Route to Inauguration Will be Abe Lincoln’s

The Associated Press produced a story on Dec. 22 concerning the president-elect’s route to the inauguration over the northeast corridor Amtrak Line between Philadelphia and Washington.  The piece was carried widely by many of the nation’s daily newspapers, and we’ve clipped part of it here in case you didn’t see it.  For the entire article click on the at the bottom, which will take you to the Wilmington News Journal, which included a few staff photographs with the piece.

—————————————

Riding Rails May Remind Obama of Task He Faces

Associated Press, Dec. 22, 2oo8

ABOARD AMTRAK 181 NORTHEAST REGIONAL — The centuries-old right of way between Philadelphia and Washington is marked by shimmering waterways and industrial sprawl, well-kept suburbs and urban blight.  Pesident-elect Barack Obama won’t be sharing a ride with thousands of long-distance commuters when he travels on a private charter train from Philadelphia’s 30th Street Station to Washington’s Union Station on Jan. 17, three days before he takes the oath of office. But his route will be exactly the same.  I fact, it hasn’t changed much since Abraham Lincoln rode the rails before his inauguration.

Evidently, Obama has thought deeply about the symbolism of the 135-mile journey, something that regular riders typically aren’t inclined to do. Nonetheless, they develop a feel for the changing landscape.  You see those deserted houses, and you know you’re in Baltimore,” said Gifty Kwakye, 27, a student at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who commutes daily from Philadelphia.  The theme for Obama’s inaugural is “Renewing America’s Promise,” and as Kwakye noted, the need for such renewal will be clear in the five minutes before Obama’s train pulls into Baltimore’s Penn Station.

The tracks pass through some of east Baltimore’s most impoverished neighborhoods, where abandoned and burned-out row homes seem to outnumber inhabited ones. The city has nearly 30,000 abandoned properties.

Closed Chrysler plant in view

A gaze out the window could also remind Obama of the troubles of the auto industry, the decline of American manufacturing and the strain on the military.  Johnnie Walker, a 60-year-old Amtrak operations supervisor from Middletown, who has been with the railroad for 29 years, finds profound scenes throughout the journey.  At the just-closed Chrysler plant in Newark, “you wonder what’s going to happen to all the employees there,” Walker said. At Maryland’s Aberdeen Proving Ground, “you start thinking about the military personnel in Iraq or Afghanistan, wondering where they’re being deployed to.  “There’s a lot of emotion when you travel on these trains,” Walker said . . .

Full Article Continues on Wilmington News Journal Web Site 

African-American School Houses in Cecil County

There are a number of old schools from the segregation era in Cecil still standing around the county and their history is interesting.  I just noticed that The Long Road to Compromise, a blog about school integratrion on the upper Eastern Shore has a new piece about the African-American school in Cedar Hill, a small community in the northeatern corner of the county.  It’s not too far from Pleasant Hill.  You may want to glance at that posting.

Inaugural Train to Pass Through Cecil

Barack Obama and Joseph Biden will travel to the inauguration by train on Saturday, January 17, the Baltimore Sun and News Journal reported this afternoon. After stopping for a celebration in Wilmington, the president and vice-president will step aboard the inaugural train for the trip to Washington. This is particularly exciting news for this memorable run will bring them through Cecil County. Naturally, this isn’t the first time a president passed through here on the railroad. There were many, including presidents Lincoln, Grant, Taft, Wilson, Hoover, Roosevelt and others. A Window on Cecil County’s Pastwill post a piece about presidents riding the rails in Cecil over the next few days and we’ll plan to do a slide show on Saturday, Jan 17 as Cecil County turns out to wish the new team well.

Dec 7, 1941 – Cecil Goes on a War Footing & Bainbridge Develops

On December 7, 1941, a serene Sunday afternoon two and a half weeks before Christmas in Cecil County, many people returned home from church and settled down to enjoy the remainder of their day. Some fidgeted with radios, slowly turning knobs and dialing up Sammy Kaye’s Sunday Serenade on the NBC Red Network. Others enjoyed a family meal and conversation or read the Sunday newspaper. As sweet, melodic orchestra music filled many homes and clocks ticked unhurriedly toward 2:30 p.m. a news flash interrupted the tranquility.
All conversation abruptly stopped as startled families gathered around the radio to hear an excited broadcaster say: “President Roosevelt said in a statement today that the Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor Hawaii from the air. I’ll repeat that, President Roosevelt says that the Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor in Hawaii from the air. . . .” Later, another newscaster reporting from Honolulu warned: “This is no Joke! This is war!”
While smoke slowly cleared at Pearl Harbor, the nation faced a stark, cold reality. A sneak attack dealt a damaging blow and we were at war. Bracing to do its part, Cecil immediately went on a war-footing by manning aircraft observation stations and posting security personnel at critical installations. But this was only the beginning for soon tremendous activity, which drastically altered the county, came to the high granite bluff overlooking Port Deposit.

As the Navy urgently needed facilities to train untold numbers of seaman, government officials searching for a large tract of land descended on property with a scenic view of the Susquehanna River. After negotiating with the Jacob Tome Institute, they purchased the institution’s magnificent holdings high above Port Deposit, and acquired additional land from farmers and homeowners adjacent to the school.
While crews fenced the 1,132 acre property, trucks, day and night, unloaded large piles of lumber for barracks. Fifteen thousand construction workers, along with a fleet of tractors, bulldozers, and steam shovels, descended on the formerly peaceful land to clear farm fields and woods, erect buildings, and open a navy base in four-months. Around-the-clock construction changed the fabric of the land and caused a hustle and bustle in the quiet little river town of 900 as traffic jammed up with crews rushing back and forth. This onslaught of workers filled every available room in town, and restaurants did “a land office business,” reported the Cecil Whig.

Enlistees started arriving in October 1942 when “45 rather nervous young men from Pittsburgh piled off a Navy bus with overnight bags in their hands,” while a military band serenaded the recruits by playing Anchors Aweigh, reported the Philadelphia Bulletin. Referring to it as the Great Lakes of the East, the newspaper speculated that it would be the “Alma Mater for thousands” of young men during the difficult times ahead.
Calling it a $50-million miracle since nearly four months to the day shovels broke ground for these arrivals, Captain Charles F. Russell told the recruits they would have to endure some discomforts because “some things we want you to have aren’t finished yet,” reported the newspaper. This is “because we are fighting a war which had been thrust upon us. We did not have these facilities ready because we were not seeking war.”
Named in honor of Commodore William Bainbridge, commander of the famous frigate Constitution, “it grew to enormous proportions, with hundreds of barracks, training halls, classrooms, gymnasiums and mess halls quickly raised on the property and at its peak the center nearly 35,000 recruits,” says At the Head of the Bay. The center’s swollen population brought prosperity to the neighboring town and by war’s end in 1945 nearly 250,000 servicemen had passed through its gates.

It was deactivated as a training center in 1947, but when the cold war blazed up in Korea the Navy needed the center again. This ramping up to help push back communists invading South Korea began in 1951; young sailors began preparing the neglected center to receive recruits. Working with contractors, they hustled about, repairing broken windows, scrubbing the barracks, and making general repairs since tens of thousands of recruits would pump life back into the hushed base.

At its peak during this war, the base had a population of 55,000 and was one of the country’s largest naval bases, he recalled. During its existence, it served as the home for several service schools providing technical training for recruits and fleet sailors. Radiomen, hospital corpsmen, dental technicians, electricians, storekeepers, personnel-men, and yeomen were among those trades.  But during the 1970s, the base withered. By the time the doors closed on March 31, 1976, barracks, unused for years, were choked with weeks and the water system leaked badly. The “enormous amphitheater, where Bob Hope and Milton Berle entertained troops was full of saplings,” reported the Record of Havre de Grace. The U.S. Naval Training Center, Bainbridge served the nation for 34 years as a recruit training center. “When the colors were lowered for the last time . . . signifying the closing of the famous base where thousands of Navy recruits were trained,” there were tears in the eyes of onlookers, the Cecil Whig reported.