Ghosts of Our Grandfathers

Recently, I've been very busy at work. Some of this work involves setting up and learning about new computers and new operating systems. Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8 to be specific.

I find myself reduced to having all thumbs as I attempt to find my way around the new "user interface" that Microsoft hopes will "look like" what you see on smart phones.

Doing this work, got me to thinking that if my Grandfather was still around, I would be rewriting the very first program I ever wrote (back in 1977-ish) for him to use with a new computer system, or perhaps even as a smart phone app.

He might have even liked it - each version of computing he lived through made his life easier - since "the program" he used to determine pricing at the foundry got more and more user friendly and reduced his work (and mistakes) with each version.

But it has not been all work and no play for me even if the weather has mostly conspired against weekends with nice weather. On the one nice weather weekend this past month, my Dad and I went to the Golden Age Air Museum in Grimes, Pennsylvania where we saw airplanes of World War One and the Depression Era fly.



I am always amazed by the sight of airplanes such as this, built in 1917, still flying! I took a ton of photos (here).

The weekend after that, the weather was stormy and gloomy but the rain held off for the most part, so I got to the houseboat to unwind from "enjoying" way too much Windows 8.

Some of you may remember the cutest little wharf rat in all the world. Here's Barley making a new friend!


My mother always says, "When it rains, we rest." Here she is resting by reading a book on the houseboat in the dinette.


For my mom's birthday celebration, my dad arranged for a sunset dinner cruise on the Tireless. The Tireless is a restored, all wooden 68 foot long Classic Trumpy motor yacht, built for Roger Firestone in 1963. Roger Firestone was the youngest of five sons of Harvey S Firestone, founder of Firestone Tire. I find it amusing that he would name a boat "Tireless" but it makes perfect sense...it has no tires!


Dinner was super yummy! I didn't eat again for almost a whole day.


While we were cruising, my dad suddenly exclaimed, "I don't believe it! Look over there, there's the Muriel Eileen!"

Built in 1926, the Muriel Eileen is a wooden "Chesapeake Bay Buy boat" typical of many similar boats of that time. It has a mast and boom forward of the hold with the pilothouse aft of the hold with the hull decked over. It is 58 feet long and 18 feet wide

These "buy boats" were used to haul freight, watermelons and oysters in the days when roads in the Chesapeake Bay area were poor. They literally bought oysters from fishermen direct from their boats while they were still out in the bay oystering, hence the name.


When Muriel Eileen's owner started to renovate it, he contacted my father regarding some of the brass fittings that needed replacement due to extensive wear. My grandfather worked up the pricing using "the program" I wrote and he also made the wooden patterns. The circular ring where the rope enters the boat from the wooden pole is made of brass...and was made by my dad and grandfather. I think they are called hawse pipes. They typically run an anchor chain out of a boat (or ship) through such a fitting to protect the woodwork.

This is not the only "old" boat on sailing on the Chesapeake Bay that has bits and pieces my dad and grandfather made.


HMS Sultana was a small Royal Navy schooner that patrolled the American coast from 1768 through 1772, preventing smuggling and collecting duties. She was retired when unrest in Britain's American colonies required larger, better armed patrol craft.

In mid-1999, my father was asked if he might help with a project to build a replica of the Sultana. The ships rudder required straps to mount it around the propeller (an engine is required by the US Coast Guard in order to carry passengers.)

My dad had the straps were made from bronze and supplied them. A couple years later, he was called and invited to the ship's launching. The replica of HMS Sultana was launched in Chestertown on March 28, 2001.


As launched, the straps were painted white. Today, they are painted black (as in the first photograph.)

For those of you with sharp eyes, I am in the front row and the third person standing to the right of the street lamp (next to the guy with a yellow vest).

Labor Day weekend proved dreary and gloomy, so I decided to take a road trip away from the houseboat. In the small town of Sudlersville, I found the local train station. The tracks went from Wilmington, Delaware through Massey (of the grass airfield fame) to Queenstown, Maryland.


I tried to find out more about the feed mill/elevator in the background, but couldn't find its owner.

I then went to Ridgely, Maryland and visited its train station, now a museum.

This station was on the line from the sleepy bay side town of Oxford, Maryland to Clayton, Delaware where it connected to the line that ran to Wilmington and Philadelphia.

From 1871 to 1920 or so, a daily steam train took freshly caught and canned oysters from Oxford to Philadelphia, stopping at this station to pick up rail car loads of Strawberries. Ridgely was the Strawberry Capital of America back in the day. Did some of those strawberries and oysters get eaten by my great-grandparents?

Did the place "next door" to my great-great-great-great-grandfather sell "Oxford, Maryland" oysters (see previous post)?

Maybe - just maybe. :)