Appalachian History

A GREY HUNTER
Cumberland [MD] Evening Times, May 18th & 19th, 1881

"Jack Chadwick lived in the wild country near Negro mountain with his mother and little brother Jesse. He was a great hunter and feared nothing. In one of his excursions he came across an Indian chief, who lived in the break in Will's Mountain a mile or two up the creek with his white wife and daughter, the latter just blooming into womanhood.

"The chief had sided with the whites against the protest of his tribe, and they forsook him. He took up his residence in the hollow. Jack fell in love with the daughter and it was reciprocated. But the chief wanted her to marry an officer at the fort and told Jack he was too poor. Disheartened but still determined, Jack left for his home. Stopping at a spring to drink he turned over a stone and uncovered a glistening ledge of rock, which he found to be rich silver ore.

"Returning to the home of his love, he told the chief what he had found, and proposed to show him the mine if he would give him his daughter. The Chief agreed, the silver mine was shown him, and the young man went home to prepare for the wedding. Returning, he brought his brother with him. The Chief, however, had changed his mind at the instigation of the officer of the fort, and declined to give his daughter to young Chadwick.

From: "Feldstein’s Top Historic Postcard Views of Allegany County," 1997.

"All day Jack protested, but the old chief was obdurate, and finally the lover seemed to acquiesce and asked for a few moments talk with the maid, which was granted.

"Sauntering among the trees and talking of the harshness of the parent, the lovers finally agreed to make for the fort and get married, and soon they slipped out of sight of the old home. The old Chief was watching, however and when he missed them he went in pursuit, overtaking them back of the cliff. He was very angry and attacked Jack with a club. The latter threw a stone at the Chief and unfortunately killed him.

"The daughter loved her Indian parent dearly, and amid her wailing declared she could die with Jack but could not live with him, now that he had killed her father. 'Then let us leap off the cliff yonder together and end our trouble,' said he. She consented, and arm-in-arm they walked to the cliff, where they clasped hands and leaped off together."


source: http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/MDGARRET/2001-09/0999818266

Excerpt from 'Cumberland, Maryland Through the Eyes of Herman J. Miller,' (1978)


During the 1920’s and early 1930’s, so many arrests and convictions were made by dry agents that the Allegany County Jail could not hold all of the prisoners, so some were housed in the Garrett County Jail at Oakland, Maryland.

One bootlegger on North Mechanic Street had a box-like platform built out of a second story window over Wills Creek. If a raid should occur, the operator would just pull a rope and the bottom would drop out and the contents would drop down to the rocks below, for this is where he kept his whiskey. When the glass bottles hit the rocks, the bottles would shatter, and thus, no evidence.

One bootlegger I knew wore an overcoat all the time. People who didn’t know him thought he was an eccentric, but he had a half dozen pockets inside the coat in which he carried his stock of whiskey for sale.

One of the favorite places for good moonshine, to the ones in the know, was a well-known Liberty Street shop. Most speakeasies were ones that you got in, if they knew you, got your drink, and got out. Some were fixed up like club rooms, with chairs, tables and some with slot machines.

People referred to the quality of liquor bought in the prohibition era, calling two dollar whiskey “long life” and the one dollar whiskey, “early grave.” While some bootleggers sold only whiskey, mostly their places sold both whiskey and home brew. Most fraternal clubs were for members only, but had both whiskey and beer for sale.

Some speakeasies stole the idea from the strictly private clubs and had membership cards made for the patrons of their places. As an example of how many wanted to sell liquor when the country went dry, there were thirty-six licenses issued for 1921 for soft drink establishments. Not all sold liquor, but most did. Some bootleggers would deliver to your home. You would use a code over the telephone. If you wanted three pints, you would ask for three pounds.

On April 7, 1933, 3.2 beer became legal. Baltimore, Hagerstown and others parts of the state were selling the brew. Cumberland and Allegany County could not because a bill that had been passed in the General Assembly pertaining to county beer licenses stipulated that the applications became available on the day beer came back, but permits became effective only seven days later. You could buy beer on the first day of repeal in Pennsylvania. A store just over the state line on the Bedford Road was selling beer on the first day. A steady stream of Cumberlanders took advantage of the beer sale.

On Friday, April 14, 1933, beer could be bought in Allegany County. Those who could sell beer reported a good business. There were almost as many women as men customers. With the return of beer, many speakeasies came out in the open, applied for licenses and operated under regulations. It is worth noting that it has been only about two years since beer and liquor could be sold legally on Sunday in Allegany County. Many people of the area would go to Ridgeley, West Virginia, to buy beer on Sundays. Now, restaurants and private clubs in Allegany County can sell alcoholic drinks after 1:00 PM on Sundays.

When it was all over and the country was again wet, there seemed to be no attachment of lawlessness or the stigma of hoodlum attached to the convicted bootleggers who had served time in jail. Some, in later years, joined highly regarded fraternal orders. Others operated successful businesses. William Harvey, who was considered to be the outstanding prohibition enforcement officer in Allegany County, became sheriff of Allegany County for a time.


Herman Miller was a lifelong Cumberland, MD resident, serving on the City's Advisory Commission on Historical Matters and the Historic Preservation Commission during the 1970s. He was a member of the Cumberland Fire Department until his retirement. In 1978, he was the subject of an oral history by Dr. Harry Stegmaier of the history department at Frostburg State University. The resulting text was entitled 'Cumberland, Maryland Through the Eyes of Herman J. Miller.'


Source: www.whilbr.org/Cumberland_HermanMiller/index.aspx



Cumberland+MD prohibition+in+MD speakeasies appalachia appalachian+history history+of+appalachia

Some of America's most famous entertainers of the 1930s era, because they were African-Americans, were barred from staying in Cumberland, Maryland's mainstream hotels. Such notable musicians as Duke Ellington, Count Basie, Cab Calloway, and others often stayed at the Davis Tourist Home while on tour. These stays were often a week at a time when their bands came into town to play the Cadillac Lounge, Crystal Park, and other venues.

The Davis Tourist Home was located at 329 Frederick Street. The 14-room house contained a kitchen and dining room on the first floor, and was operated by John (1898-1959) and Towanda Davis (1902-2001), and then by Mrs. Davis upon John's passing.

The Davis Tourist Home also had a contract with the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad to provide overnight housing for the black railroad porters and dining-car employees who had to layover while working the Capitol Limited from Chicago to Washington. Each employee brought an official written authorization from the B&O to the Davises which allowed their stay at the Home.













sources: www.whilbr.org/itemdetail.aspx?idEntry=3175&dtPointer=0
Cumberland Daily News, September 26, 1935



Cab+Calloway Cumberland+MD appalachia appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

Today realtors tout the Dingle neighborhood west of Cumberland, MD for its charming Craftsman houses of the early 20th century. But this placid upscale neighborhood was a fierce wilderness when Nemacolin, a Delaware chief, and Thomas Cresap, a Maryland frontiersman, first blazed a trail through here in 1749 or 1750.

The trail ran between the Potomac and the Monongahela rivers, traversing the land beneath this Cumberland neighborhood and leading on to the mouth of Redstone Creek, near Brownsville, PA.

Site of the Dingle in Cumberland, MD. Braddock Road is on the right and it's heading up Haystack Mountain. Today, right behind where the car is in this photo is a modern Maryland Historical Road Marker reading: "The National Road (called The Cumberland Road) was the first of the internal improvements undertaken by the U.S. Government. Surveys were authorized in 1806 over the route of "Braddock's Road" which followed "Nemacolin's Path", an Indian trail over which George Washington Travelled in 1754 to Fort LeBoeuf." Photo by Ernest K. Weller.

In 1755, during the French & Indian War, British General Edward Braddock of the Coldstream Guards led a 2,100-man army from the Washington DC area to what was then Fort Cumberland. The troops intended to dislodge the French from Fort Dusquesne on the “Forks of the Ohio” (now Pittsburgh) roughly 100 miles away.

Braddock had received important assistance from Benjamin Franklin, who helped procure wagons and supplies for the expedition. Setting out from Fort Cumberland on May 29, 1755, the expedition faced an enormous logistical challenge: moving a large body of men with equipment, provisions, and (most importantly for the task ahead) heavy cannon, across the densely wooded Allegheny Mountains and into western Pennsylvania.

Braddock’s aide, Captain Robert Orme, duly recorded the army’s 30 wagons, 400 horses, siege artillery and tons of supplies. Braddock built a road over Wills Mountain, across the Cumberland Narrows, continuing over Haystack Mountain through (what was not yet) the Dingle, close to Nemacolin’s path, and ending ultimately in Great Meadow, near Union Town, PA.

By the time he was ready to leave his 4th camp, Braddock acknowledged the ongoing challenge posed by advancing such a massive retinue, and so took a young George Washington’s advice and created a flying column, “leaving the heavy artillery and baggage behind to follow by easy stages under Colonel Dunbar,” according to the General Braddock's 5th Camp Maryland Historical Road Marker.

Among the wagoners, incidentally, were two young men who would later become legends of American history: Daniel Boone, and Daniel Morgan.

Braddock met defeat east of Fort Duquesne and was fatally wounded. He was buried in the middle of the road he built and his soldiers marched over the grave in hopes of concealing its location from the Indians.

More than 150 years after Braddock’s march to his disastrous fate, John Kennedy Lacock, a Harvard Professor hailing from Amity, PA, led an expedition to retrace the original route of Braddock’s Road. Lacock spent countless days scouring the countryside and was able to identify the exact path of Braddock's march.

“From Fort Cumberland westward Braddock had to make a road for his troops across mountains divided by ravines and torrents, over a rugged, desolate, unknown, and uninhabited country. The history of the construction of this road and a description of its course it is the purpose of this paper to set forth; for the growing interest with which the routes of celebrated expeditions are coming to be regarded, and the confusion that attends the tracing of such routes after a lapse of years, make it altogether fitting that the road by which the unfortunate Braddock marched to his disastrous field should be surveyed, mapped, and suitably marked while it is yet possible to trace its course with reasonable definiteness.”

'Braddock Road' by John Kennedy Lacock

Lacock hired photographer Ernest K. Weller of Washington, PA to document the road. Fortunately, Weller's photographs survive in the form of postcards which Lacock published between 1907-1914 (see above).

The Dingle development then being built around Braddock’s historical path was no doubt one motivator for Lacock and his survey. The president of The Dingle Company, Tasker Gantt Lowndes, was the well-connected son of a recent Maryland governor, and contesting his development was probably difficult.

And why, exactly, was it named ‘The Dingle’? “After a beautiful private estate on the outskirts of Liverpool, England,” said Lowndes in a 1926 letter. “The Dingle lies between two roads (McMullen Highway and Braddock Road), and means a 'Hollow between the Hills' which is very appropriate". When it was first developed it was a gated community that excluded Jews and African Americans.


sources: "Redcoats in the Wilderness: British Officers and Irregular Warfare in Europe and America, 1740 to 1760", Peter Russel, The William and Mary Quarterly > 3rd Ser., Vol. 35, No. 4 (Oct., 1978), pp. 629-652
Who's who in Finance and Banking, By John William Leonard, Who's Who in Finance Inc., 1922
http://www.whilbr.org/itemdetail.aspx?idEntry=535&dtPointer=0
Allegany County, by Albert L. Feldstein, Arcadia Publishing, 2006
Empire of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies, and Tribes in the Seven Years War in America, by Francis Jennings,New York: Norton, 1988.
www.route40.net/ history/ braddock-lacock.shtmlJohn



General+Edward+Braddock the+Dingle Cumberland+MD John+Kennedy+Lacock appalachia Benjamin+Franklin Daniel+Boone appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history

Sara Roberta Getty (1880-1973) served as Woman’s Editor for the Cumberland [MD] Daily News from 1924 to 1942. She wrote four books of poetry, including Little songs of every day, (1924) and Maryland Melodies, (1930), the latter dedicated "to the Queen City of the Alleghenies and her warm hearted people who to me have been a never failing source of encouragement and inspiration."

Photo: from the program of the Cumberland Sesquicentennial in 1937. Sara was among the Board of Directors.

Her husband, Charles, was not overly fond of the idea that Sara worked. Despite this, she continued her career. After her husband's death in 1917, she moved to Wellersburg, PA where she again became a columnist, this time for the Somerset Daily American. Sara continued to work until she was 88 years old, regardless of the fact that she was hit by a car in 1965 and broke her hip.

During this time she raised her two surviving daughters (her twin sons both died within a year of birth) as a single, working mother. She had help from her family, which is why she returned to Pennsylvania.

To Lindbergh

To one with the vision and courage to do
Each task, and admit no defeating;
Adventurous spirit, unconquered, to you
We lift up our glasses in greeting.

Searching new goals in each unchartered place
Your hazardous questing has sent you;
Blazing new trails into infinite space
On wings that the morning has lent you.

Modest, retiring, not seeking for fame,
Yet the world in each triumph is sharing;
History's pages will carry your name,
A viking of courage and daring.

The Cumberland News, 1938


sources: www.whilbr.org/itemdetail.aspx?idEntry=2813&dtPointer=9
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~victagg/47.htm
Davis Anthology of Newspaper Verse for 1938, by Athie Sale Davis, self-published, Oklahoma City, OK


Sara+Roberta+Getty Cumberland+MD appalachian+poetry appalachia appalachian+history appalachian+mountains+history