. Kyle moved on from that initial survey to visit McDaniel College, which has the papers of Morris Rannels, the county’s superintendent of schools, 1952-1960. He continued the inquiry by examining the record of the Board of Education at the Cecil County Public Schools Carver Leadership Center, visiting the Maryland Archives, and reviewing sources at the Enoch Pratt Library.
After the historic Supreme Court ruling of Brown vs Board of Education of Topeka, which ruled that legally sanctioned racial segregation in the public schools was a violation of the Constitution’s promise of equal protection, officials throughout the United States struggled with implementation of desegregation. In Cecil County that matter was more urgent because the county had a major military base, and the attempted admission of African-American students resulted in an immediate test of federal policies. In the local system racial segregation was the norm, but the military was fully integrated, in accordance with a policy enacted by President Harry Truman and carried on by the Eisenhower’s Secretary of Defense, Charles E. Wilson.
When students headed back to the classroom in September 1954, seven African-American children of navy personnel were denied entry into the Bainbridge Elementary School when they were met at the door by Superintendent Morris Rannels and Principal Mildred Balling. The administrators instructed the youngsters to report to the “Port Deposit Colored School.”
This early incident involving a facility on federal property resulted in a suit against the Cecil County Board of Education in 1954, and started the county on the long-winding, eleven year trip toward racial equality in public schools. The Board of Education, at first, instructed professional and legal staff to resist integration. But as time went on mounting public and judicial pressures, involving the Eisenhower Administration, Department of Navy, the NAACP, the U.S. Attorney General, the press, Maryland Department of Education, and the involved families, increased.
An article on the NAACP’s suit against the Cecil County School in the January 11, 1955, Baltimore Afro-American.
After a federal judge refused to dismiss the civil suit, charging local officials with violating the 14th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the parties agreed to settle the matter out of court, according to the Afro-American. When the school doors opened next year, it was an integrated facility for Navy personnel. Eventually the Board voted to fully integrate one school, Bainbridge Elementary, and slowly begin the process of opening all facilities to African-American students through a plan of optional integration.
Under the “freedom of choice” system families could request that their children attend another school. In August 1957, five students made history when the Board of Education approved transfer of Diane Elizabeth Hobday and Janie Mae from George Washington Carver High School to Perryville High; Robert Thomas and David Tipton Hobday from “Port Deposit Colored Elementary School” to Bainbridge Elementary; and Marie Dante Sewell from George Washington Carver Elementary to Chesapeake City Elementary. These are the first documented transfers under the optional system.
Another student made history in June 1960. Bernard Purdie graduated from Elkton High, becoming the first African American to receive a diploma from an all-white high school.
But the end of separate, overlapping districts for whites and blacks was near by the mid-1960s. During George Washington Carver High’s 37th commencement exercise on June 8, 1964, nine seniors stepped forward to receive diplomas. The class of 1964 was last the last one to graduate from Carver as the next autumn African-American teenagers attended the nearest high school. The elementary school in the same building continued for one more year.
Cecil County School integration was completed, fully, in 1965. That year, the Board of Education voted to close the last two segregated schools, Levi J. Coppin in Cecilton and Carver Elementary in Elkton. Youngsters formerly attending classes there reported to the nearest facility in their area when the doors opened in the autumn.
Kyle is also a volunteer at the Historical Society of Cecil County, where he serves as the social media editor, looking out for the county’s history beat on Facebook and Twitter.
Kyle Dixon stands in front of the Levi J. Coppin School, Built for African-Americans in the Cecilton area it opened in 1952. Dr. Thomas G. Pullen, State Superintendent of Schools, and Mrs. Helen Harris, principal, spoke at the dedication, It was one of last two segregated schools in the county before Cecil County School Integration..
The list of schools and teachers for Cecil County in 1921.
Calamity Jane, an all-purpose rescue truck, arrived in Cecil County late in 1953. This special emergency vehicle was available for use in Cecil, Harford, and Kent counties. The truck had nearly 100 different types of extraction equipment, every imaginable tool, mechanical device, and article needed when lives and property were endangered.
It was one of six heavy rescue vehicles that Maryland Civil Defense stationed in various parts of the state. The truck, a bright and shiny Reo with the familiar red-and-blue CD symbols on it, was under the command of rescue squad Captain W. Andrew Seth of Civil Defense. John J. Ward, Jr. the chief of the agency said that while the truck was primarily here to “protect the community in the event of an air attack by a hostile power, it could be used for any disaster which might occur.”
It had been manufactured by the Reo Motor Company of Lansing, MI. It was capable of carrying a crew of eight and traveling at a speed of about 55 miles per hour. The manufacturer called it a “combination Red Cross ambulance, fire truck, and utility company trouble-shooter.”
A major explosion rocked Chestertown in 1954 when the Kent Manufacturing Company’s fireworks plant exploded. The charred five acres of plant property, leveled buildings, and critically injured workers called for massive emergency response from throughout the region, and calamity Jane, Cecil’s heavy rescue vehicle, rushed to the scene to provide aid.
Calamity Jane, a Civil Defense Rescue Truck arrived in Cecil County in 1953. It was one of six CD vehicles stationed around the state. Source: Cecil Whig, Dec. 3, 1953
When an explosion charred five acres of the Kent Manufacturing Company Fireworks plant, the CD rescue truck responded. John Farrell, John C. Cooke, and Andrew Seth were the crew on the truck. Source: Cecil Democrat, July 22, 1954.
The county decided it needed a bomb shelter during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Cecil Democrat, Oct. 24, 1962
The end of October is normally a scary time in Cecil County as Halloween rolls around. But an actual nightmare on the eve of the trick-or-treat season in 1962 caused people to shy away from ghosts and goblins. Facing a dreadful reality, the world standing on the edge of a nuclear war, people decided they had enough frightening antics and scary tales, although the situation eased by the time the last two days of the month arrived.
George Prettyman, a columnist for the Cecil Democrat, wrote about those jittery days. “Almost everything has become of scant importance since the president spoke on October 22 on the Cuban Missile Crisis. Several times during the past few years it has seemed that we have been on the brink of war. But all other crises pale in the light of the present one, for we are indeed dangerously – very dangerously – close to hostilities. Every moment we remain disengaged from open warfare gives us a little more hope that the matter can be settled short of all-out, worldwide war.” With a chill of that type in the papers, on television, and in the air, nervous people weren’t in the mood for the mysterious and spooky season or any other dark jolts.
It was the quietest in years, “virtually free from malicious mischief and vandalism,” Elkton Chief Thomas N. McIntire, Jr. reported. Looking to bolster his patrols, given the normal antics, the county seat’s top cop called out the Civil Defense Auxiliary Police. Already on high alert because of international tensions, it was easy for the chief of the CD force, Norton Singman, to mobilize his resources. He detailed 27 men to take up positions throughout town for two days, and between the regular officers and the CD auxiliary the entire community was “under surveillance.”
Elkton’s Annual Halloween Parade
Elkton’s annual Halloween parade, a popular event, was headed by Harry Cleaves in 1962. It was a “huge success,” papers reported, although the floats and paraders seemed to be far fewer in number.
Sheriff Edgar Startt also reported that mischief night passed quietly in rural Cecil. He put all four full-time deputies on patrol and had six extra men supplement the regular force.
Rising Sun Managed to Pull Off Its Traditional Trick
Despite the heightened presence of lawmen and the frightening specter of mass destruction, pranksters in Rising Sun managed to pull off their traditional trick. After a group prowled around the countryside and found a convenient outhouse, they promptly dragged it to the center of the town square. There it stood under cover of a chilled October darkness. Police were looking for the owner of the privy.
Jittery residents weren’t looking for the creepy and kooky in 1962.
County Commissioners meet with state and federal officials to go over procedures for federal assistance in construction a bomb proof building to house Civil Defense and county records. Commissioners Howard Tome & Davie Racine attended the meeting. Source: Cecil Democrat, Nov. 1, 1962
