Category: Programs

C&D Canal Talk

Harford Community College is offering a talk and continuing education course on the C&D Canal. Starting on May 5, 2022, at 1:30 p.m., it involves three sessions. The first is a classroom lecture and that is followed by two field trips to towns along the C&D Canal The course is presented by Mike Dixon.

The Chesapeake and Delaware Canal has fascinating stories to be told. Along the 14 miles of the nearly 200-year-old waterway, every town and village, every lock and bridge, and every camp spot used by Union soldiers during the Civil War contributed to the engaging narrative. Discover the role that mule-drawn barges, locks, steamboats, and changing methods of transportation played in the evolving history of the Canal and the region.

For additional information and registration click this link https://hccweb1.harford.edu/scheduleofc…/U_noncrweb.asp…

C&D Canal Talk
A talk and course on the C&D Canal.

Life in the Past Lane at Rodgers Tavern & Perryville

Topic:

Life in the Past Lane at Rodgers Tavern (2022 Rodgers Tavern Museum Virtual Spring Lecture)

Description:

“Life in the Past Lane” examines the role of Perryville and the Tavern as an important transportation hub, from the colonial era to the 20th Century. Join us in this engaging program as we journey into the past lane, examining the unique stories and characters of the Lower Susquehanna River, the local ferries, the old colonial road that still carries traffic past the Tavern, and the bridges. This presentation includes many seldom-seen photos, which will help us consider the role the tavern played in the development of the broader community. So be sure to join us as we consider important history in your neighborhood.

FREE LECTURE
ONLINE ONLY
Advanced Registration RequiredTime

Apr 23, 2022, 06:30 PM

Click here for registration

Rodgers Tavern in Perryville
Rodgers Tavern in Perryville on June 30, 2018

New Delaware Humanities Lecture Examines Pandemic of 1918

I am pleased that Delaware Humanities has selected a timely new program I have been researching about the pandemic of 1918 in the region.  The goal of this program is to understand how the experience of 1918, a situation that called for drastic action, unfolded and use this examination in a discussion that connects the past with today.       

TITLE

We Have Been Here Before: Delmarva During the 1918 Pandemic

Art work from the Illinois State Department of Health in 1918. Source: National Institutes of Health Library)

DESCRIPTION   

With the nation currently struggling with an unprecedented public health emergency as the coronavirus impacts the nation, this program examines the impact of the so-called Spanish Influenza Pandemic of 1918 on Delmarva and nearby points.  The virus took a grim toll in this region, and it overwhelmed the health care system, forcing the region to shut down for an extended period.  Although they didn’t call it social distancing at the top of the twentieth century, the methods they used to quarantine the contagion are similar to what we practice today.  Thus, as the world struggles with this novel contagion, we will take a relevant look at the past to see how people in the region 102-years ago managed a similar situation, at a time when medical science did not have a treatment for the pathogen.

A Delaware Humanities speakers bureau program.

A 1918 poster created in response to the virulent created by the United States Shipping Board Emergency Fleet Corporation (Source: Philadelphia Free Library https://bit.ly/34BT3Oq)

Lecture Explores Getting Hitched in a Hurry in Days Gone By

This talk explores stories about getting hitched in a hurry in days gone by.

Eloping couples once came to Wilmington for a licenses and a quick ceremony, but just before World War I, Delaware passed more restrictive laws. A city newspaper, proclaiming that Wilmington was no longer a “mecca” for marriages, remarked that “Wilmington’s Days as a Gretna Green has gone glimmering.”

Since the “honeymoon express” was no longer able to deliver cupid’s hurried business to the City, passenger trains steamed on down the tracks, stopping at the first county seat beyond the Mason Dixon Line.

There the marrying parsons picked up the trade as the marrying parsons worked overtime completing a ceremony every 15 minutes. Quirky marrying parsons, humorous occurrences, and an international incident involving Iran, are part of this colorful narrative.

The program will also sketch out marriage practices and customs and how they have changed over the longer period.

The lecture was offered by the Friends of Old Dover in for Valentine’s Day 2017.  Here is the post, they shared for that talk.

Wilmington was the place for elopements and quick marriages.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1160336937376428/

Photos: Courtesy of the Delaware Public Archives