Category: Collections

I always look forward to the last Saturday in January because Singerly Fire Company holds its annual paper americana show on that date.  The Elkton organization has sponsored these shows, which bring over 30 paper, postcard, photograph, and advertising dealers from the tri-state region to Cecil County, for 20 years now.  I’ve never missed one for it’s a great place to browse for items related to the region’s history.  As the time for the show approaches, I start looking forward to seeing some of the outstanding Delaware and Maryland postcards brought to the show by Neil Boyle.  From Neil and Jane this year, I purchased two Delaware whipping post postcards and a photo of the Easton jail.  For over thirty years, I’ve added substantially to my collection thanks to Neil and the quality stock he carries.  He always has the best collection of real photo cards of any dealer at this show.  This year the folks from the Corbit-Calloway Memorial Library were there selling off excess inventory from their collections and items that were donated to them.  They had a magnificent 1825 H.S. Tanner Map of the New Castle and Cecil counties, which I’ll get framed for my office.  Saturday was a great day for purchasing materials to study the region’s history.  (In the photo above, the Corbit-Calloway librarians work to get their booth ready for the show opening.)

One tradition for kicking off the Christmas Season along the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad through northeastern Maryland was  the annual lighting of the “Holly Tree by the tracks.”  The B & O held the first public ceremony in 1948 when thousands of people gathered to ring in the season as lights from thousands of bulbs on the evergreen softly illuminated the Jackson, Maryland, hillside. For many years, the company dispatched a special train from Mount Royal Station to Jackson for the occasion. After 1971, the tree was dark until a group of volunteers started making sure the tree festively blazed for the holiday season.

Over the decades, I have periodically attended the ceremony, so when I came across an old 33 1/3 long playing record that captured the magic of the 1954 lighting, including carols, speeches, a visit by Santa, and the illumination, I was very excited.  That old vinyl, a long unheard broadcast, has sat silently on a shelf for a long time.  But thanks to an old record player I could enjoy the snap, crackle, and pop of the vinyl recording as the lost sound poured from the speakers. 

Today, we can easily digitize sounds and video images to make research with these sources easier.