January, 2010

Baltimore City — 1 Comment
14
Jan 10

Capitol Limited

This is the observation car from the Capitol limited, one of the more popular trains of the B&O railroad, which ran on the line from DC to Chicago.  

I thought this was a neat post since, throughout the last two years, we’ve taken pictures of many of the stations along the MD portion of this line, and in fact yesterday’s picture of the bridge to Harper’s ferry would be the last place this train would pass in MD.     Here are some of the other places along the line that we’ve stopped:

Silver Spring (where it first enters MD)

Kensignton (next stop down the line)

Dickerson (mid-way)

Harper’s Ferry Tunnel

Though, largely just a namesake, Amtrak still operates a train called the Capitol Limited between DC and Chicago.

Frederick County — No Comments
13
Jan 10

Insulator Posts

This outrigging belongs to the previously pictured railroad bridge between Harper’s Ferry and MD.  I am a fan of the picutre becasue it shows the masss of wires that used to be needed for communication across the river at key points.  I’m also interested becasue there are no more insulators on that post.   Typically those little posts would all have a glass insulator sitting on top of them.  The wires would then wrap around the insulator, preventing their contact with each other and with the support structure.    You see a lot of these insulators for sale in antique shops and other places.   So when I see this I have to wonder if some collector made his way out there to pluck the insulators off of each of those posts so that they could earn themselves a dollar or two a piece.

Howard County — 1 Comment
12
Jan 10

Rocks and Running Backs

I thought the patterns in this pile of rocks would make a good picture.  These are actually part of a retaining wall in Centennial Park in Howard county.   Originally I wanted to do another post today about Howard County.  I wanted to have a picture related to their declaration last week in praise of Willis McGahee.   The county executive had announced that last Friday was dedicated to the Raven’s running back and that in Howard County it would be referred to as  “McGahee Dayhee.”   Of course, there was no physical evidence left of this declaration and that made it very hard to photograph.  So I just thought I’d celebrate (though a few days late) with any sort of Ho Co picture and I’ll leave it up to you if you can find a clever metaphor between this picture and football.

Montgomery County — No Comments
11
Jan 10

Japanese Pagoda

This is the seminary building commonly referred to as the “Japanese Pagoda”  like all of the free standing architecturally varied houses at the seminary, this building housed one of the sororities of the school.   This building was one of the first to be refurbished and was in fact repaired largely by a team of volunters prior to the current effort by developers to refurbish the seminary into condos and apartments.

Prince Georges — No Comments
8
Jan 10

Bowie State Bulldogs

When I was at the wildlife refuge last weekend,  I thought I should take advantage of being near Bowie and get some photos of places I’ve been meaning to visit.  One of those was Bowie State. (the other was the Bowie railroad museum, which had closed by the time I got there, so look for that one sometime in the future)

I really liked the view of the sky and the sign that this picture offered, though it says little about the college itself. 

Bowie State is actually the oldest of the historically black colleges in Maryland, though it was founded in Baltimore.  The school, like many in the mid 1800′s went through a few changes in names as well as in focus, becoming a teaching school through the mid 20th century, when it began to rapidly change curriculm and to become the larger university that it is today.

Uncategorized — No Comments
7
Jan 10

Snowy Railroad Crossing

It’s hard for me to resist the opportunity to post a railroad related picture.  This crossing was the first thing I pictured on my snowy photo hunt.    A train had crossed just two minutes prior, but already the silver top of the tracks had been covered with a new layer of snow.

Montgomery County — 2 Comments
6
Jan 10

Windmill in the Snow

During our big snow storm I ventured out for an hour or so armed with my film camera to see what I could find.  You probably could have guessed this, but my first thought was to head to the seminary.    I just got scans of the film I used there so it’s time to share.    

 You can tell that it’s still snowing in this picture.  To take it, I actually ended up holding an umbrella in one hand and the camera in the other hand.   I was limited in where I could take a picture because the snow covered all of the walkways, which made the hilly seminary a bit tough to navigate. 

  You might remember this picture of the seminary’s windmill from last week.  The building, like many of the others there,  looks better in the snow.  One goiung there for the first time might not have even been able to tell what was abandoned and what wasn’t.   The snow covered many wounds.

Prince Georges — 7 Comments
5
Jan 10

Welcome to the UPDATED LOOK of Maryland Daily Photo

You’ve probably noticed that the site looks different today.  MDP has taken on a new look for the new year.   We’ve moved all the archives and categories to the right side, allowing larger pictures to fit in the page. 

You can see that yesterdays picture below has been re-posted in the new larger format, and today’s picture is also posted in the new format.  

We’ve also changed the color to a refreshing white. 

What might interest many of you is that there are new anti spam procedures in place so that the majority of the site’s grammar errors will be in the body of the posts as opposed to being in the comments from odd spammers. 

In the upgrade, we’ve temporarily lost the ability to show the comments and posts all on the front page.  However, you can click on the underlined “comment”  link below to read the comments and to leave one of your own.

About today’s picture:

Today’s picture is also from the National Wildlife Refuge.  This picture looks out over Cash Lake, (I don’t have to tell you that it’s not a natural lake as we know that there are none in MD)  which is one of the more scenic and more visited areas of the refuge.  During this time of year half of the trails around the lake are shut down to prevent people from interfering with the migration of birds to the lake.   I was armed with a zoom lens to help overcome this problem, but I wasn’t armed with the right clothing to be out there for too long.  In the Spring, MDP will be back to see the rest of the lake.

Prince Georges — 5 Comments
4
Jan 10

National Wildlife Refuge

If you’ve ever travelled down the B-W parkway or looked at map of what’s between Baltimore and Washington, you may have noticed the National Wildlife Refuge.  The refuge is one of five within the state of Maryland.  However, it’s unique as one of the largest forested areas in the region.  It offers protection to a number of different species of wildlife that are native to the area, but it also serves as a location for the fish and wildlife service to bring threatened species from other parts of the country to see if they will thrive.  The Patuxent site is also the only wildlife refuge dedicated to wildlife research in addition to it’s natural role as conservator.

Today’s picture looks out on of the many lakes on the grounds.  On Saturday, when MDP travelled to the refuge, the weather was so inhospitable that I didn’t get to venture far enough on any trails to picture any good wildlife.   What you see here is the refuge’s “Bayscape,” a demonstration of the program encouraging residents to landscape their homes with native plants and species.

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