Charlie Seidel, commercial crabber, 1967
Description: Photo of Charlie Seidel, commercial crabber, 1967, at Middle River, Maryland. Photo from the collection of Melissa Todd, daughter of Charlie Seidel.
Contributor: Melissa Todd
All Aboard For Back River!
(The Baltimore Sun, 7/23/1911)
…’A trip to Back River is worth taking. Once there were two young men standing at Baltimore and Holliday streets watching the crowds board the cars. One of the men was a chap who knew the last names of half the bartenders in town and could tell unhesitatingly where a drink could be had on Sundays. The other was a gentleman, for he never drank too much, and the pleasures of the plain people did not appeal to him.
The pushing, surging throng fighting for a toe hold on the crowded cars interested him. He wanted to know why they shoved each other so and why they were so keen on getting to Back River. He had never been there, so the other suggested that they take a ride and follow the crowd.
“Be a roughneck for once and ride down to Back River,” he suggested. “There’ll be rough stuff there if you want it, but you’ll be safe enough if you’re good.”’
Publisher – Baltimore Sun
Date – 7/23/1911
Footage of the 2004 Baltimore County Waterfront Festival interspersed with interviews conducted by Essex historian and author Jackie Nickel.
10/02/2004
Sun article about a later event:
Festival will highlight the county’s waterfront
Event will help raise money for aviation museum
By Kristi Funderburk (Baltimore Sun, May 12, 2006)
When a dozen seaplanes touch down on Martin’s Lagoon, the festival will begin.
The second Baltimore County Community Waterfront Festival, set for tomorrow in Middle River, includes music, food and crafts – and, naturally, a boat show.
Some of the proceeds from the festival, which is designed to highlight the county’s 175 miles of waterfront, will go to the Glenn L. Martin Maryland Aviation Museum.
Throughout the day, visitors can tour the museum’s new exhibits and get a close look at a small squadron of aircraft.
About 20,000 people are expected to attend, and $40,000 to $45,000 is expected to be raised, said John Markley, deputy director of the county’s Department of Recreation and Parks, which organized the festival.
John Tipton, the aviation museum’s marketing communications director, said money from the event will go toward building an education center for engineering and, later, a larger museum.
“We’re a small museum, a little unknown and out of the way,” he said, “but we want to become a cultural destination point for the community.”
Continue reading at The Baltimore Sun.
Picnic beach. The Pospisils purchased four waterfront lots on Bay Drive in Bowleys Quarters in 1923, clearing trees and opening 200 feet of shoreline to the public as a swimming beach and picnic grounds. Mary Pospisil recalls the family closing up the nightclub late Saturday night, attending 2:30 a.m. Mass at St. Vincent’s church downtown and then transporting food to the Bowleys shore for Sunday business. The family moved there to live in the 1940s. — Jackie Nickel
Mary Pospisil, Jackie Nickel